Bill Clinton was born in a place called Hope. But he was not born in the place called “Birthplace Home.”
| President | Bill Clinton |
| Location | Hope, AR |
| Operated By | National Historic Site: National Parks Service Actual Birthplace: Brazzel Oakrest Funeral Home |
| When Visited | December 16, 2018 |
| Who With | Solo visit |
| Presidential Significance | Home where Bill Clinton lived as a child, and Bill Clinton’s birthplace. |
| Pre-Visit Reading | Clearly nothing about where Bill Clinton was actually born. |
Sometimes I do a good bit of reading and research to prepare for a visit to a Presidential history site. Other times, I dazzle (irritate) tour guides and fellow tourists with random bits of Presidential knowledge I’ve acquired over the years. And sometimes I say dumb things that show I really don’t know what I’m talking about. Part of this visit falls into that third category.
The William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home National Historic Site was a bonus stop tacked onto the end of a December 2018 Presidential history road trip through east Texas. It was actually my third visit to a Bill Clinton site in Arkansas that year, which is maybe why I went really light on the preparation on this one.
The site is Bill Clinton’s grandparents’ home, where he lived up until age four. In 1994, during Clinton’s first term, it was designated as a National Historic Site. It was administered by and tours were offered by a private foundation for several years, before the site was turned over to the National Park Service in late 2010.
When I arrived at the visitor’s center (another house on the same block), it looked like I might get a solo tour as I was the only visitor. I spent a few minutes looking at the handful of exhibits on display. Right before tour time, another solo visitor showed up.
One our way over to the house, the park ranger asked where we were from.
“Florida,” replied the other visitor.
“Me too,” I responded. This was not particularly notable since Florida is a big state and lots of people live there.
“I’m from Pensacola” he offered.
“Me too.” OK, this was a bit more interesting.
“Oh really? Which city do you live in?”
“Um…Pensacola?” Did we not just establish this?
“I live in Navarre!”
OK, so I once lived in the Chicago suburbs, but when I tell people where I used to live, sometimes I just say Chicago. That works when you’re talking about a major city. Pensacola is not a major city. And Navarre is not part of or even adjacent to Pensacola. It’s like 45 minutes away. But whatever. I get it. You really get a feeling for how little people know about Florida geography when you live on the panhandle and try to tell strangers where in Florida you live. I usually count it as a win if the person I’m talking to doesn’t think I live near Miami. Living in a smaller town like Navarre, this guy probably had it worse. I conceded that we were basically neighbors.
But I digress…
The first stop in the home was the living room. The park ranger gave us a little bit of background about the family and the home. This is where Bill Clinton (originally William Jefferson Blythe III) lived with his mother and grandparents. His father, William Jefferson Blythe Jr., was killed in a car accident three months before Clinton was born. The best part in this room were the picture and trophy from when young Bill Clinton competed in a beautiful baby pageant.
As we were wrapping up in the living room, a lady showed up at the front door. Another solo tourist, she explained had shown up just after the tour started and the park ranger at the visitor center said she could come over and join us. I, of course, asked where she lived and then solemnly informed her that I was sorry, but this tour was only for people from Northwest Florida. She looked at me strangely at first, but then laughed politely when I explained the context for my lame joke.
From the living room, we went on to tour the rest of the house, including the kitchen, which was late addition onto what used to be the exterior of the house.
Then, we headed to Bill Clinton’s mother’s room. The park ranger explained how her parents had actually given her the master bedroom so she could have more space, while they shared a smaller room.
It was in Clinton’s mother’s room where I made my blunder.
“So is this the room where Bill Clinton was born?”
The park ranger paused a moment and I could see him consciously trying to not let his facial expressions betray how stupid he thought that question was. He explained that no, Bill Clinton was born in a hospital.
OK, so this was a dumb question and even as an amateur Presidential historian, I should have known better. But, while I get that Bill Clinton was born in the 1940s and hospital births were common by then, Hope wasn’t a very populated place even in 2018, so I imagined that it was probably even more rural in 1946. I still maintain that wasn’t crazy to think that a home birth was within the realm of possibilities here. And, um, hello, THE SITE HAD THE WORD BIRTHPLACE IN ITS NAME.
“So you guys are lying, then?” I challenged the park ranger.
“What do you mean?”
“You call yourselves Birthplace, but this isn’t the birthplace. Just what exactly are you trying to pull here?” (This was sarcastic. Mostly.)
“We call ourselves birthplace because it’s in the town that is Bill Clinton’s birthplace and this is the home where he first lived.”
I really did like the tour guide so I didn’t give him too much crap here. Just enough to try to save some face myself.
After this the tour continued. One of my favorite rooms was Clinton’s childhood bedroom, decked out in a cowboy theme complete with a Hopalong Cassidy bedspread.
After the tour wrapped up, I chatted with the tour guide for a few minutes. During the tour he had mentioned how he had been there when Bill Clinton himself had visited the site in 2011 for its official dedication as an NPS site, so I asked more abut this. He talked about how friendly, engaged, and intelligent Clinton had seemed as he toured the house and shared memories of living there. I then shared with him about the time I myself “met” Bill Clinton, i.e. the time I essentially dove over two layers of people shake his hand for roughly 0.5 seconds. This occurred following a 2016 campaign event where he was speaking as a surrogate for Hillary Clinton (the part of Florida where I live is too “red” for Democratic candidates to actually visit themselves).
After I departed the site, I of course had to get to the bottom of this birthplace matter. The park ranger had mentioned the hospital where Clinton was actually born had been about a mile down the road, but was no longer there. In one of those “what did people do before smart phones?” moments, I was able to quickly identify the exact location and get Siri to give me directions. Oddly enough, despite my usual overplanning, this was not even the first time that calendar year I had found myself driving around Arkansas, my trusty iPhone guiding me to a random Bill Clinton site for an impromptu visit (my adventures in Hot Springs are a post for another day).
So here’s the deal about Bill Clinton’s real birthplace. He was born at Julia Chester Hospital in Hope, AR, which was indeed about a mile from his “Birthplace Home.” The hospital closed in 1955 and is no longer there. But do you know what is currently standing on the spot where Bill Clinton was born? A funeral home. Isn’t it ironic? Don’t you think?
At first I felt a little strange getting out of my car and snapping a bunch of pics of a funeral home, but then I realized that I was definitely not the first person to do this, nor would I be the last. There was a historic marker right in front of the funeral home which I of course needed a picture of, so it was fortunate that there were no services going on for my casual tourist self to detract from.
And that’s that! I visited both Bill Clinton’s birthplace, and the place where he lived as a young child, and only had to visit twice the number of locations that I had planned to in order to accomplish this.