Ward 1

Dark Hollow is a community in North Little Rock that spans generations. A community of historical impact to Central Arkansas, Dark Hollow lies at the intersection of Interstate Highways 30 and 40, one of the major Interstate crossroads of the nation. It is bounded on the east by the Missouri Pacific Railroads electronic classification yard, and on the south by low- and middle-income residential areas and by Shorter College, predominantly but not totally African American.

Dark Hollow is a topographic depression and has no natural drainage. It collects drainage water from a basin of 6,700 acres, including the Park Hill area, the adjacent Interstate Highways 30 and 40 and even from the federally owned lands at Fort Roots on the west side of the city, where the Veterans Administration Hospital is located.

Prior to any attempt at drainage, Dark Hollow was a dense swamp. In 1905, the first Drainage Improvement District in Arkansas was organized to provide drainage for the Dark Hollow area. In 1909, construction of a drainage system was started. The system constructed at that time is still in use. It is essentially a system of open drainage ditches converging into the main ditch on Redwood Street. In Cary Bradburn’s book: On the Opposite Shore: The Making of North Little Rock, he stated that 100 years ago, the area we called Dark Hollow was not a Black neighborhood. It wasn’t a neighborhood at all. Before 1908, Dark Hollow was more than 3000 acres of homeland, forests and cypress breaks.

Bradburn dismisses a theory that an old Indian name for the area translated as Dark Hollow. He says the Corps of Civil Engineers named it, most likely because the swamp was gloomy. Earlier maps had labeled it Loomis Swamp. The Arkansas Gazette remembered it as Loomis in a long report in 1909 on a massive engineering project to drain Dark Hollow. The swamp had been known as Loomis Lake for 25 years, named for a lumber mill on the hill north of Dark Hollow. The man was a brother to ex-governor Loomis of Rhode Island. He ran the mill until he died. Before then, he cut down many of the 100-foot cypress trees that had kept the swamp perpetually dark.

The search of old newspapers finds Dark Hollow in use as early as 1895. When The Gazette North Side gossip column reported that one Mr. Echols had caught an otter in there, measuring 5 feet, 9 1/2 inches. And in 1897, the paper described a forest fire.

From 1909 to 1911, while crews with steam powered dredging machines worked to install six miles of ditches and concrete culverts to drain the swamp, spectators turned out to watch 100-foot-tall trees uprooted with roots running in every direction.

“In the memory of many citizens here that have lived in Pulaski County for more than a half century there has never been a time that the swamp has not contained water,” the Gazette noted. “Some places being five to 20 feet deep and during a wet season, the water is much higher than this. As the water receded children rushed into the teeming shallows to bash trap fish on their heads and carry them off.”

In February 1911, the club system opened in Dark Hollow Drain. The land was sold to cotton farmers and developers. Over the course of decades, the neighborhood we know today grew up with churches, small businesses, and houses.

“Chris” Huie a Chinese American photographer whose photographs of Dark Hollow and other areas in North Little Rock, is at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Chris was born and raised in North Little Rock, Arkansas. “I grew up in North Little Rock, Arkansas in the ’40s and ’50s,” he said. “I grew up in a particularly impoverish section of North Little Rock nicknamed “Dark Hollow”
because it was too poor to even have electricity. Our store sold a lot of kerosene for lighting.”

William J. Johnson became the first African-American general in the history of the Arkansas National Guard. Curtis Henry Sykes was a pioneering educator, community leader, and historian from the Dark Hollow community

–Belinda Sykes Burney

North Little Rock’s Dark Hollow is a historically Black neighborhood of working people and entrepreneurs who began settling on the edge of an ancient swamp in the early 1900s.

Many families migrated from other parts of the city and state and from other southern states, often to take jobs with the nearby St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railroad (later Missouri Pacific and now Union Pacific). They established small businesses, schools and churches in a tight-knit and self-reliant community in which people looked after one another.

The neighborhood encompasses some 10 blocks north of the Union Pacific railroad tracks and several blocks east of Main Street, bounded by wetlands along North Hills Boulevard and Interstate 40. Construction of Interstate 30 divided the neighborhood geographically in the early 1960s.

Life was challenging in segregated America. The neighborhood, though not in every case, lacked utilities and paved roads until the 1960s. From the earliest time, residents endured chronic flooding and poor drainage with little outside help.

Financed by Pulaski County Drainage District No. 1 and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, a million dollar land reclamation project in 1909-10 dredged, drained, and cut 2,300 acres of Cypress-thick Loomis Lake and the Dark Hollow swamp. But flooding in the neighborhood has persisted over the years.

While the origin of the Dark Hollow name is unknown, it came into usage by the early 1900s and probably was derived from the gloomy Cypress swamp, where trees grew more than 100 feet tall to provide a dense habitat for bull frogs, ducks, mud hens, cypress trout, and an occasional bears. Legends of swamp creatures and a werewolf served as cautionary tales.

Dark Hollow old-timers attribute the name’s origin to the lack of street lights. Some residents remembered having street lights, but none in the blocks north and east of 16th and Vine streets, where it was “pitch black dark.”

–Cary Bradburn

The neighborhood north of 20th Street between the railroad tracks and Pike Avenue up to Pershing Boulevard comprises the north half of Schaer’s Addition, the Machin Addition, and the Buddenberg Addition. The names come from early landowners before the area was subdivided for residential and commercial development. Holt’s Industrial Addition was located south of Schaer’s.

The Schaer’s plat dates to the late 1880s after construction of the Little Rock and Fort Smith railroad track in the 1870s. The railroad opened up the area, which was north of Argenta and north of the Fort Smith Crossing, where the Fort Smith line and the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railroad line crossed. Today, the crossing is immediately west of the Main Street viaduct. The first viaduct was built in late 1906, but it was replaced by the present bridge in 1927.

Prior to railroad construction, this area was situated along what was called the pike (later Baring Cross Pike and now Pike Avenue), which connected with the old Fort Smith military road built in the 1820s. Scattered farms worked by homesteaders predominated. Land speculators bought up property north of the Arkansas River across from Little Rock as soon as Arkansas became a territory in 1819. By the 1870s, the property had changed hands. Development, however, was slow after the properties were subdivided. A tract owned by H.H. Julian between 22nd and 23rd streets wasn’t platted until about 1920. The Machin Addition was originally platted in the early 1900s by Thomas Lafferty, and the Buddenberg Addition was platted about 1910. Percy Machin, whose father built a home known as Oaklawn at 2308 Pike Avenue in 1904, was a long-time city clerk of Argenta/North Little Rock (1916-18, 1939-68).

Few families lived in the Schaer’s, Machin, Buddenberg, and Holt’s additions, according to the city directory of 1906. A count of households shows 18 listings in the area. The 1914 directory shows 44 mostly residential with at least one grocery store and a physician’s office on the east side of Pike Avenue. By 1926, the directory shows at least 75 households of mostly homeowners and a diversity of commercial development on Pike. The directories in many cases note occupations. Railroad workers and people engaged in the service sector account for most of the job descriptions. Demographically, they were mostly white families. Their elementary school-age children attended the Clendenin school at 13th and Main after it opened in 1902. The city’s juniorsenior high school was located at Fourth and Willow streets in Argenta. In 1929, the city opened a new high school in a grand Art Deco-style building at 22nd and Main. Interestingly, a winery owned by Serafino Orsini was located at 817 West 22nd Street in the late 1930s and 1940s.

The middle class neighborhood continued to grow into the 1960s. Household counts in the directories (as examples) show about 160 in 1940, 235 in 1951 and 265 in 1966. Pike Avenue during this period was a thriving commercial district. But as in other older areas of the city, economic decline set in during the 1970s as North Little Rock expanded commercially and residentially to the north. McCain Mall, which opened in 1973, rang a death knell for downtown North Little Rock.

Although Mayor Casey Laman (1958-72, 1979-80) invested city and federal money to build a new police station, library and community center on Pershing in the 1960s and early 1970s, the development was east of the railroad track and didn’t do anything to change the downward trend west of the track. Pike Avenue had provided an economic boon in the late 1950s, but that didn’t halt the movement of homeowners and businesses to newer neighborhoods to the north. The construction of Interstate 40 in the early 1960s eventually served as an unofficial line of demarcation between economic growth and decline in the 1970s and 1980s.

