Thomas and Forrest were instrumental in moving Thomas to Arkansas. He had two horses in Texas and they loaded the horses into a 48 Studebaker for the long drive. Surprisingly, both horses survived the trip in good health, though they found that the Arkansas grass lacked the nutrients of the sparse grass from West Texas and the horses needed a regular supply of oats. It was only after the two horses had been successfully relocated that Thomas Stinson and Forrest went with their father and signed the mortgage papers.

Thomas used the horses for plowing a portion of the land. He later purchased a mule and tried to hook him up to the team, replacing one of the aging horses. The mule was unbroken to the yoke and nearly dragged the accompanying horse to injury, but Thomas managed to plow the field. He sold the mule to another farmer who ran into similar difficulties when he tried to put the mule under the yoke. "I thought you told me that mule was broken," complained the farmer. "No'" Thomas replied, "I said that we plowed with him."

Though the land had been purchased, a hefty mortgage remained on the property and Jesse took it upon himself to send regular payments to his father for the mortgage. A number of years passed and then he found that his father had been using those funds for other needs while the mortgage went unpaid. Rather than allow a foreclosure to take place, Jesse made the payments himself and put the farm into his own name so that it would not be lost.

There were five natural springs on the property, each with a different mineral content. Thomas bottled the water and sold it to the hospital. The spring that was closest to the house supplied the springhouse at the bottom of the hill on which the cabin stood. Water flowed from the springhouse and down into a pond that had been fashioned in the past by a rock mason.

The farmhouse was a dilapidated old log cabin that was over a hundred years old. It had belonged to a hanging judge but had long since been abandoned. Thomas was able to identify each type of tree making up the various logs of the cabin. This was not too difficult since all of the outer logs still retained their bark.

The house originally had one long room and an adjoining kitchen. A second room was later added, though not with the same sort of wood, so that the addition was obviously an afterthought.

Flying squirrels took up residence in the attic and hornets occasionally had to be flushed out of the stove pipe by the front door.

The house was abandoned in the early 1970's when Thomas became too ill to live alone. It was burned down in the 1980's, though it is unknown who started the fire.