Entries - Entry Category: Architecture

Saenger Theatre

The Saenger Theatre, which opened in Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) on November 17, 1924, was called “The Showplace of the South” and made Pine Bluff an entertainment center for people in southeast Arkansas. It was one of over 300 such theaters the Saenger brothers built in the South during the 1920s, of which fewer than 100 remain. The Saenger Theatre is now owned and operated by a local non-profit agency, Old Towne Centre Theatres, Inc. It is located across the street from the Community Theatre on West 2nd Avenue. O. C. Hauber owned an old store building that he converted into the Hauber Theatre in 1912. It changed hands twice and became the Saenger. It later burned due to a …

Saline County Courthouse

The Saline County Courthouse, located at 200 North Main Street, is in the historic commercial district of Benton (Saline County). The courthouse square is surrounded by Conway and Sevier streets, named after two Arkansas families that joined together to create an influential political faction in the nineteenth century called “the Family.” The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program recognizes the structure as architecturally and historically significant due to its Romanesque Revival architecture. The Saline County Courthouse, featured in the 1973 movie White Lightning because filmmakers considered it to be a typical Southern courthouse, is the third seat of justice in the county’s history. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 22, 1979. In 1836, William Woodruff, editor …

Sam Epstein House

The Sam Epstein House in Lake Village (Chicot County), constructed in 1910, was of historical and cultural significance on several counts. The wood-frame house itself was an interesting blend of Colonial Revival design with touches of Craftsman and Vernacular, primarily in the additions and the second story. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 21, 1992, but burned down approximately twenty years later, on June 30, 2012. Sam Epstein came to America from czarist Russia at the end of the nineteenth century. As a young adult, he moved to Memphis, Tennessee, with his brother Nathan and peddled a variety of goods between that city and the Louisiana border. Epstein left Memphis to become one of the …

Sanders, Theodore Marcus

Theodore Marcus Sanders was an accomplished architect who designed a variety of buildings in Little Rock (Pulaski County) and other cities in Arkansas. Many of his buildings have been nominated to the National Register of Historic Places, including the Ada Thompson Memorial Home, the Woman’s City Club building, and the Cornish House—all in Little Rock. He was partner in the Thompson, Sanders and Ginocchio firm, which continues to operate in the twenty-first century as Cromwell Architects Engineers. Theodore Sanders was born in Little Rock on March 13, 1879, to Fred and Fannie Sanders. He was one of ten children. The family had settled in Little Rock in 1879 after a relative saved them from starvation on the family’s fledgling farm …

Sarah Bird Northrup Ridge House

The Sarah Bird Northrup Ridge House is the oldest house still standing in Fayetteville (Washington County), dating back to 1836. Its original pine flooring and field stone fireplaces have endured to the present. It was built with the latest methods of the time, including mortised construction, shake shingles, and square-headed nails. The original cabin style was called “dog-trot” or “dog-run” and consisted of two single rooms separated by an open passage called a breezeway. A common roof covered the two rooms and the breezeway. In later years, the house was made into two stories and converted to “salt box” style, and the breezeway was converted into a central hallway. The Ridge House, at 230 West Center, is now owned and …

Schnable, John Adams

Lieutenant Colonel John Adams Schnable was a noted Arkansas architect and engineer who designed and built Spring Mill and two rock bridges over Salado Creek in Independence County, as well as the Jacksonport (Jackson County) courthouse in Jackson County. He was a Civil War veteran and one of the few German immigrants who fought on the side of the Confederacy. John Schnable (name spelling varies) was born on June 11, 1817, in the German Confederation shortly after its creation in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna. Researchers are unsure about the names of his parents. He was directly involved in the Revolution of 1848 and, as a result, migrated to the United States and arrived in Virginia in 1851, where …