–Cary Bradburn

Our city’s Lakewood had its beginnings in the early 1930s with developer Justin Matthews Sr.’s acquisition of about 2,000 acres north of Park Hill. After forming the Lakewood Development Company, Matthews created six artificial lakes to attract future residents. He also commissioned Mexican artist Dionicio Rodriguez to create the faux‑bois (concrete “fake‑wood”) sculptures that help define the area to this day. These include rustic bridges, seats, and portions of the iconic Old Mill, surrounded by T. R. Pugh Memorial Park, on the north end of Lake 2.

The Great Depression and World War II delayed the area’s development. Lakewood’s first home sites were finally sold in 1947. North Little Rock annexed most of Lakewood in 1951.

Lakewood has grown into one of our city’s most recognizable neighborhoods, characterized, among other things, by its curving streets and mid‑century homes. The lakes and the Old Mill (also known as Pugh’s Mill) are recreational magnets, the mill serving as the site of photo shoots, weddings, family reunions, and a variety of other celebrations.

Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture

Levy in North Little Rock – named for a prominent Jewish merchant — originated as a campground for farmers and drovers traveling the Fort Smith road to markets in Little Rock. In 1892, Levy founder Ernest Stanley opened a general store near the campground north of Argenta. A settlement of industrious working-class people emerged with the opening of Camp Pike in 1917. War preparations at Camp Robinson in 1940 further fueled Levy’s growth. A municipality from 1917 to 1946, Levy has retained its identity and the Levy Day political rally put it on the map in the 1950s. Today, a growing Latino population, plus nearby Camp Robinson and resident associations contribute to Levy’s economic and cultural vitality.

Ernest Stanley, Levy’s first postmaster in 1905, named the new station after dry goods merchant Morris Levy. Historian Evelyn Eubank said Levy loaned Stanley $50 and credit to start his store. Walter Stanley, a grocer and one of Ernest’s brothers, said the community would have been called Stanley if that name hadn’t already existed elsewhere. Brothers William F. “Flake” Stanley and Oscar Stanley opened Stanley Hardware in 1901. The Stanleys, Dr. James F. Pairet’s drug store and Abraham B. Kyzer’s grocery formed the nucleus of the business district. Eubank said her mother, Clara Knight, remembered stopping at Ernest Stanley’s store in the 1890s. “What a delight it was to have Ernest Stanley place tubes in their ears so they could hear the graphophone or buy a grab bag for a nickel,” Eubank wrote.

Levy incorporated as a municipality on May 7, 1917. Voters elected a mayor, city recorder and five alderman on Aug. 7, 1917. The town of a few hundred people was bounded by today’s Pershing Boulevard on the south, 38th Street on the north, Division Street on the west, and Orange Street on the east. There were two grammar schools— Levy and Hillside. At the town’s north border was Thomas Cemetery, adjacent to Edgewood Cemetery established later in 1923. The council first met on Aug. 13, 1917, and soon imposed a speed limit of 10 mph. Mary Bottomley, who moved there in 1918, recalled dirt streets, the Stanley stores, “a cold drink stand and a bowling alley.” Flake Stanley, the first of eight mayors, served until 1925. By 1940, Levy’s population was 1,400 and it rapidly grew with military expansion at Camp Robinson. The Arkansas Gazette on Aug. 19, 1941, estimated a population of 2,000.

Levy’s treasury never adequately addressed dark and unpaved streets, poor drainage, substandard bridges and unreliable fire protection. Housing shortages and traffic congestion also plagued the town. Nonetheless, Levy annexed an area between Camp Robinson Road and Orange Street up to 45th Street in 1944, and built a City Hall at the site of the present Levy fire station. James H. Fretwell was Levy’s last and longest serving mayor. Following annexation by North Little Rock in 1946, downtown Levy remained vibrant, with Bob Evans’ Esso, Huggins Drug, the Ashley Building, Wasson Home and Auto, George’s Dry Cleaners, Hill Drug, Venable lumber, Tolliver’s Gulf station, King’s barbershop, Economy Furniture, Art’s Marine, cafes, beauty shops and grocery stores. The Scenic Drive-In movie theater, which closed in 1961, and Jim’s Roller Rink in the 1950s and ‘60s were attractions, as was the Spot drive-in restaurant from 1964 to 1997.

Doyle Venable’s lumber company opened in 1951, and launched Levy’s greatest tradition — an all-day paint sale, spiced with musical entertainment. “Levy Day” became one of Arkansas’s premiere political rallies after Venable—Levy’s “unofficial mayor”– invited candidates in 1954. The Sertoma Club continued Levy Day until 2006. Construction of Interstate 40 in 1962 cut through downtown Levy and the business center shifted north on Camp Robinson Road, where the Levy Shopping Center and Wal-Mart opened in 1967. Levy grew well beyond its original boundaries, stretching north of 47th Street. North Heights Elementary opened in 1953 and the city added a recreation center there in 1971. Levy Elementary School closed in 1985 after 78 years. In the 1990s, Levy residents lobbied for more street lights, street repairs and a police substation.

Levy area population grew only 1.1 percent from 1990 to 2010, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and that growth was due to a rising Latino population. Figures from census tracts in Levy, compiled by the North Little Rock Community Planning Department and Metroplan, show that Latinos were 12 percent of the overall Levy population of almost 12,000 in 2010. That compares with about 5 percent of Levy population in 2000 and 1.2 percent in 1990.

Cary Bradburn
North Little Rock History Commission

The neighborhoods in the North Argenta, Holt, Kahn, and Cassinelli additions in area known as Mid City are among the oldest in the city. They were subdivided between the mid-1870s and early 1900s. The population grew rapidly after 1900.

Constructed in the 1870s, the old Little Rock and Fort Smith Railway track is the eastern boundary. In the southeast end of the area was a portion of the railroad’s yards, known as the Fort Smith Crossing, where the tracks of the Fort Smith line crossed those of the Cairo and Fulton Railroad, which became the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railway in 1874 and then Missouri Pacific in 1917.

The Fort Smith Crossing was immediately west of the Main Street viaduct. Prior to 1900, a passenger depot was located at the crossing. An older wooden viaduct was built in 1906 over what had been a treacherous at-grade crossing. The present viaduct was built in 1927 to accommodate the ever growing number of cars.

The area south of 15th street was the northern part of the territory that the City of Little Rock annexed in 1890 and designated as the Eighth Ward in 1892. The annexation included all of Argenta. Northside residents, led by William C. and James P. Faucette, conspired to break away from Little Rock. The first step came in 1901 with the incorporation of a municipality known as North Little Rock. This town was north of 15th Street and east of Pike, including the Mid City (except for College Park).

Cary Bradburn

In 1903, the north side faction snuck a bill through the Arkansas Legislature that allowed for annexation of all or part of a city by another city. Once it became law, the northsiders petitioned for an election and the people of North Little Rock and the Eighth Ward voted to secede from Little Rock. Following a court challenge, North Little Rock and the Eighth Ward became one city in 1904. Mid City was part of this new city of North Little Rock.

College Park Circle on the north end of the area was developed in the early 1940s, the last part of the area to be subdivided. Although surrounded by the city, College Park was outside the city limits until being annexed in August 1940. A newspaper article at the time said that city crews were grading roads in preparation for residential development.

In November 1943, the city bought six lots on West 12th Street between Sycamore and Willow for the Street Department. The next year the city built a garage and storage building to house Street Department equipment. The city barn, as it was called, opened in June 1944. The area started declining economically in the late 1960s and 1970s. With residential and commercial expansion north of Interstate 40, the city’s wealth and many homeowners moved north.

Maps in the early 1900s show the 600 to 1000 blocks of West 23rd Street as part of the Henry H. Julian tract. Julian was a prominent Argenta businessman who co-owned the Julian-Sullivan Furniture Company at 303 Main Street. He also served as president of the
Valley Savings Bank at 223 Main in Argenta. During this time and earlier, farms and pastures dominated the landscape around what is now West 23rd Street.

The area was historically an unincorporated part of Pulaski County situated north of Argenta. The town of North Little Rock incorporated in 1901, but didn’t include the Julian tract (or what we know today as the 600 to 1000 blocks of West 23rd Street) until the next year when North Little Rock annexed all the remaining territory within an area bounded by Olive Street on the east, Pershing on the north, Pike Avenue on the West and 15th Street on the south. The Julian tract then became a part of Argenta after the secession from Little Rock and merger with North Little Rock in 1904.

