Historic Dyess Colony: Johnny Cash Boyhood Home | Dyess, AR (2024)

Ray Cash brought his family to Dyess in1935 after President Franklin Roosevelt's administration carved anagricultural resettlement colony out of snake-infested swampland in MississippiCounty. Dyess Colony was an unprecedented government social experimentas part of the New Deal to give nearly 500 down-on-their-luck farmers a chancefor a new start in life. With no money down, the Cash family wasgiven 20 acres of fertile bottomland and a five-room house in which tolive. Now owned by Arkansas State University, the house has been restored,along with several of the historic federal buildings.

The Dyess ColonyVisitors Center, located in the Colony Circle at the former site of the theatreand pop shop, is the first stop. It includes a gift shop, orientation video,and exhibits. The Dyess Colony Administration Building next door housesexhibits related to the establishment of the colony, lifestyles of typicalcolonists, and the impact that growing up in Dyess had on Johnny Cash and hismusic. From the Colony Circle, visitors are shuttled to the Johnny Cash BoyhoodHome, less than two miles from the Colony Center. It is furnished as itappeared when the Cash family lived there, based on the memories ofJohnny's two youngest siblings who assisted in the restoration.

Comevisit the childhood home of American music icon Johnny Cash and see therestoration efforts that have preserved the story of the nation's largestfarming resettlement community.

The Historic Dyess Colony: Johnny Cash Boyhood Home is a stop along the Sunken Lands Cultural Roadway, as well as an official loop off the 10-state Great River Road National Scenic Byway. A building in the Colony Circle and the gravel road leading to the Cash home were settings for the movie, Walk the Line.

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110 Center Drive,

Dyess, AR 72330

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