Scipio A. Jones House

The Scipio A. Jones House is a 1928 Craftsman-style residence on Cross Street in Little Rock (Pulaski County) that was the home of Scipio Africanus Jones, a renowned African-American attorney, and his second wife, Lillie. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on May 28, 1999. Jones was born a slave in 1863 near Tulip (Dallas County). Moving to Little Rock around 1881, he attended Walden Seminary (now Philander Smith University) in Little Rock and Bethel Institute (now Shorter College) in North Little Rock (Pulaski County) before passing the bar in 1889. Jones would practice law in Little Rock for the remainder of his life, with his most noteworthy case being the defense of the so-called Elaine …

Searcy County Courthouse

The Searcy County Courthouse is in the historic commercial district of Marshall (Searcy County). Built in 1889, this two-story building, made of stone native to the area, stands as one of the oldest courthouses in Arkansas. The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program recognizes the courthouse as architecturally and historically significant as an outstanding example of an Arkansas Adamesque building. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 12, 1976. Since Searcy County turned eleven acres into its county seat in 1856, three courthouses have managed local affairs. The first was a log cabin, one of the few structures in town at that time along with a two-story hotel, a mercantile store, and a collection of houses. At …

Sebastian County Courthouse

aka: Fort Smith City Hall

The Sebastian County Courthouse stands at 100 South 6th Street, less than a mile from the Fort Smith National Cemetery, in the heart of the frontier city of Fort Smith (Sebastian County). The white, Art Deco–style courthouse is home to one of the county’s two seats of justice (the other is in Greenwood) as well as Fort Smith’s City Hall. This is the only public building in Arkansas that has this dual purpose. The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program recognizes the building for its historical significance due to its New Deal–era construction, as well as its architectural attributes. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 8, 1993. After Sebastian County’s establishment in 1851, citizens of the …

Segraves, Warren Dennis

Warren Dennis Segraves was an architect who practiced in Fayetteville (Washington County). He was among the first designers in northwestern Arkansas to promote and utilize the International-style mode of modernism in his work. Warren Segraves was born on November 7, 1924, in Oskaloosa, Kansas, to Samuel Patrick Segraves and Velma Dennis Segraves. The family moved to Fayetteville when he was a small child. At age eighteen, Segraves enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps. Serving as a bombardier in the European Theater during World War II, he earned the rank of captain. In 1946, Segraves married Rhea Ash, his childhood friend and Fayetteville High School classmate. After his marriage, and while working for his father-in-law’s trucking company, he enrolled at the University …

Shaw-Blair House

The Shaw-Blair House is located on a large, wooded parcel of land along the southern shore of Beaver Lake near Lowell (Benton County). The house was built between 1967 and 1969, and was designed by architect Robert E. Herndon, who was an architecture student at the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County) when he initially received the commission. Herndon designed the Shaw-Blair House in the Organic Modern style of Mid-Century Modern architecture, following the ideas of by Frank Lloyd Wright, which were promulgated by John G. Williams and E. Fay Jones in the UA architecture program. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on November 3, 2021. The Shaw-Blair House is a frame residential …

Shelton-Lockeby House

The Shelton-Lockeby House is located on Springhill Church Road, west of Murfreesboro (Pike County) in the Spring Hill community. Constructed in 1905, the single-story, dogtrot-style home was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 28, 2005. The land upon which the house was constructed was owned by a number of individuals before being purchased by James Shelton in 1896. The taxable value of the land increased in 1905, indicating that a house was constructed on the property at that time. Shelton sold the land to W. M. Riley in 1907, who in turn sold it to James Lockeby in 1915. James and his wife, Lula Ann, raised animals and grew a number of crops on the property, …

Shoppach House

aka: Sadie Praytor Home

The Shoppach House, located at 503 North Main Street (although some sources, including the National Register nomination form, give the address as 508 North Main Street) in Benton (Saline County), is the oldest surviving brick structure in Saline County. The Shoppach House was built by German immigrant John (or Johann) William Shoppach after he purchased the land in 1853. (Many sources give the building date as 1852, but it was likely a bit later, soon after the 1853 land purchase.) The bricks used to build the house, and its well, were made on site. Shoppach was born in Hessen, Germany, and immigrated to the United States in the mid-1830s, eventually making his way to present-day Saline County, where he built …