A 1913 map of Argenta indicates there was no West 23rd Street between the railroad tracks and Pike Avenue. Addresses for the 600 block appear in the city directories in the 1920s and the 1930s for the shotgun houses on the south side. One address is listed on the south side of the 900 block in the 1920s and 1930s. Addresses for the 700 and 800 blocks began to show up in the early 1940s. The Sanborn map (1939) confirms these additional dwellings with paste-ups representing development in 1942. Housing was at a premium in the early 1940s in North Little Rock with the military buildup at Camp Robinson before and during World War II.

Architecturally, there are a few Craftsman style homes, one distinctive stone house and one brick that have architectural integrity. Their setting detracts from any integrity they have and they are not unique, as North Little Rock has numerous other examples of this style of house. The commercial building on the south side of the street that was constructed in the 1940s also has some visual architectural integrity.

The most interesting architecture on this section of 23rd is concentrated IN a few houses in the 600 block on the west side that appear to be similar to “shotgun” style homes. These are said to have been barracks from Camp Pike that were split in half and moved to this location after the army camp geared down following the end of World War I in 1918. These houses do have some historic and architectural significance, due to their association with Camp Pike. It is unknown how many other former Camp Pike barracks exist in the city, but it is likely there are other examples.

Houses on the west end of this section of 23rd have no architectural integrity, nor no known historic significance. A number of the houses along this part of 23rd, particularly on the western end, were not constructed until the 1940s or later. The 600 block of 23rd seems to be the only block that contains early housing, largely the former Camp Pike barracks.

–Cary Bradburn and Sandra Taylor Smith

Two prominent Argenta residents, Dr. Edward Meek and John Cuneo, filed the original plat in February 1898 for the subdivision of Military Heights, north of downtown. No explanation was given in court documents for the origin of the name, but it may have been inspired by the opening of Fort Logan H. Roots on nearby Big Rock Mountain in 1897. Before the end of 1898, North Little Rock Real Estate Company of 120 Louisiana Street in Little Rock began marketing lots for African Americans in Military Heights, ranging in price from $9 to $69. Incentives for potential buyers included free roundtrips to the site and the promise of easy terms. Another draw, according to advertisements in March 1901, was a “Grand Balloon Ascension and Parachute Jump by World Famous Aeronauts” — the Padgett Brothers. From 1908 to 1937, streetcars on Main Street turned around at 22nd Street on the eastern edge of Military Heights.

Originally bounded by today’s Pershing Boulevard on the north, 22nd Street on the south, Orange Street on the east and the St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern (later Missouri Pacific) Railroad tracks on the west, Military Heights grew to include the Rose Hill, Laurel, Hill, Bourketown, and Mary J. Bourke
additions. The area north of Pershing up to 29th Street was part of the City of Levy from 1917 to 1946. The Military Heights neighborhood also included an area west of Main Street in the North Argenta Addition. South of Pershing, Military Heights was a part of the town of North Little Rock that incorporated in 1901 and then annexed Argenta in 1904 to form the city of North Little Rock. A number of African American families settled in the neighborhood. Some had moved from an older black neighborhood known as the West End near the Baring Cross railroad shops, but others migrated from outside the city or state. A large number came from the Scott plantation area. The railroads, mills, and factories provided many of the jobs that helped support Black families. Numerous Black-owned small businesses served the area. Because of segregation, African Americans could not go into white areas without permission to avoid suspicion or harassment. As a consequence, they built their own self-reliant communities.

The Odd Fellows Cemetery was established in Military Heights in 1896 and eventually had more than 700 African American graves. To the south on Main Street, Jackson Park at 20th Street served as a community center for meetings, picnics and special events. Black Republicans from Little Rock held a mass meeting in 1888 at Jackson Park to organize a Black Harrison and Morton Club. Jackson Park Elementary School at 2023 Maple Street provided instruction to Black students starting in the 1890s, but was replaced in 1904 by the Hillside Elementary School, formerly a white school. In 1899, a half dozen Black families and the Rev. D. Davis founded First Baptist Church of Military Heights. Many churches followed as the neighborhood grew. Among those were Second Baptist, Primitive Baptist, Mt. Sinai Christian, First Holiness Church of God, Lee’s Chapel, Spring Hill Methodist, Zion Methodist, Matthew’s Temple, Mt. Pleasant Baptist and the Church of Christ.

James P. Strickland, the principal of the Hickory Street school for Black pupils in the early 1900s, resided at 2102 Maple Street, according to city directories. Across the street stood a Queen Anne-style Victorian house built in 1895 by a famous Black jockey, Alonzo “Lonnie” Clayton. While only 15 years old, Clayton
rode Azra to victory in the 1892 Kentucky Derby. He lived with his family in the ornate two-story dwelling, which the Arkansas Gazette described as the “finest house” on the north side. Clayton finished second in the Kentucky Derby in 1893 and 1897, and third in 1895. He also won the Arkansas Derby in 1895 on Laureate. At his peak in 1895, Clayton notched 144 wins on 688 mounts on tracks across the U.S., according to Goodwin’s Official Turf Guide. But his fortunes, as those of other black jockeys, turned sour after 1900 when racial prejudice systematically eliminated black jockeys from horse racing. “It was bigotry, in the form of big money and physical threats and outright exclusion, which was as widely practiced as if it were writ, that explained the vanishing of the black jockeys,” turf historian Edward Hotaling wrote. Clayton was arrested at the Aqueduct track in New York in 1901 as he prepared to mount Golden Prince. Facing legal judgments and tax liens, Clayton sold his Queen Anne house in 1901, according to property records.

The area of Military Heights included within the Levy city limits was designated “South Levy” and sometimes “Laurel Heights” or the “colored district” in the Levy city council minutes. An entry in the minutes for October 1, 1923, noted that a resident, W.C. Thomas, addressed the Levy council about a need for better roads. There were only dirt roads and his request did little to change the conditions. Military Heights generally lacked utilities until Urban Renewal in 1964. Many residents lived in shanties and relied on outhouses or septic tanks. Electrical service was almost non-existent. Poor drainage made flooding in low areas a chronic problem when it rained.

In 1929, the North Little Rock School Board opened a new white high school in Military Heights. Black high school students who lived in the neighborhood became accustomed to walking past the grand Art Deco-style building of North Little Rock High School en route to Jones High School on East Ninth Street,
two miles away. In 1957, six Black students – Eugene Hall, Frank Henderson, William Mack Henderson, Richard Lindsey, Gerald Person, Harold Gene Smith — attempted to integrate the city’s all-white high school. Their efforts weren’t for naught. Black students desegregated the high school in 1966. Camp Pike opened in 1917 to the north of Military Heights to train some 50,000 raw recruits during World War I. By early 1940, the military installation had been renamed Camp Robinson. Tens of thousands of soldiers were trained there for combat in World War II. Many of the African American soldiers frequented night clubs in Military Heights and other parts of North Little Rock. In the 1950s, black airmen from the Little Rock Air Force Base also took in the club scene at places known as the Blue Diamond, Connie Cole’s, and the Jitterbug Inn in Military Heights. “It was rocking, the place was rocking,” a black resident remembered.

Military Heights was North Little Rock’s first Urban Renewal project. Total expenditures on the project were about $5.9 million before it closed out in 1973. North Little Rock officials regarded the area as one of the worst slums in the city and chose it first. But a North Little Rock planner, who recommended the neighborhood to start improvements, noted that not all of the 575 buildings in Military Heights deserved to be torn down. “There are many substantial homes in that area,” he said. “We would clear around them so that their property value would be improved.” The project covered about 140 acres and began in 1960 with plans to clear out slums in the vicinity of 27th Street (now Pershing Boulevard) to construct a civic center.

There was resistance to Urban Renewal’s condemnations in Military Heights. T.J. Deloney and his wife Mattie, who lived at 2620 Orange Street, disagreed with the amount of compensation for the taking of their house, which was where the city wanted to build a police and courts municipal building. But the couple was under a court order and had to vacate their home. After they left, Mayor William F. “Casey” Laman had the house burned to clear the property which Urban Renewal had sold to the city. In 1961, Willie H. Moore wrote the director of the federal Housing and Home Finance Agency to share concerns that the city of North Little Rock was using Urban Renewal to perpetuate segregation and prevent integration of North Little Rock High School. Moore’s home, too, was in the area targeted for clearance to build the civic center. Urban Renewal’s emphasis on commercial development to replace residential was opposed by community leaders Frank Henderson, Grant Henderson, John W. Smith, Joseph T. Smith, Cloyd Trent, and Willie J. Marshall. Their efforts persuaded city officials to focus more on replacing substandard housing with new or rehabilitated residential properties.

