Little Rock's most riveting historic attraction is the site of the 1957 desegregation crisis that changed the country forever. This was where a group of African American students known as the Little Rock Nine were first denied entry to the then all-white high school despite a unanimous 1954 Supreme Court ruling forcing the integration of public schools. Images of the students being escorted to class by national guard soldiers remain some of the most iconic records of the Civil Rights movement.
There's an on-site National Parks museum that offers some interpretive displays on the Little Rock Nine incident. Sadly, following the desegregation of Little Rock's public schools, white students packed into private 'segregation academies.'