Shryock, Gideon

Gideon Shryock is responsible for one of the finest examples of Greek Revival architecture west of the Mississippi River—the Old State House in Little Rock (Pulaski County). Shryock’s other recognizable architectural achievements include Kentucky’s Old State House and Old Morrison Hall at Transylvania College in Lexington, Kentucky. These structures still stand and still represent freedom, power, wealth, and limitless possibilities. Gideon Shryock was born on November 15, 1802, to Mathias Shryock and Elizabeth Gaugh Shryock in Lexington, Kentucky. Mathias Shryock was once described in a newspaper article as a “practical builder” but not a professionally trained architect. The family found prosperity and popularity in Lexington. Shryock’s father held slaves as early as 1810 and served as captain of the Lexington …

Simmons First National Bank Tower

Simmons First National Bank Tower is a forty-story skyscraper located at 425 West Capitol Avenue in downtown Little Rock (Pulaski County). It is the tallest skyscraper in Arkansas at a height of 546 feet and an area of 740,000 square feet. (The previous record was held by Regions Center, formerly known as the First National Building, at 454 feet.) Originally known as Capitol Tower (1986–1991), the skyscraper was subsequently renamed TCBY Tower (1991–2004) and Metropolitan National Bank Tower (2004–2014) before its acquisition by Simmons First National Bank. The project originally started when John Flake, a local real estate developer, and Jerry Maulden, president of the Arkansas Power and Light (AP&L), wanted to see a new skyscraper in the Little Rock …

Sink-Crumb Post 72 American Legion Hut

The Sink-Crumb Post 72 American Legion Hut, located on the northeastern corner of 2nd and Cherry streets in the small Clay County community of Knobel, is a tin-roofed cypress log building designed in the Rustic aesthetic common among American Legion buildings erected during the early 1930s. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 25, 2008. As with other towns around Arkansas, Knobel was home to many World War I veterans, and when the state’s American Legion leadership began encouraging the creation of additional posts in the late 1920s, members decided to band together and create Sink-Crumb Post 72. The post—likely named for local men who died while in military service—was founded in the spring of …

Snowball Gymnasium

The Snowball Gymnasium is a one-story concrete-block building located to the west of downtown Snowball (Searcy County). As the site of sporting events and other community gatherings, the Snowball Gymnasium has been an important community center and gathering place for the Snowball community since the mid-twentieth century. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 16, 2020. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) constructed a new school at Snowball in 1938. The school campus was expanded in 1956 with the construction of the gymnasium. The gymnasium was built by contractors Vance Crow and Bea Stuart of Harrison (Boone County), and they boarded in Snowball with the Joe Cash family while the building was being constructed. The first …

South Side High School Sign

The South Side High School Sign, located on the grounds of the South Side Bee Branch School District complex in Van Buren County, consists of large stones that were placed by workers of the National Youth Administration (NYA) in 1937 to mark the location of the local high school. The South Side Bee Branch School District was established in the fall of 1929 to serve the students living south of the small, thriving town of Bee Branch (Van Buren County). The Great Depression began around the same time, and Van Buren County took advantage of the federal relief programs established to bring jobs to afflicted areas. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) established a camp at Damascus (Faulkner and Van Buren …

St. Agnes Catholic Church

St. Agnes Catholic Church in Mena (Polk County) is the center of worship for St. Agnes Parish, which was established by Bishop Edward Fitzgerald in 1896. A temporary wooden structure first served the congregation, with a two-story frame building following. A new church building was completed in 1922, and St. Agnes Catholic Church was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991, having retained all of its significant architectural and decorative features. Mena was incorporated as a township on September 18, 1896, as settlers began to flood into the area around the Kansas City Southern rail line. Within a month of Mena’s incorporation, Bishop Fitzgerald established the parish, and with the help of Father Patrick Enright of Fayetteville …