By 1967, the city had constructed paved streets in Military Heights and had finished all but the last few of the scheduled demolitions by year’s end, according to the Urban Renewal Agency’s 1967 annual report. Land acquisitions had been completed earlier and the agency reported having only one family to help relocate. Fourteen rehabilitation projects, both commercial and residential, totaled $46,315. The North Little Rock Urban Renewal agency estimated a total redevelopment value in 1967 of $2,289,000 — $344,000 for residential, $827,000 for commercial, and $1,118,000 for public, which included a new $600,000 science and home economics annex at North Little Rock High School on land the School District bought from Urban Renewal. Lee Chapel and Mt. Pleasant Baptist also had moved to new church buildings. In the annual report of 1968, the Urban Renewal agency noted that in addition to new streets and curbs and gutters, trees had been planted along the streetscape. Underground electric lines, a storm water drainage system and sanitary sewers were installed by 1968, according to that year’s annual report.

On 27th Street, which was renamed Pershing Boulevard in 1964 when the street was widened to four lanes, the city constructed its new civic center where residential dwellings had once stood. North Little Rock’s new Police and Courts building opened in late 1961, followed the next year by the dedication of a
new public library named after Mayor William F. (Casey) Laman at 29th and Orange streets. Connected with the new library was a plaza named for Laman, a fountain and a gazebo designed by noted architect E. Fay Jones. In 1963, the city Health Department moved into a new building at the civic center. Other public buildings included a new U.S. Post Office at Pershing and Orange Street in 1965 and the North Little Rock Community Center at Pershing and Willow Street in 1970. Among commercial developments was the 120-room Holiday Inn, built on the site of the old Odd Fellows Cemetery and opened in early 1963. A 90-room addition was added in 1973. Two other motels moved to Military Heights in the early 1970s, Passport Inns of America and Scottish Inns. Pharmacies, medical and diagnostic clinics and dental officers were also part of a mix of services in a new Doctors Village built along Pershing and along 26th Street, all near the Memorial Hospital that opened to the west of Military Heights in Boone’s Hill in 1961.

New houses, office buildings and a neighborhood park gave Military Heights a modern look. The city installed playground equipment and a basketball goal in the residential park. In 1971, the North Little Rock Housing Authority opened the 12-story Willow House high-rise for elderly and disabled residents. That same year, Sir Loin’s Inn restaurant opened at 801 W.29th and became one of North Little Rock’s most popular restaurants. The city of North Little Rock built a Water Department building next to the Willow House in the early 1970s and the city Planning Department located its office on 29th Street. In 1972, the North Little Rock Times moved its offices and production plant into a new building on 26th Street. In the early 2000s, the city of North Little Rock built the Patrick H. Hays Senior Center at Pershing and Willow.

John W. Smith, North Little Rock’s first black School Board member, moved to Military Heights in 1940 with his brother Joseph T. Smith. The two men were bricklayers and married sisters before starting their own business, Smith Brothers General Contractors. They were the first black general contractors licensed by the state in 1958.ii Smith Brothers built a number of residential houses, including John Smith’s own home and four of his neighbor’s homes. Smith Brothers also had numerous commercial and church building projects. The company built new church buildings for Mt. Pleasant Baptist and Lee Chapel on Urban Renewal land on 22nd Street in Military Heights. Other church projects included Bethel AME in Little Rock and North Little Rock, First Baptist in Military Heights, Shiloh Baptist, Morning Star Baptist and Eighth Street Baptist, among others.

The Smith Brothers company was active with numerous construction projects from the 1950s to 1980s. In the 1950s, Smith Brothers projects included masonry jobs for St. Patrick’s Catholic Church in North Little Rock, the Missouri Pacific Hospital laundry building in Little Rock and Sylvan Hills High School. General contracting jobs in the 1960s included the Shorter College administration building, Miller Funeral Home in Pine Bluff and Metropolitan Baptist and Mt. Pleasant Baptist in Little Rock. Smith Brothers’ projects in the 1970s included Ruffin and Jarrett Funeral Home and Mercy Nursing Home in Little Rock. Work in the 1980s took the company to the Little Rock Air Force Base where the Smiths created about 50 jobs on a $650,000 refueling and parking deck project. The company was also onethird partner in the Modern Properties joint venture of minority firms on construction of a $3.8 million hangar at the Little Rock Air Force Base. This was the largest minority construction contract in the state’s history at the time.

–Cary Bradburn

North Little Rock (Pulaski County)
AKA: Argenta (Pulaski County)
Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture
Latitude and Longitude: 34º46’10″N 092º16’01″W
Elevation: 280 feet
Area: 52.33 square miles (2020 Census)
Population: 64,591 (2020 Census)
Incorporation Date: July 17, 1901

North Little Rock is the state’s sixth-largest city (as of 2010), though once the second largest, with historical ties to the transportation industry and
the military. Before railroad companies spurred the growth of a town of mills, stockyards, and small businesses in the last three decades of the nineteenth century, the flood-prone north side of the Arkansas River across from Little Rock (Pulaski County) had few residents. But starting in the 1820s, its ferry and riverboat terminals prospered at a junction of roads on routes between St. Louis, Missouri, or Memphis, Tennessee, and Texas or Oklahoma. The military continues to have an economically viable relationship with central Arkansas, with Fort Logan H. Roots atop Big Rock Mountain since 1897; Camp Pike, established northwest of the city in 1917; Camp Robinson, headquarters of the Arkansas National Guard; and the nearby Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville (Pulaski County). In 1921, the U.S. Congress established Fort Roots as a veterans hospital, which is known today as the Eugene J. Towbin Healthcare Center.

Early Statehood through the Gilded Age
Chronic flooding on the low north bank, while good for farming, killed early efforts to found any large settlement in the nineteenth century. One venture that led to financial ruin, the town of DeCantillon, washed away in the flood of 1840. The northside junction was a major crossroads and campground for the relocation on the Trail of Tears to Oklahoma of 50,000 Native Americans in the 1830s and 1840s. During the Civil War, an unincorporated town known as Huntersville clustered around the Memphis and Little Rock Railway depot near the north approach to what is today the Junction Bridge.

Vestal Nursery, started in 1860, was operational for over a hundred years. In 1865, William E. Woodruff, founder of the Arkansas Gazette, tried to
sell lots on the platted town site of Quapaw immediately east of Huntersville, yet nothing more was heard of it beyond newspaper ads. The heirs of territorial and early statehood politician Thomas W. Newton Sr. platted the town of Argenta in 1866. The name, derived from the Latin “argentum” (silver), recognized Newton’s leadership during the late 1840s and early 1850s in the Southwest Arkansas Mining Company that operated the Kellogg lead and silver mine about ten miles north of Argenta. A majority of the population on the north side in 1870 was African American, including many former slaves. European immigrants began arriving in the 1870s to take the railroad jobs and other employment connected to the railroads, fueling development of Argenta. Mining at Big Rock quarry, as well as timber and agriculture, also benefited from the access to transportation. Argenta likely gained the unwanted nickname of “Dogtown” from this working-class origin. According to oral tradition, people from Little Rock dumped their unwanted dogs in North Little Rock, but the name probably predates this practice and was a disparagement of the north side’s blue-collar base. In the mid-1900s, Little Rock students often taunted North Little Rock students with chants of “Dogtown” at sporting and other events.

The Baring Cross Bridge (named after British financial backers Baring Brothers of London) opened for railroad, wagon, and foot traffic in 1873,
becoming the first permanent structure across the Arkansas River. It was followed by the Valley Route (Junction) Bridge in 1884, the free bridge in 1897, and the Rock Island Bridge in 1899. But, politically, the territory remained unincorporated until Little Rock forcibly annexed it in 1890 without giving northsiders a vote in the matter.

