Booger Hollow

Overview

A roadside town of seven and a coon dog

Booger Hollow was never a town in the usual sense. It was the Booger Hollow Trading Post, a roadside stop that opened in 1961 on a ridgetop of the Boston Mountains along Arkansas Highway 7, the Scenic 7 Byway north of Dover. Its sign gave the population as seven, "countin' one coon dog." Signs counted down the miles from about ten out in each direction. Families on their way to Dogpatch USA stopped for corncob pipes, tumbled rocks, honey and sorghum, and for a ham sandwich or a boogerburger at the Chuckwagon next door. The two-story outhouse out back, its upstairs closed "until we git the plummin' figgered out," was the photo everyone took.

Traffic on Scenic 7 thinned in the 1990s as US 65 was improved and Dogpatch closed. In 2004 owner Charlotte Johnson sold the place, and it never reopened for good. Two blog accounts say the buyers didn't make the payments and that ownership of the land became tangled. A fence went up across the front by 2012. In May 2026 a photographer found the lot overgrown, some buildings gone, the outhouse among them, and the rest fenced off and decaying. Legends of America calls it a "ghost attraction." Wikipedia lists it among Arkansas's ghost towns.

The name came from somewhere else. The real Booger Hollow is a narrow valley about 11 miles to the south-southwest, where Highway 164 runs west from Highway 7 toward Bullfrog Valley. Local stories called it haunted long before the trading post borrowed its name.

Timeline

From roadside stop to ruin

1. 1800sLocals call a narrow hollow northwest of Dover "Booger Hollow" and say it is haunted. The stories differ on why: two cemeteries, one at each side of the hollow, or a headless horseman (both below).
2. 1932–1934The USGS Treat sheets show a few buildings along Highway 7 on the ridge where the trading post will stand, and name the spot Simpson.
3. 1961The Booger Hollow Trading Post opens on the ridgetop, about ten miles from the real hollow. It takes the name anyway.
4. March 1970Rural Arkansas magazine runs a short piece on the community of Booger Hollow and its name, as Kat Robinson later quoted it.
5. 1960s–1990sRed-and-white signs count down the miles along Highway 7. The store sells hillbilly souvenirs, honey, sorghum and lye soap; the Chuckwagon next door sells ham sandwiches and the "boogerburger." A two-story outhouse becomes the photo stop.
6. 1991–1992During Bill Clinton's presidential run, national news crews come to the trading post to ask working Arkansans what they think.
7. Mid-1990sFaster roads on US 65 draw traffic away from Scenic 7, and Dogpatch USA to the north closes.
8. 2004Owner Charlotte Johnson sells. The buyers, a couple from Green Forest, never reopen the store for good; two blog accounts say they didn't make the payments. There are a couple of attempts to reopen.
9. Oct 2007Kat Robinson finds the buildings standing empty, a window broken, a burned-out building out back and the outhouse still upright.
10. Sept 2011A blogger finds blackberry canes growing through the porch and the outhouse being swallowed by trees and weeds.
11. By 2012A fence goes up across the front of the property.
12. Apr 2022A photographer finds the outhouse collapsed into rubble and the remaining buildings fenced off.
13. May 2026The same photographer reports the parking lot overgrown, some buildings gone and the rest fenced off and decaying.

Accounts of the closing differ in the details. Kat Robinson wrote in October 2007 that the store had been officially shut for three years, and in 2010 that it had been closed most of a year when she went back in 2007. A 2011 blog post says the doors had been shut since late 2004. Legends of America and Wikipedia give 2004.

Legend and record

Where the name comes from

USGS records a valley named Booger Hollow in Pope County, about 11 miles south-southwest of the trading post and west of Highway 7. A cemetery listing posted to the USGenWeb Archives in 2009 puts Booger Hollow Cemetery, also called Howard Cemetery, 5.5 miles north of Dover on Highway 7 and 0.7 mile west on Highway 164. The hollow, it says, lies just west of the cemetery, and Highway 164 runs through it on the way to Bullfrog Valley. It is so narrow that the sun reaches the ground for only about an hour at noon outside midsummer.

Kat Robinson writes that the community there really is named Booger Hollow, and Wikipedia speaks of "the community of Booger Hollow." We found no account of how many people lived there or whether anyone still does, so we don't describe a settlement. Nothing from the trading post is there.

The name rests on ghost stories, and the stories don't agree. Treat them as legend.

Legends of America, Wikipedia and a 2011 blog say the road through the hollow ran between two cemeteries in the 1800s, and people believed the dead haunted it. A 1970 Rural Arkansas piece, as Kat Robinson quotes it, says the community sat right between two cemeteries and you'd do well to bring a friend at night. The cemetery listing tells a different story, credited to C. L. Boyd: a murdered man rode the hollow headless on moonlit nights, between the old well where his head was thrown and the cemetery where his body lay. In this sense "booger" is a variant of bogeyman, Wikipedia notes.

What's left

What you'll see from the road

The newest report is a May 4, 2026, post by photographer Brian Cormack, who stopped on a foggy drive up Highway 7. He found the parking lot filled with weeds and the buildings in various stages of decay. Some buildings are gone, the two-story outhouse among them, and the rest are fenced off. His photo from April 29, 2022, already showed the outhouse collapsed into a pile of rubble.

