The Murfreesboro Hardware origins started in Prescott, AR as the Prescott Hardware in the late 1800’s. Prescott, AR was a prosperous town. They had their own telephone system and a power and light plant. The Ozan Lumber Company and the Prescott & Northwestern Railroad were major companies that helped Prescott grow. In this growth period, the Pittman family started a chain of retail hardware stores called Prescott Hardware Co. in 1890. John M. Pittman and his sons, Dan and Chas. F., had expanded their stores in southwest Arkansas. One of the expansion stores was in Murfreesboro due to the recent growth of the diamond mine in 1906 found by Diamond John Huddleston. A local resident, H.M. Ross, built a building to house the expansion store on the road to the diamond fields.

The Prescott Hardware opened in Murfreesboro in the spring of 1910. They bought a Victor safe to use. The safe was originally locked. The Pittmans wrote a letter to the safe company to get the combination. The original store had places to tie horses to on the front. A tin awning was added later to the front of the building. A fruit tree was growing in the street in front of the original store before pavement.

As WW I was in the news, the Pittmans decided to sell the Murfreesboro store to Tom Terrell. Tom managed the store for a short time period and decided he wanted to do other things. He asked his brothers, A.P. Terrell and Frank Terrell, to take over the store. A.P. Terrell had a clothing store in downtown Murfreesboro that burnt. The new partnership started in 1917. They competed with Sears and Roebuck. Some customers would use Sears to get concessions. One story involved a customer wanting to match a Sears price on a product. A.P. matched the price and would not let the customer have the product for a week. That was the time period it would take for the customer to have Sears ship the product to them.

The store had in store credit that was recorded in ledgers. Customers were allowed to charge products and pay out the expense. Companies like Arkansas Diamond Company, Arkansas Peach growers and Arkahoma Orchard Company told the stories of Pike and Howard counties in the ‘20’s and ‘30’s as diamond and peach growing were major industries.

The store survived through the end of the first World War into the prosperous 20's through the Great Depression of the 30's and into the second World War. After the war A.P.’s wife agreed to sell the store to her son, Robert Terrell, in 1949. Robert and Louella Terrell continued to successfully grow the store with a $500 initial funding. Robert was in the Army Air Force in WW II, serving as an airplane mechanic. He played tennis at Arkansas Tech and at the University of Arkansas before Pearl Harbor. Robert built a new store beside the original in 1963. He added warehouses as needed.

The store continued to manage in-house credit, selling cookware, sporting goods, fishing items, appliances, housewares, furniture and hardware and building material. Before Walmart, items were sold with the intention of using them a long time. Items like fishing reels and bicycles had parts to fix to reuse them. Walmart stopped this practice with products being cheaper and made worse to get a cheap price point. The store offered credit to members of the colored community in the ’70’s. The old hand written ledgers gave way to hand written tickets stored in spring loaded metal containers. Computers came in the ’90’s to end all the handwritten tickets.

Robert’s death in 1996 left the store in Luella’s hands. She had three sons that helped her. Ray, Phil and Lance all contributed. Louella agreed to buy out a local competitor called Carroll Building Material in the late 2000’s. Ray and Lance left to start a store in nearby Nashville in the early 2000’s. Phil and Louella worked together until Louella lost her vision. Phil manages the store alone now. The store has survived the Korean War in the ’50’s, Vietnam in the ’60’s and the growth in the ’70’s and ’80’s. Homes were built in additions in great numbers by builders like Harry Stanford, Watson Harris, Joe Ledbetter and Bill Flaherty. The store has served southwest Arkansas on the same spot from 1910 to the present day, counting for 113 years.