The town of North Little Rock was organized on July 1, 1901, as part of an elaborate scheme hatched by politician and businessman William C. Faucette to reclaim Argenta, which Little Rock called the Eighth Ward. The secret plan to reannex Argenta grew out of resentment by north side residents who never wanted to be a part of Little Rock. Faucette, an Eighth Ward representative on the Little Rock City Council, frequently complained of the lack of services provided to Argenta during the 1890s and early 1900s, despite the payment of taxes to the south-side city. North Little Rock’s southern boundary from 1901 to 1904 bordered the Eighth Ward along what is today Fifteenth Street. Legislation known as the Hoxie-Walnut Ridge bill was signed into law in 1903 and surprised Little Rock’s leaders as to its statewide implications—because any town or city within a mile of another had the ability to annex all or part of the other. Sponsors of the bill worked secretly with Faucette and other northside businessmen to disguise the bill’s true intent, which also provided that only electors in the areas to be merged could vote on annexation. Little Rock sued to try to stop the election. The courts allowed it to proceed on July 21, 1903, although the state Supreme Court sealed the results, which overwhelmingly favored annexation. The state Supreme Court upheld “Hoxie-Walnut Ridge” on February 6, 1904, and North Little Rock, a rural town of about 1,200, officially took control of the Eighth Ward on February 23. Three days later, North Little Rock, by proclamation of the governor, became a first-class city with a population of 8,203.

Early Twentieth Century
Faucette was elected the first mayor of the new city government on April 5, 1904. All three previous mayors of the old town of North Little Rock—Frank Cook, William Mara, and Michael Brown—guided the town and its five-member council from 1901 to 1904. The North Little Rock City Council, an eight-member board, first met on April 11, 1904, in the fire station at 506 Newton Avenue (now Main Street). In January 1906, the city adopted Argenta as its name but changed it back to North Little Rock in October 1917 at the urging of James P. Faucette, the first mayor’s brother and the city’s third mayor. The elder Faucette died in January 1914, after which the town built a new city hall and opened it in 1915 in his honor. The building at Main and Broadway is still the city’s seat of government.

The Argenta Race Riot of 1906 saw the death of three African-American men and the burning of several businesses and homes. The violence, which spanned a few days in October 1906, had its origins in the separate deaths of two black men at the hands of two white men the previous month.

West of Argenta, the railroad and farming community of Baring Cross (named after the bridge) incorporated in 1896, but in January 1905, it voted to join North Little Rock. Similarly, the settlement of Levy northwest of Argenta incorporated in 1917 with a mayor and five aldermen and became a second-class city in 1941. Levy (named for Morris Levy, a prominent Argenta merchant) was annexed voluntarily by North Little Rock in 1946. The unincorporated areas of Rose City, Dixie, Park Hill, Fort Roots, and others were annexed in 1946, enabling North Little Rock’s population to leap from 21,137 in 1940 to 39,552 in a special census in 1948. Beginning in the 1890s, Rose City and later Dixie were home to manufacturers, cotton oil mills, and many blue collar workers. The Jackson Cookie Company, founded in 1933, continued production until 2022.

Park Hill, perched on ridges above the river valley, was the brainchild of Justin Matthews Sr., who also spurred the development of the Lakewood and Sylvan Hills neighborhoods. Construction in Park Hill began in 1922 and blossomed until the Depression. Despite the economic downturn, which led to the closing of numerous small businesses in the downtown, Matthews’s company completed the future Lakewood’s six lakes in 1932. He also commissioned Mexican sculptor Dionicio Rodriguez, who had perfected the faux bois (fake wood) technique, for construction of the Old Mill in Lakewood’s Pugh Memorial Park in 1933. The mill, a replica, is one of the city’s major attractions and appeared in the opening credits of the 1939 movie Gone with the Wind. However, the Depression brought the development of Park Hill to a near stand-still and delayed the development of Lakewood until the latter half of the 1940s.

World War II through the Modern Era
After World War II, building activity picked up again, and Lakewood came to fruition in the 1950s and 1960s. Other residential developments in that period were Glenview, Ranch Estates in Amboy, and Indian Hills. In 1949, the city acquired 870 acres—and another 700 acres in 1955—from the federal government for development of Burns Park, one of the nation’s largest municipal parks. It was named for physician and parks advocate William Burns, a former North Little Rock mayor. William F. “Casey” Laman, mayor from 1958 to 1972 and 1979 to 1980, spearheaded the construction of ball fields, tennis courts, pavilions, and other park amenities. In the early 1960s, Laman relocated the city’s police and courts headquarters and library (named for Laman) to Pershing Boulevard. Memorial Hospital also opened on the hill above Pike Plaza. During the Laman administration, the city started five recreation centers, built a new main fire station as well as two branches and improved its sewer system and electric company.

Urban renewal from 1960 to 1980 modernized the city’s poorest neighborhoods, but it also displaced many residents, slowed population growth,
and razed most of the city’s historic downtown south of Broadway. McCain Mall, the state’s largest, opened in 1973 during a period of smaller mall openings in suburban areas. While suburban growth has continued, a downtown revitalization movement that began in the early 1990s has led to the restoration of historic properties and construction in older areas. The city’s oldest commercial building at 4th and Main has housed three pharmacies since its construction in 1887—Humphreys Drugs (1887–1903), Hall Drug Company (1903–1916), and Argenta Drug Company (1917–present). Alltel Arena opened near the river as a sports and entertainment venue in 1999; ten years later the name was changed to Verizon Arena due to a corporate merger, and it 2019 it was renamed yet again to Simmons Bank Arena.

In 2005, the city, under the leadership of Mayor Patrick Hays, launched the Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum with the USS Razorback, a
submarine commissioned in 1944, as its centerpiece. The submarine served in World War II and the Vietnam War under the U.S. flag and in the Cold War under the Turkish flag. Adjacent to the museum is the Beacon of Peace and Hope sculpture. In 2005, North Little Rock voters approved a two-year, one percent sales tax for construction of the Dickey-Stephens baseball stadium on land adjacent to the Broadway Bridge. It became the new home of
the Arkansas Travelers minor league baseball team. On March 10, 2026, the city opened a new downtown event center.

North Little Rock was one of many Arkansas locations affected by the Flood of 2019. On March 31, 2023, the city was hit by a tornado that killed one person and damaged large portions of the city, including Burns Park, before to the northeast.

Education
A rural school district that dated to the 1870s was replaced by the North Little Rock School District in 1901, shortly after North Little Rock incorporated. Northside High School (through grade eleven) was built in 1902. Argenta High School, built in 1912, became a junior high in 1929 with the opening of the present Art Deco–style North Little Rock High School building designed by noted architect George R. Mann. Scipio A. Jones High School, an African-American school, started teaching through the twelfth grade in 1928. Named for a civil rights activist and lawyer born a slave, Jones High closed in 1970 during the desegregation of North Little Rock schools. The district opened a new high school, Northeast, in 1970 but merged the city’s two high schools in 1990. Just days after the Little Rock Nine brought national attention to desegregation efforts in Little Rock, the North Little Rock Six faced similar circumstances outside North Little Rock High School. However, their attempts to desegregate that particular school proved unsuccessful.

North Little Rock public schools enroll more than 8,000 students, down from a peak of about 13,000 in the early 1970s. Immaculate Conception, Immaculate Heart of Mary, St. Patrick’s (the city’s oldest parochial school), and Central Arkansas Christian Schools offer private education. North Little Rock has a pair of two-year higher-learning institutions: Shorter College, which located in Argenta in 1897, and Pulaski Vocational Technical College (now University of Arkansas-Pulaski Technical College), which moved to the city in 1976.

Famous Residents
Among North Little Rock’s famous former residents are Jerry Jones, the Dallas Cowboys owner, and movie actresses Mary Steenburgen and Joey Lauren Adams. Al Bell, former owner of Stax Records, was part of the Memphis music scene, developing rhythm and blues legends such as Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, and Booker T. and the MGs. Samuel P. Massie Jr., whose parents taught school while he grew up in North Little Rock, was recognized as one of the top seventy-five chemists of the twentieth century.

Additional residents of note have included jockey Alonzo “Lonnie” Clayton, writer and producer Paula Marie Martin, author and musician Mary Myrtle Medearis, stunt double Monica Staggs, educator Curtis Sykes, and biochemist Virginia Anne Rice Williams.

Attractions
Baker House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978, the Justin Matthews Jr. House was listed in 1990, and the Argenta Historic District was listed in 1993. The Arkansas National Guard Museum is free and open to the public. North Little Rock is home to a municipal airport as well as one of two Arkansas State Veterans Cemeteries for the interment of military veterans and selected family members. Crystal Hill is a bluff consisting of sandstone, shale, and sparkling iron pyrite; it also shares the name with the nearby neighborhood. RiverFest, a
music festival, was held on both sides of the river for many years on Memorial Day weekend.

Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture

The Park Hill Historic District in North Little Rock recognizes the city’s first planned suburban development and its growth inspired by businessman Justin Matthews Sr. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000, following a survey by historian Sandra Taylor Smith, the district includes 568 properties from two distinct periods of development: 1920s Craftsman Bungalows and Period Revival styles, and 1940s Minimal Traditional. The historic designation is strictly honorary; not subject to regulations regarding architectural change.