Earlier visitors saw more. In October 2007 Kat Robinson found the red buildings with white trim standing empty, the store's shelves bare, a broken window, the Chuckwagon's coolers still inside and the remains of a burned building behind it, with one wall standing. In 2011 blackberry canes were growing through the porch. Those visits came before the fence. Kat Robinson writes that the fence went up by 2012 "to discourage others from doing what I did that day," and in spring 2015 she stopped only briefly by it.

Today the site is somewhere to look at from the highway, not to walk around. We found no public parking there. AR 7 is a winding mountain highway, so don't stop in a traffic lane.

The USGS sheets in the historic maps below show the ridge before the trading post. On the 1934 Treat sheet a few buildings line Highway 7, and the name Simpson sits just to the southwest with a benchmark of 1,863 ft. The 1956 Russellville sheet marks Simpson on Highway 7, with Freeman Springs and a lookout tower to the north and Moccasin Gap to the south. The 1983 Fly Gap Mountain sheet still names the spot Simpson, beside a clearing on the highway.

• Trading post buildings, fenced and decaying (May 2026)
• Overgrown parking lot (May 2026)
• Double-decker outhouse: collapsed by April 2022, gone by May 2026
• Burned outbuilding behind the Chuckwagon, one wall standing (October 2007)

Historic maps

Booger Hollow on USGS maps, 1934–1983

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

19341:62,50019561:250,00019831:100,000

Map & directions

Getting there

Russellville is the closest city with full services. Both routes follow Highway 7 north through Dover and then up into the Boston Mountains to the site. From Little Rock, take I-40 west to Russellville first.

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

Photos

Booger Hollow in photos

The closed Booger Hollow Trading Post, September 28, 2006The double-decker outhouse, August 1, 2007

Visitor reports

Been to Booger Hollow?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

Thanks. Your report reached us, and we'll read it before it goes on the page.

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Nearby

Other sites near Booger Hollow

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our Arkansas index.

• Racket Ridge23.8 mi E · Van Buren
• Weathers35.1 mi NW · Madison
• Lewisburg37.4 mi SE · Conway
• Bruno40.0 mi NE · Marion
• Harness40.1 mi NE · Stone
• Eros41.1 mi N · Marion
• Rush45.2 mi NE · Marion
• Cadron Settlement45.5 mi SE · Faulkner

Sources

Sources and credits

1. Wikipedia, "Booger Hollow, Arkansas", retrieved October 2026: the 1961 opening, the population sign, the goods and the Chuckwagon menu, the attraction twelve miles from the community on a Boston Mountains ridgetop, the two-cemetery story, the 2004 sale, the outhouse sign, the ghost town category, coordinates. Its caption dates the storefront photo to August 2007; the photo's own metadata says September 28, 2006.
2. Kathy Alexander, Legends of America, "Booger Hollow and the Double-Decker Outhouse", updated March 2026: "ghost attraction," the hollow about ten miles south, the countdown signs, the post office and ham store, the 2004 sale, Scenic 7 north of Dover.
3. Kat Robinson, Tie Dye Travels, "Ghosts of Booger Hollow", posted October 19, 2007, with a postscript of August 25, 2017: the 1970 Rural Arkansas piece, the 1991–92 news crews, US 65 and the decline of Scenic 7, Charlotte Johnson's 2004 sale to a Green Forest couple, the attempts to reopen, the October 2007 visit, the fence by 2012, the spring 2015 stop.
4. Kat Robinson, Tie Dye Travels, "Scenic Seven Survives", posted October 26, 2010: the July 2010 visit and her later account of how long the store had been closed in 2007.
5. One Dusty Track, "Booger Hollow & The Double-Decker Outhouse", posted September 11, 2011: the missed payments, closed since late 2004, the porch and outhouse overgrown.
6. Michael Schwarz, Abandoned Arkansas, "Booger Hollow", posted July 21, 2015: closed in 2004 and shuttered since.
7. Brian Cormack, "Booger Hollow," Flickr, taken April 29, 2022: the outhouse collapsed into rubble, the remaining buildings fenced off (caption read; photo not licensed for reuse).
8. Brian Cormack, Cormackphotos, "Booger Hollow", posted May 4, 2026: the overgrown lot, buildings in decay, some gone including the outhouse, the rest fenced off. Our newest dated status report.
9. USGenWeb Archives, "Booger Hollow Cemetery, Pope County, AR", submitted January 3, 2009 by Lina Boyd, archived copy of September 4, 2025: the cemetery (also Howard Cemetery) and its directions, the hollow on Highway 164, the headless horseman story by C. L. Boyd.
10. USGS Geographic Names Information System, via The National Map geonames service, read October 2026: Booger Hollow, Pope County, a valley (feature 46830); Simpson, Pope County, a populated place (feature 73583).
11. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026. Not field-checked.

Photo and map credits

• The closed Booger Hollow Trading Post, September 28, 2006: Some_Person, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.5
• The double-decker outhouse, August 1, 2007: Some_Person, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.5
• Topo map, area base map and aerial imagery: USGS The National Map (public domain).
• Historic maps: USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection (public domain): Treat 1934, 1:62,500; Russellville 1956, 1:250,000; Fly Gap Mountain 1983, 1:100,000.