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Please check out the link below to see the latest news about Historic
Dyess Colony: Boyhood Home of Johnny Cash. Also, please remember to
view the Johnny Cash Music Festival website periodically to get
project updates and info about this year's festival!
http://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2012/feb/07/cashs-80th-birthday-legacy-be-celebrated
http://www.johnnycashmusicfest.com
The finale of the August 4, 2011, Johnny Cash Music Festival
(photos courtesy of Michael Johnshon & John B. Zibluk)
 On Thursday, Aug. 4, Arkansas State University’s Convocation Center was the scene of a sold-out concert—the first-ever Johnny Cash Music Festival. More than 7,000 tickets were sold, yielding $310,000, with every penny earmarked for the restoration of Johnny Cash’s boyhood home in Dyess, Arkansas. Fans young and old, urban and rural, from places as close as Bono and as far away as Norway, crowded the Convocation Center to witness a behemoth concert of Cash family and friends, what Johnny Cash himself might have called “kith and kin,” who had gathered in tribute to the man himself and his musical legacy and to contribute to the restoration of the New Deal-era frame house that housed Cash and his six siblings.
The multi-artist show was produced by Bill Carter, a native of Rector, Arkansas, and an alumnus of ASU.
The set was stark yet impressive, featuring a triptych of screens that featured an evolving montage of
black-and-white Cash family photos, interspersed with clips of Johnny Cash performing many of his hits.
The Dyess Colony was established in 1934 as one of the nation's first agricultural resettlement community under the Works Progress Administration and the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. The colony was named after Mississippi County native and Arkansas's first WPA administrator, Williams Reynolds Dyess. The federal government acquired 16,000 acres of land in Mississippi County and laid out the colony in a wagon-wheel design, with a Town Center at the hub and farmsteads for 500 colonists stretching out from the middle. The colony's centerpiece was a large Greek-Revival Administration Building dedicated by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in 1936. Colonists recruited to take part in this cooperative experiment included the Ray and Carrie Cash family. They moved from Kingsland, Arkansas, in 1936 with their children, including 3-year-old J.R. Cash (later known as Johnny Cash). The country music legend grew up in Dyess, graduating from Dyess High School in 1950. His experiences there influenced much of his music and career.
In 2007, the City of Dyess acquired the Dyess Colony Administration Building and adjacent Theater/Community Center shell. The City of Dyess planned to restore the Administration Building and use one side as municipal offices and the other side as a museum/memorial to favorite son, Johnny Cash. After extensive fundraising efforts, the City of Dyess (population 515) was able to come up with enough money to replace the roof of the Administration Building, thereby assisting somewhat in stabilizing the structure.
In an effort to save these important structures and tell the story of the Dyess Colony and the Johnny Cash family, a bill was passed in the 2009 legislative session directing ASU to determine the feasibility of making this site part of the Arkansas Heritage Sites program. As part of this mandate, a community master plan has been completed. ASU recently received a grant to restore the exterior of the Administration Building and to stabilize the Theater/Community Center shell.
Working with the community, Arkansas Heritage Sites' goal is to make "Historic Dyess Colony: Boyhood Home of Johnny Cash" an international tourism destination. Already, even though there is nothing open to the public and no interpretation, tourists are coming to this town in great numbers. Bus tours in the past year have included groups from places such as Ireland and Finland.
With enough support and resources,"Historic Dyess Colony: Boyhood Home of Johnny Cash" will become a heritage site that represents the Dyess Colony Town Center and the Johnny Cash boyhood home during the years 1935-1950, the period when Cash resided there.
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