In 1921 Matthews acquired significant acreage in the sparsely populated, wooded “high country” north of the city limits. With the Broadway Bridge under construction and the time being ripe for development, Matthews announced the debut of Park Hill in 1922. He advertised the community as a “second Pulaski Heights” but with higher elevation, better views, cooler temperatures and health benefits. Unlike Pulaski Heights, well-paved and accessible by streetcar, Park Hill was remote and lacking in streets. With the growing popularity of automobiles, Matthews set about improving roadways in and around Park Hill.

To jump start his development, Matthews’ Park Hill Land Company financed home sales with 10 percent down and pay outs for construction costs that ranged from $3,000 to $7,000. Lots of 2.5, 5 and 10 acres at $50 each were offered as miniature country estates.
The Arkansas Gazette reported on April 30, 1922, that “streets are being laid out and arc lights are to be installed. Yesterday workmen were digging holes for street light poles and in a few weeks Park Hill will have all the modern conveniences of a regular suburb.”

Electric lines were installed, a new bus line was in service and work began on a water system in 1923. Matthews built Park Hill Elementary School, which opened in 1925 after he donated it to the North little Rock School District. Matthews sat as commissioner on
improvement districts for the Broadway and Main Street bridges and North Little Rock’s Main Street viaduct, facilitating traffic northward to Park Hill. Matthews also served on Arkansas’ first Highway Commission and saw to the paving of the Arkansas Missouri
Highway which ran through Park Hill.

Matthews employed about 200 people, including an architect, brick mason, road engineer and landscaper. Craftsman architecture, nationally popular in the 1920s, is predominate in Park Hill. Also found are English Revival cottages with steep gable roofs, gable porches and tapered chimneys. Spanish Revival styles feature stucco walls, flat roofs, terraces, patios and decorative ceramic tiles. More than 200 homes had been built by 1927 when Matthews launched a high-end development known as Edgemont in Park Hill. Listed on
the National Register in 1992, Edgemont includes 11 grand-scale homes built from 1927 to 1931.

While the Great Depression halted most Park Hill housing construction until the 1940s, public projects forged ahead. Construction of the Park Hill Fire Station and Water Company buildings at a cost of $8,000 in 1938 was a joint effort by Park Hill and the Works Progress Administration. Designed by the Brueggeman, Swaim and Allen architectural firm, the Mediterranean style Fire and Water Company buildings feature red tile roofs, arched windows and decorative cast concrete detailing. Located in the 3400 block of Magnolia Street, the complex was listed on the National Register in 1993. A theater, pharmacy, grocery and post office were among the first tenants in a community shopping center that opened in 1941 in the 3400 block of the Arkansas Missouri Highway (renamed John F. Kennedy Boulevard in 1963). Although Park Hill had a fire department in 1939, the unincorporated subdivision had no fire truck or equipment until 1944 – two years before annexation to North Little Rock. Its water company, managed by Edward A. McCain, merged with North Little Rock in 1959.

More than 100 homes were built in Park Hill in the early 1940s with the influx of soldiers at Camp Robinson in World War II. Demand intensified with the return of veterans and readily available government-backed loans. Small, affordable homes were popular, including 84 prefabricated houses manufactured and moved on site by Bralei Homes Inc. Street widening and commercial development on JFK Blvd. in the 1960s razed historic houses that were replaced by fast food restaurants. Subsequently, Park Hill residents and business owners have explored ways to boost economic vitality and promote the area’s historic appeal. A federal grant awarded to the North Little Rock History Commission in 2010 supported a branding and marketing campaign for the benefit of historic Park Hill.

Cary Bradburn
North Little Rock History Commission

The Park Hill Historic District is historically significant to the city of North Little Rock, Arkansas, as that city’s first planned suburban development. Development of Park Hill is attributed to the inspiration of local businessman Justin Matthews, whose contributions to the city were instrumental to the growth of North Little Rock and the Greater Little Rock area. The architectural significance of the Park Hill Historic District is diverse, yet typical of two distinct periods of development –1922 to the early 1930s and the immediate post-World War II years. An eclectic mix of 1920s Craftsman Bungalows and picturesque Period Revival styles combine with the simplicity of 1940s Minimal Traditional style housing to reflect distinct periods of
intense growth in the neighborhood. The process by which Park Hill was platted and developed as an unincorporated area, and then in 1946 annexed to North Little Rock is typical of many early suburban developments throughout the United States.

Aside from a few farms and orchards, the earliest development in the neighborhood known as Park Hill was in 1922, when local businessman Justin Matthews acquired a large tract of heavily wooded property atop a steep hill about a mile north of the city limits of North Little Rock.

Development of Park Hill in 1922 was concurrent with suburban growth all across the United States, particularly with the larger capital city of Little Rock, just across the Arkansas River. However, North Little Rock had come a long way in keeping up with national growth, particularly in contemporaneous development with Little Rock. Although the city of Little Rock had been settled as early as 1819 and in 1821 was sizable enough that it was chosen as the capital city of Arkansas, the north bank of the Arkansas River had remained largely unsettled.

The land on the north side was far different from Little Rock in that it was, for the most part lowlying and swampy. It was not until the first railroad line through Arkansas was constructed (the Memphis-Little Rock) that the north side of the river began to develop. The north side had a number of attempted identities such as the “Town of Argenta” and a federal post office was established. The name Argenta came from a Latin derivative of the word meaning silver, since silver had been “discovered” about ten miles north of the river. Argenta was a railroad town, built around and centered on the railroad industry. As the only Central Arkansas rail terminal, Argenta had a transient nature due to the constant activity surrounding the arrival and departure of trains. Restaurants, hotels and saloons developed to accommodate the numbers of travelers. Streets were unpaved and muddy much of the time and city services were minimal. Main Street, with its saloons, was “off limits” to soldiers stationed at nearby Fort Roots Army Post.

In December 1880, the Arkansas Gazette newspaper called for the residents of the north side to “get control of the lawless conditions.” Argenta applied to incorporate as a city of the First Class in 1890, but instead the government of Little Rock elected to annex the north side of the river. So in 1890, the town of Argenta Arkansas became the Eighth Ward of the City of Little Rock. By the turn of the century, residents of Little Rock’s Eighth Ward were ready to reclaim their town. As a result of some clever politics, a bill was manipulated through the Arkansas Legislature in 1903 called the Hoxie-Walnut Ridge Bill. This bill allowed for any city whose boundaries are contiguous to another to annex that city. Meanwhile on the north side of the river
a city had been established and incorporated called North Little Rock. Its boundaries began just north of the Eighth Ward (Argenta) and extended to what is now 22nd Street. Less than a month after passage of the Walnut Ridge-Hoxie bill, the city of North Little Rock applied to annex Little Rock’s Eighth Ward (formerly the Town of Argenta). Little Rock strongly objected to the annexation application and after many months of dispute the issue went to the Arkansas Supreme Court where it was upheld: North Little Rock could annex the Eighth Ward of Little Rock. In 1904 the City of North Little Rock annexed Argenta and once again the north side of the river was its own city.

Because of the turmoil over this dispute, little growth was seen on the north side of the Arkansas River until 1904. Businessmen and leaders of the united city in North Little Rock began to effect unprecedented growth. Prohibition eliminated the problem saloon establishments in the downtown and the city emerged as a growing industrial center in Arkansas.

Justin Matthews
Once of the many people who took interest in the booming growth of North Little rock at this time was Justin Matthews. The son of a circuit judge, Justin Matthews was born in 1876 near Monticello in Southeast Arkansas. He was trained as pharmacist over the strong objections of his father, who wanted him to study law. In 1901 Justin Matthews married Agnes Somers, who proudly traced her lineage to George Washington and had a sizable inheritance. At the age of 24, Matthews sold the three drug stores he had acquired near Monticello and moved with his new bride to Central Arkansas.

Matthews’ first venture in Central Arkansas was the organization and establishment of the Rose City Cotton Oil Mill, which was built near the eastern edge of North Little Rock in 1902. He was president of this company for many years. Matthews showed an interest in real estate and within a few years had accumulated a considerable amount of property on both sides of the Arkansas River. One of his many purchases of land included six lots on Main Street in Argenta (North Little Rock). In 1910 Matthews built a two-story brick building with basement and steam heat that covered an entire city block. Known as the “Matthews Block,” the construction of the building was the precursor for much growth in the business district on the city’s Main Street. A year later, in 1914, a new city administration building was constructed. Other substantial development in the city began in earnest at this time.