St. Anthony’s Hospital

aka: CHI St. Vincent Morrilton

With a view of the Arkansas River to the south and mountains to the southwest, the original building of St. Anthony’s Hospital in Morrilton (Conway County) (which later became CHI St. Vincent Morrilton) is an imposing three-story Art Deco–inspired structure made of brick and stone. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on March 28, 1986. The Benedictine sisters at St. Scholastica Monastery established St. Anthony’s Hospital as a fourteen-bed facility on December 4, 1925, initially using a private home belonging to the Burrows family of Morrilton. During the following twelve years, they moved twice, first to a Harding College dormitory (when that school, now Harding University, was located in Morrilton), then to the Jones Hospital building …

St. John’s Episcopal Church (Camden)

St. John’s Episcopal Church, located in Camden (Ouachita County), was constructed in 1926. The building includes Gothic Revival details and is in the shape of a cross. Added to the National Register of Historic Places on January 24, 2017, the church continues to have an active congregation. The parish was organized on March 6, 1850. Early efforts to purchase a building in which to hold services proved difficult due to a lack of funds, but in 1871, the parish obtained a former school on Adams Street. By 1887, that building was in such poor condition that it was demolished, and a new building began to be constructed on the same site in 1888. Around the late 1910s, the parish purchased …

St. Mary’s Catholic Church (Paragould)

St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Paragould (Greene County) is a brick-and-steel structure designed by renowned architect Charles Eames and his architectural partner Robert Walsh in 1935. Charles Eames was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri, where he attended Washington University before opening an architecture firm with Charles Grey and Walter E. Pauley. After a solo trip to Mexico in 1933, Eames started a new firm with Robert Walsh in 1934. During the next few years, Eames and Walsh worked on several projects in and around St. Louis, as well as two Catholic churches in eastern Arkansas: one in what is now Helena-West Helena (Phillips County) and one in Paragould. Eames eventually gained an international reputation as an architect and …

St. Mary’s Church (Altus)

aka: Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church (Altus)

Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church, more commonly known as St. Mary’s Church, was founded in Altus (Franklin County) in 1879. It has been located atop Pond Creek Mountain, better known as St. Mary’s Mountain, since its inception. The congregation was founded by and for immigrants from Germany and Switzerland. The Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71 and the Kulturkampf (religious persecution) of the 1870s in Germany drove many Catholics out of Europe and to the Altus region of Arkansas. As these new immigrants did not speak English, there was a conscious effort on the part of the Church to get a German-speaking priest in order to maintain these immigrants in the Catholic faith. After St. Mary’s became established, the fact …

Stone County Courthouse

The Stone County Courthouse in the Ozark Mountain city of Mountain View (Stone County) is located in a picturesque commercial district marked with storefronts and local institutions. Native sandstone from the mountains makes up the courthouse’s walls and echoes the look of the congregation of buildings on the courthouse square, forming a cohesive identity. The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program recognizes the 1922 building as historically and architecturally significant, and it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 17, 1985. The Adamesque courthouse was constructed in 1922 to replace its 1888 predecessor, presumably because county operations outgrew the old wood-frame building. Clyde A. Ferrell designed the new courthouse, and Bill Laroe, the head mason, constructed it; Laroe …

Stone, Edward Durell

Edward Durell Stone, one of the foremost American architects of the mid-twentieth century, established an international reputation and designed buildings throughout the world. Though he lived in New York City for much of his adult life, Stone made a lasting contribution to the architecture of his native Arkansas. Edward Stone was born on March 9, 1902, in Fayetteville (Washington County) to Benjamin Hicks Stone, a merchant and businessman, and Ruth Johnson Stone, a former English teacher at the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville. The youngest of three children, Stone attended Fayetteville’s public schools but was not a serious student. His mother encouraged his talents for drawing and building things and allowed him to have a home carpentry shop. At …

