About Manila

Founded in 1852, Manila was first named Big Lake Island, with the name changed to Manila in 1901 when the community incorporated. The choice was to honor the U.S. naval victory at Manila Bay in the Philippines during the Spanish-American War. Downtown streets are named for battleships that participated in the Battle of Manila. Fitting of its military connections, one of Manila’s main attractions is the Herman Davis Memorial State Park, which honors the state’s most decorated World War I hero. Among its distinctions, Manila also formed the first Boy Scout troop in Arkansas in 1911.

The town is one of the highest, driest spots in an area that once was part of the “Great Swamp,” created through upheavals during the New Madrid Earthquakes of 1811-12. Along with four other towns, it is situated on Buffalo Island, so named because Little River and Big Lake separate them from the remainder of Mississippi County. Manila also is on the Sunken Lands Loop of the Great River Road National Scenic Byway and is 35 miles east of Jonesboro.

Since its earliest days, the area was known for its abundance of wild game and fish. Big Lake, four miles from Manila, is a popular hunting and fishing spot. At one time, the railroads shipped fur, fish and game to markets outside the state. The wild duck market on Big Lake began around 1890 and lasted until President Woodrow Wilson named it a Federal Game Reserve in 1915.

Manila’s history as a fish and fur-trading area, an agricultural community and a railroad town is preserved at the Manila Depot Museum and the Main Street Historic Museum. The depot itself, a 1910 wood frame structure that served the Jonesboro, Lake City & Eastern Railroad, is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.