In 1912 Justin Matthews turned his attention to public projects. The only thoroughfares that were surfaced in Argenta (North Little Rock) at that time were Main Street, running north and south, and Washington Avenue, running east from Main Street. Other thoroughfares in the city were so poorly drained that water stood on them for several days after each heavy rain. The unpaved streets were covered with a soil that was almost pure sand, making automobile traffic difficult as their tires dug into the loose sand.

Justin Matthews conceived a plan for street paving and drainage and in 1913 persuaded the Argenta (North Little Rock) City Council to establish two street-paving improvement districts. One of the improvement districts was to pave the streets running north and south and the other was to pave those running east and west and to install underground drainage tiles to relieve the flat sections of the city from surface water. The proposed paving would make the sandy street usable for all types of vehicular travel. Matthews is given credit for the difficult job of obtaining signatures of the majority of landowners on petitions presented to the city. In January 1913, the Argenta (North Little Rock) City council established two improvement districts. Matthews was appointed to the Board of Commissioners, whose job was to oversee the projects. Street Paving District Nos. 15 and 16 laid 152 blocks of concrete pavement in the city in 1913. The streetpaving project was especially controversial because the technology was fairly new. This
endeavor has been recognized as the world’s first big concrete paving job, making Argenta (North Little Rock) the leader in the concrete pavement field. Much of the credit for this project is given to Justin Matthews, who as the organizer and a commissioner on both districts, inspected
construction with daily visits to the work site. An editorial in the North Little Rock Times in 1944 extolled the significance of the street paving stating….”it lifted us out of the mud and water. A transformation of our city immediately began to take place… Cheap shacks gave way to modern, attractive homes and our community rapidly changed from a gloomy, dusty, muddy backward town into a beautiful modern city.” This 1944 Times editorial quoted from an article entitled “Every Community Needs a Justin Matthews”, which had then recently been published in a “national construction publication.”

Mayor William Faucette then asked Matthews to plan a Sewer District for the city. Formed in 1914 with Justin Matthews appointed as a commissioner, the sanitary and storm water sewer system district provided a citywide system of storm and sanitary lines that emptied into an eightfoot diameter main to the Arkansas River. This drainage system was essential to the growth of a city, which was largely below the high-water level.

Justin Matthews is also given credit for negotiating a contract with Merchants Lighting Co. (later Arkansas Power and Light Co.) in 1913. It was arranged for North Little Rock to purchase current from the Merchants Co. At a low rate to operate the North Little Rock-owned electric plant. This contract was worded so the successors and assigns of the Merchants Lighting Co. Would be forever bound by the contract. A few years later, when Merchants Lighting Co. Sold to Arkansas Power and Light Co., they tried to cancel the contract with North Little Rock. The issue was taken to court, but the contract was upheld and Arkansas Power and Light Co. Was forced to continue delivering current to the north side at the low rate established in the 1913 contract.

Of the most outstanding contributions to the growth and development of Central Arkansas by Justin Matthews was his role in obtaining the construction of two reinforced concrete bridges across the Arkansas River. The Broadway-Main Street Bridge Commission was established in 1917 to plan and construct two new bridge s across the Arkansas River. Matthews was appointed to the six-member commission and served as its secretary. Completion of the Broadway Bridge in 1923 was heralded withe celebrations, fireworks, speeches and a grand parade. The Broadway Bridge replaced a bridge that had been weakened during its many years of use and was not safe for more than one vehicle at a time. The bridge project was a joint effort of Little Rock and North Little Rock alleviated the long-time problems associated with crossing the river between the two cities. Four years later, in 1927 the commission directed construction of a second concrete bridge across the river, this time to connect the two cities’ Main Streets. Also in 1927 a new concrete viaduct over the railroad tracks was opened on Main Street between Ninth and Thirteenth streets.

Park Hill Development
Despite the improvements Justin Matthews had spearheaded, land was still cheap in the railroad town. Matthews began to buy land in the city, much of it from the Missouri Pacific Railroad for taxes. But as astute businessman, he recognized the potential for growth in the highlands north of the city limits and began purchasing large tracts there from landowners. The first few blocks in the hilly regions north of the city limits was platted by Justin Matthews in 1921. Early in 1922 Matthews announced the opening of the residential subdivision he had named “Park Hill.” One of Justin Matthews’ grandsons stated that his grandfather’s view, as a speculator, of this “high country” was that he could sell the land cheap and make a profit on the
home construction. The time was ripe for development north of the city limits in 1922. That same year the War Department ruled that Camp Pike (northwest of the city) be turned over to the state for its National Guard units. And not coincidentally, the Broadway Bridge was almost completed and ready for easy automobile access to the north side of the river.

Accessibility was key to residential development on the edges of the city. Unlike the contemporaneous residential development in Little Rock’s Pulaski Heights, which was reached by a streetcar line, Matthews worked toward making Park Hill accessible by automobile. As the second major suburban development in Central Arkansas, Park Hill was the first to rely solely on automobile transportation.

However, due to poor road conditions, it was still difficult to reach the Park Hill development. A favorite story about Matthews’ technique for early buyers visiting Park Hill regarded how he would greet perspective buyers. At the foot of the hill, he would jump on the running board to help give their wheels some traction and go into his sales pitch on the merits of living in Park Hill all the way up the hill.

After completion of the Main Street and Broadway bridges, Justin Matthews was appointed by the Gov. John Martineau to the state’s first highway commission. Paving of the Arkansas- Missouri Highway (which coincidentally became the main thoroughfare through Matthews’ Park Hill development) was one of the first projects undertaken by the new commission. It assured easy automobile access to Park Hill.

An article in the Arkansas Gazette in April 1922 reported that … “streets are being laid out and arc lights are to be installed. Yesterday workmen were digging holes for street light poles and in a few weeks Park Hill will have all the modern conveniences of a regular suburb.” Less than three months later the newspaper reported that the electric lines in Park Hill were almost complete and work had begun on the water system.

Early sales in Park Hill were geared to move the first 760 tract of land, which had been subdivided into two-and-one-half, five-and-ten-acre tracts. Advertisements touting miniature country estates with city advantages appealed to the businessmen who worked in the city. Each tract had over 300 feet fronting a good road and was marked with white-painted, creosoted stakes at all four corners. Ten of the tracts were fenced and had a small orchard containing apple, peach, plum and cherry trees and three varieties of grapes planted on the rear of the properties. Prices were $50 an acre, considerably cheaper than in other developing large tracts of land in Park Hill, owners would get a desirable place to live with the potential to sub-divide the land at a
future date as its value increased.

Park Hill was advertised as a “second Pulaski Heights” but with many advantages over the Little Rock suburban development. Park Hill was nearer the business district of Little Rock and North Little Rock, had a greater elevation, and thus cooler temperatures with added health benefits. Park Hill was more level than land in Pulaski Heights, with better views. It was also pointed out that in commuting to and from work from Park Hill to downtown, one would not have to face the sun in the morning and afternoon as they did during the east/west commute from Pulaski Heights.

Some of the first advertisements for Matthews’ development lured buyers to Park Hill through an almost unheard-of offer in the 1920s. The Park Hill Land Company, in an effort to erect the first ten homes in the development offered the potential buyer the chance to pay 10 percent of the cost of the home and pay out the remainder on a monthly basis as they would pay rent. The buyer could select plans for homes costing from $3,000 to $7,000 to suit their individual tastes. This offer, made for only the first ten buyers, was an ingenious way to “jump-start” the project and assure that the type of houses intended for the development would be built.

By June 1922 six homes were under construction, seven more were sold and in the planning stage. The first houses constructed in Park Hill, as well as hundreds of subsequent others built in the 1920s were modest renditions of popular architectural styles being built all over the country. The Craftsman and the Craftsman Bungalow were the predominant house styles built in the early years of Park Hill development. Scattered throughout the area, though, are modest versions of the popular Period Revival styles such as English Revival and Spanish Colonial Revival.

In April of 1923, barely one year after the official opening of the Park Hill Addition, thirty homes had been constructed and another six were under construction. Matthews announced the opening of another 400-acre section of Park Hill. Eleven blocks in the western area of the new section comprised some of the most picturesque portions of Park Hill. These blocks, whose western edge was Ridge Road, afforded the homeowner views of downtown and the mountain ranges to the west.