Strauss House

The Strauss House, located in Malvern (Hot Spring County), was designed in the Dutch Colonial style by the architectural firm of Charles Thompson and Thomas Harding. Constructed in 1919, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on December 22, 1982. The design and construction of the house were commissioned by Albert Lincoln Strauss, the president of Malvern Lumber Company. His father, Ludolph Adalbert Strauss, founded the company and the town of Perla (Hot Spring County) in the late nineteenth century. Albert Strauss was born on July 11, 1886. He married Martha Vogeler, and the couple had one daughter. Strauss was deeply involved in the timber industry in the state. He was serving as the chairman of the …

Stuck, Elmer Axtell

Elmer Axtell Stuck was an architect based in Jonesboro (Craighead County) who founded the firm that became Stuck, Frier, Lane & Scott, Inc. Several of his designs were listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Elmer A. Stuck was born on February 2, 1900, in Jonesboro, the son of Bessie M. Axtell Stuck and Elmer Charles Stuck, owner and operator of the Jonesboro Brick Company and the Stuck Lumber Company. Though he had been groomed to take over the family business with his brother Howard, Stuck chose to pursue architecture, graduating from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1924. While Stuck was in school, he worked from 1921 to 1923 in the offices of William B. Ittner, who …

Sunset Hotel

The Linebarger Brothers Realty Company, run by Clarence A. Linebarger and his two older brothers, opened a summer resort at Lake Bella Vista in northwestern Arkansas in 1917. In 1929, they added a large new hotel high on a hill across the highway to the west of the lake. The hill was called Sunset Mountain, and the hotel became the Sunset Hotel. The hotel, located in what is now Bella Vista (Benton County), consisted of approximately sixty-five rooms with a private bathroom for each room or suite of rooms, a large lobby, and an upscale restaurant. Vacation visitors flocked to the hotel, and locals often traveled up the hill for meals in the restaurant. A substantial part of the workforce …

Sutherland, Cyrus Arden (Cy)

Cyrus Arden (Cy) Sutherland was a professor at the College of Architecture at the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County), a leader in the movement to preserve the historic buildings of Arkansas, and a professional architect who designed numerous homes, libraries, churches, and school buildings in addition to directing historic restoration projects around the state. Cy Sutherland was born on January 6, 1920, in Rogers (Benton County) to James William Sutherland and Lena McSpadden Sutherland. He became an Eagle Scout before graduating from Rogers High School. He studied radio broadcasting at the University of Arkansas and the University of Iowa before being drafted into the U.S. Army in 1941 during World War II. Rising to the rank of …

T. C. McRae House

The T. C. McRae House is located in Prescott (Nevada County). Designed by architect Charles Thompson and commissioned by Thomas Chipman McRae, the house was constructed in 1919 and added to the National Register of Historic Places on December 22, 1982. Thomas McRae was born in Mount Holly (Union County) in 1851. Educated in New Orleans, Louisiana, and at Washington and Lee University, he began practicing law in Nevada County in 1873. McRae married Amelia Ann White in 1874, and the couple had nine children. Elected to represent Nevada County in the Arkansas House of Representatives in 1876, McRae moved to Prescott after the county courthouse was moved there in 1877. Subsequently elected to represent the Third Congressional District in …

Taborian Hall

Built at 800 W. Ninth Street in Little Rock (Pulaski County) between 1916 and 1918 by local African-American contractor Simeon Johnson, Taborian Hall is the last remaining original building on the Ninth Street “Line,” which was once the center for black businesses and culture in Little Rock. Originally known as Taborian Temple, the Classical structure was built for the Knights and Daughters of the Tabor, a black fraternal insurance organization. More than 1,500 fraternal members came to the grand opening in 1918. Also in 1918, the first floor informally became the Negro Soldiers Club for black soldiers stationed at Camp Pike (now Camp Joseph T. Robinson). Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, Taborian Temple housed many black-owned businesses, including offices for Dr. J. V. …

