October 26, 1852

Scottish stonemason Robert Brownlee married Annie Lamont of Little Rock (Pulaski County). Brownlee had been twenty-three when he read about the December 1835 fire in New York City and the need for help in rebuilding the city. He arrived in New York in 1836, where he found work cutting stone. Four months later, he was hired by the architect for the State House in Raleigh, North Carolina, to cut stone for the capitol building. As the building neared completion, he learned that skilled masons were needed in Little Rock to help finish what would come to be known as the Old State House. Brownlee lived in Little Rock from 1837 to 1849, and the Brownlee House is preserved on its original site at the Historic Arkansas Museum in Little Rock at 3rd and Cumberland streets.