1. In 1908, the state of Arkansas made it illegal for “colored” and “white” people to play checkers or dominoes together in public. The law was finally repealed in 1969.

2. On June 30, 1944, the town of Jerome, Arkansas, officially closed its Japanese internment camp, which housed over 8,000 Japanese-American residents during World War II. Many of the detainees were forced to sell their businesses and possessions before being sent to the camp.

3. In 1953, the Arkansas Gazette published a series of articles exposing the fraud and corruption of Arkansas Governor Francis Cherry’s administration. The scandal led to Cherry’s impeachment and the election of a reformist governor, Orval Faubus.

4. On June 30, 1984, the School District of Pulaski County Special School District became the first school district in Arkansas to be desegregated by federal court order.

5. In 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs in the case of Obergefell v. Hodges, effectively legalizing same-sex marriage in Arkansas and other states that previously banned it. The ruling was celebrated by LGBT activists and supporters across the state.