Telephone Exchange Building (Powhatan)

The Telephone Exchange Building is the oldest commercial building still standing in Powhatan (Lawrence County) in the twenty-first century and visually represents the commercial and civic characteristics of the town during the nineteenth century. The Powhatan Telephone Exchange Building is a one-story brick building that reflects Greek Revival architecture and design. The building was constructed between 1887 and 1888, placed in the heart of the thriving town where commerce, business, and social interaction took place. The Telephone Exchange Building is a rectangular structure with long, straight, flat sides. There are no windows on the south side, and the north side has two windows like those on the front of the building. The design style of the time called for buildings …

Ten Mile House

aka: Stagecoach House
aka: McHenry House

The Federal-style Ten Mile House, located on Highway 5 in Little Rock (Pulaski County), is a rare example of a largely intact rural home of the early nineteenth century. The house has suffered few exterior alterations and retains four nineteenth-century outbuildings surrounded by a large parcel of wooded property. Ten Mile House was commandeered by Union troops during the Civil War and accommodated travelers on the Southwest Trail stagecoach line, earning it the alternative name “Stagecoach House.” The house is also referred to as the McHenry House after the original owner of the property, Archibald McHenry. Twentieth-century newspaper articles and periodicals state that McHenry built a log home on land he had purchased in Pulaski County after moving from Tennessee …

Thomas R. McGuire House

The Thomas R. McGuire House at 114 Rice Street in Little Rock (Pulaski County), built in the Colonial Revival style, was rendered in hand-crafted or locally manufactured materials by Thomas R. McGuire, a master machinist with the Iron Mountain and Southern Railroad. It is the finest example of this particular architectural style in the turn-of-the-century Capitol View neighborhood and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on December 19, 1991. The house has been owned by the McGuire family ever since its construction. The house is a one-and-one-half story, cast-concrete block residence on a continuous poured-concrete foundation. It was built on a rectangular plan in a vernacular design with Colonial Revival details. The hipped roof and ridge of …

Thompson, Charles Louis

Charles Louis Thompson was a highly prolific architect who created one of the most successful architectural practices in Arkansas during the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries. His firm designed more than two thousand buildings, of which hundreds still exist today. Charles Thompson was born in November 1868 in Danville, Illinois, to James C. and Henrietta Lightner Thompson. He and his six siblings were orphaned when he was fourteen, and they moved to Indiana to live with relatives. He quit school at the age of fourteen and went to work in a mill to help support his brothers and sisters. During his extra hours, he worked for an architect named Hunt, who taught him drafting and exposed …

Thorncrown Chapel

Thorncrown Chapel, designed by architect E. Fay Jones, is the most celebrated piece of architecture built in Arkansas. It won five design awards and was named by American Institute of Architects (AIA) as the fourth–best building of the twentieth century. Its uniqueness was recognized almost immediately. Within a year of its July 10, 1980, opening in Eureka Springs (Carroll County), it had been featured in many major architecture journals worldwide and had received an AIA Honor Award for design; in December of 2005, it received the 2006 AIA Twenty-five year Award for architectural design that has stood the test of time for twenty-five years. The chapel draws more than 100,000 visitors a year, and more than four million people have …

Tower Building

The Tower Building is an eighteen-story commercial structure located at 323 Center Street, which is at the northeast corner of 4th and Center Streets in downtown Little Rock (Pulaski County). It was constructed between 1958 and 1960 and, as the state’s tallest building at the time of its completion, was usually referred to as a skyscraper. On September 23, 2011, it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Amid the prosperity and optimism of the postwar era in the 1950s, the building was the brainchild of Winthrop Rockefeller, an influential state resident and future governor who lived at Petit Jean Mountain in Conway County. Rockefeller was interested in economic development for the state, claiming that Arkansas would not …

Trapnall Hall

Located at 423 E. Capitol Ave. in the MacArthur Park Historic District of Little Rock (Pulaski County), Trapnall Hall is an exquisite example of Greek Revival architecture. It was constructed in 1843 of brick at a time when most houses were made of either wood or rock. The architect is unknown. The house was built for Frederic and Martha Trapnall. Frederic Trapnall was a lawyer who spent several sessions in the Arkansas General Assembly. Frederic fell ill and died in 1853, and Martha lived in the home until her death in 1861. Frederic’s brothers became the heirs to the property, and, as they lived out of state, quickly sold the home. In 1929, Julia Taylor purchased the home and donated it …

Trapp, George Francis

George Francis Trapp was one of several architects active in Little Rock (Pulaski County) in the mid-twentieth century, a period of relative prosperity and growth that included much public and private building. Two qualities consistent throughout his career were sensitivity to siting (judging how a building’s design and material related to the site) and boldness in setting shapes against each other. George Trapp was born on March 20, 1900, in Chicago, Illinois, to Charles C. and Fanny Trapp. The family moved to Little Rock in 1914, and Trapp’s father worked for the Otis Elevator Company and the Big Rock Stone Company. Trapp’s interest in architecture might have been inspired by some of the new tall buildings in Little Rock, such …

Twelve Oaks

The Twelve Oaks estate, located in a rural setting just south of Harrison (Boone County), is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, which notes its local significance for its Craftsman- and Colonial Revival–style architecture. The house is one of the best examples of a Craftsman/Colonial Revival estate—and an unusually large example of the style—in the Harrison area. With the rise of the railroad industry in Harrison in the early twentieth century, a building boom hit the city. Among those who had worked on many high-profile buildings in Harrison was J. W. Bass, a steel contractor based in Detroit, Michigan. His J. W. Bass Erecting Company and Atlas Iron & Steel Company had offices in Detroit; Chicago, Illinois; and …

Two Bayou Methodist Church

The Two Bayou Methodist Church and Cemetery are located near Camden (Ouachita County). The oldest marked graves in the cemetery date to 1846, and the church was constructed around 1875. The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places on July 9, 1998. The first church services at the location were held under brush arbors well before the Civil War. A log building offered worshippers a more permanent structure but was destroyed during the war. Another log building was used by the congregation until the construction of the current building by J. T. Mendenhall in 1875. The congregation was served by various circuits over the decades. Research indicates that services held prior to 1848 were likely part of …

Tyson Family Commercial Building

Located in downtown Camden (Ouachita County), the Tyson Family Commercial Building is an example of early-twentieth-century commercial architecture that continues to be utilized for that purpose in the twenty-first century. Constructed around 1923, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 21, 1994. Founded on the Ouachita River in the early 1800s, Camden became an important regional commercial hub. Crops grown in the surrounding area were taken to the city for shipment downriver. In 1873, the Iron Mountain Railroad constructed a line to Camden, increasing economic activities. By the early twentieth century, the town served as a major industrial and agricultural center in southern Arkansas, with numerous businesses operating in the area. One of the …

Union County Courthouse

The Union County Courthouse is located in downtown El Dorado (Union County), a 1920s oil boomtown about twenty miles from the Louisiana state border. The four-story Union County Courthouse, like others across the state, is situated in a public square where businesses, banks, and law offices occupy rows of buildings around the seat of justice. The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program recognizes the courthouse as historically and architecturally significant for its symbolism of El Dorado’s growth and its example of the Classical Revival style. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 30, 1983. The first building used as a courthouse in Union County was a storeroom owned by Albert Rust at Champagnolle (Union County) in the …

Van Buren County Courthouse

The Van Buren County Courthouse in Clinton (Van Buren County) is situated in the hilly terrain of northern Arkansas. It was built with local materials from a quarry outside of Dennard (Van Buren County), with walls made of reddish sandstone. The smallest courthouse in the state, it measures just 100 feet by 43 feet, with a basement. The Arkansas Historic Preservation Program (AHPP) recognizes the building as historically significant as a New Deal–era public works project, and it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 13, 1991. After Van Buren County was established on November 11, 1833, the county elite housed the first two courthouses in one-room log structures near the now-defunct community of Mudtown, whose …

Van Buren Post Office

The Van Buren Post Office at 22 South 7th Street in Van Buren (Crawford County) is a one-story, brick-masonry structure built in 1936–37 and designed in a restrained, minimalist interpretation of the Art Deco style of architecture. It contains a mural financed through the U.S. Treasury Department’s Section of Painting and Sculpture (later renamed the Section of Fine Arts), a Depression-era stimulus project that promoted public art. The post office was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on August 14, 1998. On November 1, 1935, the Van Buren Press Argus announced that a plot of land on the corner of South 7th and Webster streets would be the site of a new city post office. Postal engineer R. …

Vernon and Moore-McIlroy Produce Warehouse

The Vernon & Moore-McIlroy Produce Warehouse is located in Fayetteville (Washington County) at 200 N. West Avenue, on the northeast corner of N. West Avenue and W. Spring Street. Built circa 1906, the warehouse is a one-story, red masonry commercial building with Italianate influences. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 10, 2020. During the first few decades of the twentieth century, the produce industry (in particular the cultivation of apples) was the primary economic enterprise for northwestern Arkansas. With the increasing production of apples, an industrial infrastructure developed to support it. This was seen in the many types of businesses established throughout the region, which included nurseries, barrel factories, ice plants, cold storage warehouses, …

Villa Marre

In 1881, Angelo and Jennie Marre built an elegant family home at 1321 Scott Street in Little Rock (Pulaski County), and 125 years later, its façade became familiar to millions of people around the world through its appearance in the opening credits of a popular television show. Television producers and former Arkansas residents Harry Z. Thomason and his wife, Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, used the home’s exterior to depict the design firm run by the main characters of the couple’s CBS television series, Designing Women. The house—which has weathered storms, architectural changes, urban renewal, and neglect—is still one of Little Rock’s most prominent landmarks. After amassing a fortune in the liquor import and saloon business, Marre began to build his home, which …

W. H. Allen House

Located in Spotville (Columbia County), less than twenty miles from Magnolia (Columbia County) on the old Magnolia–El Dorado road, the W. H. Allen House is representative of the early settlement of the area. It is also an example of the transitional architecture many dogtrot structures have undergone. It was built by William Henry “Dick” Allen in 1873 as a four-room dogtrot, a common style for pioneer families in the southeastern United States in the nineteenth century. In 1907, his son, Walter Howard Allen, enlarged the house, added a front porch, and enclosed the breezeway, using handmade shingles for the roof and timber cut from trees grown on the Allen property. In January 1853, Dick Allen married Eliza Jane Gillespie. They …

W. H. Young House

The Craftsman Bungalow–style W. H. Young House was constructed in 1921 in Arkadelphia (Clark County). Located at 316 Meador Lane, the house was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 20, 2006. The land on which the house is located was originally purchased by John S. T. Callaway in 1836 and subsequently lost at a sheriff’s auction in 1842. It had been auctioned to pay a legal judgment to Benjamin Duncan, a party to the lawsuit that forced the sale of the land. The land was later platted and added to the city in 1858, named for Duncan. Duncan’s Addition is located north of downtown Arkadelphia and to the southeast of the Ouachita Baptist University campus. Born …

Waldron Commercial Historic District

The Waldron Commercial Historic District comprises a collection of buildings along Main Street from 1st to 5th Street in downtown Waldron (Scott County). Within the boundaries of the historic district are thirty-four buildings and one additional structure, built in several different phases between the years 1880 and 1958. Of the thirty-five total structures, twenty maintain a high level of integrity and contribute to the historic district; the other fifteen are non-contributing. The district was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 25, 2008. The oldest buildings remaining in the Waldron Commercial Historic District date from circa 1880; however, development on Main Street began prior to that time. In the late 1830s, resident William Featherston operated a tavern …