Also in April 1923 the Park Hill Land Co. Announced that a new “modern” bus line would be put into service within two weeks. The buses seated eighteen and ran between Park Hill and downtown Little Rock at ten-minute intervals. And to add to the desirability of Park Hill, pipes for gas lines were laid in 1923.

Justin Matthews had formed the “Park Hill Land Company” to exclusively market and sell home sites in that development. The “Justin Matthews Company” extended Matthews’ land developments to other areas in Central Arkansas. In the mid 1920s the Justin Matthews Company was running advertisements for three separate residential suburban developments: Park Hill, Sylvan Hills and Westwood. Sylvan Hills (now included in the incorporated city of Sherwood) was a 10,000-acre development “on the highland” north of Park Hill, accessed by the paved Arkansas-Missouri Highway. Westwood was southwest of Little Rock’s city limits. “Matthews built” homes were advertised as quality construction with the best of materials and workmanship built to “endure the ravages of time.” These homes featured such luxuries as builtin medicine cabinets, wall-heated towel bars, hardwood floors and French doors. A nameplate was installed in each home which the company constructed, reading “Built by Justin Matthews,
Real Estate and Investments, Builders of Homes That Endure the Ravages of Time.” In Park Hill this claim has proven to be true.

Reflective of the professionalism of its founder, the Justin Matthews Company was a highly efficient and profitable operation. The company’s close to 200 employees included an architect/builder, Frank Carmean; a brick mason, Julius Bender; a road construction engineer, Robert Massey and a horticulturist /landscape artist, Oscar Wilhelm. All of these professional members of the company resided within the Park Hill development.

Just two years after the Park Hill development opened, growth was so great that there was need for an elementary school. Justin Matthews, in his visionary way, felt the suburban development would be handicapped by lack of a school. So in early 1924 Matthews offered to build a school and give it to the North Little Rock School District if they would operate it. The school board and Matthews struck a deal and in 1924 at a cost of $15,635, on land Matthews donated that was valued at $5,000, Park Hill Elementary School was built. The school officially opened in February 1925. Reflective of the steady growth in the area, it was expanded in 1930, 1948 and 1953. The building is non-contributing to the historic district due to inappropriate replacement of windows in the main building in the early 1990s; nevertheless the construction of Park Hill Elementary School solidified the presence of this suburban development and it continues to be one of the strong assets of the neighborhood.

Steady Growth
The success and growth of Park Hill steadily continued. Now– with the added attraction of a school, bus service, and paved streets– more than 200 homes had been built by the middle of 1925. More than 80 percent of Matthews original Park Hill holdings had been sold by 1927 so after five years of steady home sales in Park Hill, Justin Matthews opened a restricted addition, known as “Edgemont inPark Hill.” Matthews felt the time was right in 1927 to introduce a grander scale development that would compete for the upper-middle-class and upper-income residents of Central Arkansas. Most of these affluent buyers were purchasing homes in the restricted additions of Pulaski Heights. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1992, the Edgemont multiple-property listing includes eleven of the sixteen picturesque grandscale homes built by the Matthews Company between 1927 and 1931 for affluent residents. Matthews published a brochure advertising this restricted addition in the desirable Park Hill development. Unfortunately for Matthews and the Edgemont development, the Great Depression brought the building in this area to a virtual halt. Construction did not begin in the area again until after World War II.

Although “Edgemont” is not currently included in the boundaries of the Park Hill Historic District, one of the most important components of the physical character of the entire Park Hill neighborhood was brought into the Matthews Company as a result of Edgemont’s opening. Frank Carmean, whose background was in building construction, was hired by Justin Matthews to design the large homes planned for this high-dollar area of Park Hill. Carmean was billed as the Justin Matthews Company’s “architect.” Matthews sent Carmean on a tour of several southwestern cities– Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, El Paso, Los Angeles– “to obtain the very latest ideas in design and construction…” As a result, the Spanish Colonial design influence is prevalent in Park Hill. Although Carmean was brought into the company to work on houses in Edgemont, his designs are found throughout the Park Hill neighborhood. Spanish Revival style examples designed by Carmean are found at Ridge Road, Olive and Magnolia. Other examples of his designs are located on Plainview Circle. Written in the sidewalk in front of these houses are the words “Carmean Did It.” The Plainview Circle houses designed by Carmean are renditions of the English Revival style and feature prominent gables, green tile roofs and elaborate stone walls and site features.

During the years of the Great Depression, there was little construction in Park Hill, but by the late 1930s several notable projects took place. Park Hill residents had needed a fire department for the obvious reasons and insurance purposes. Through a joint effort of the Park Hill Fire Department and the Works Progress Administration, “modern” fire station and water company office buildings were constructed 1938. Listed on the National Register in 1933, the Park Hill Station and Water Company Complex includes six historic structures. It is dominated by a twostory fieldstone veneered fire station building and a similarly styled one-story building constructed to house the offices of the Park Hill Water Company.

The local architectural firm of Brueggeman, Swaim and Allen designed the Fire Station and Water Company buildings. The design of both buildings was strongly influenced by the Mediterranean style as seen by the red tile roofs, arched windows and decorative cast concrete detailing. Constructed at the same time were two 100 foot by 44 foot concrete water reservoirs and two fieldstone pump houses. Located in the western region of Park Hill this complex occupies ten lots in the middle of Block 33 of the Park Hill Addition. Now owned by the City of North Little Rock, this historic complex remains an important landmark in the Park Hill neighborhood.

Also designed by Brueggeman, Swaim and Allen in the late 1930s, and just one (extra long) block from the Park Hill Fire Station and Water Company Complex is the McCord House at 3300 Magnolia. This Mediterranean styled one-story home with rear basement is located on a corner lot. The McCord House is clad in native fieldstone and features a red tile roof and casement windows. The highlights of the house is a screened porch with arched openings on each side and a fanciful wood simulated spider- web complete with wooden spiders.

The Park Hill Theater and Community Center in the 3400 block of John F. Kennedy Blvd. (formerly the Arkansas Missouri Highway) was constructed in 1939-1940 and was another design by architects Brueggeman, Swaim and Allen. The complex, often referred to as North Little Rock’s first multiple-store complex, originally housed a drug store, grocery, post office and movie theater. Edward F. Brueggeman headed this local architectural firm, which was responsible for he design of some of the most notable buildings in Park Hill, the Knoop house in Pulaski Heights’ Hillcrest section. The firm was best known for its designs for Malco theater buildings nationwide in the 1930s. In the early 1940s, the Brueggeman firm designated a large portion of the new construction at Camp Joseph T. Robinson, north of North Little Rock’s city limits. One member of the Brueggeman firm, Guy W. Swaim, was a resident of Park Hill. Swaim built the Minimal Traditional style house at 115 Cherry Hill in 1941 and it is still occupied by his widow.

World War II- era Development
Events in Europe in the summer of 1939 and the resulting preparation for impending war had a direct and immediate financial effect on the city of North Little Rock. President Franklin Roosevelt, in the fall of 1939, increased the size of the then small Regular Army and al combat units of the stateside army were ordered into the field for intensive training. Northwest of North Little Rock, Camp Pike– renamed Camp Joseph T. Robinson in honor of Arkansas’s United States senator after his death in 1937– was selected to house a training division. In early 1940 Army engineer and quartermaster units started arriving at the camp to formulate plans to build the camp to house upwards of 50,000 troops.

Knowing that housing would soon become one of its most pressing needs, North Little Rock officials formed a housing authority to operate under the guidance of the Unite States Housing Authority. Demand for housing near Camp Robinson became so great that in 1940 North Little Rock Mayor O.W. Neely warned property owners in the city against charging exorbitant rents.

The impact of the war effort brought a large increase in population. The need for housing in Little Rock and North Little Rock, specifically near Camp Robinson, was tremendous. Despite wartime shortages of construction materials over 100 homes were constructed in Park Hill between 1939 and 1941 to meet the demand for housing.

The close of the war saw veterans returning to North Little Rock, to find a housing shortage that continued through the end of the decade. With the end of war efforts, the federally mandated limitations on availability of construction materials were lifted. Post World War II entrepreneurs with high aspirations and a newly discovered belief in mass production emerged all across the country. The returning Gis’ needs for housing and government-backed loans for these veterans started a nationwide building boom. The demand was for affordable housing that could be cheaply and quickly produced.

Prefabrication of housing in the nineteenth century had been defined by the mass production of interchangeable building parts. The Great Depression intensified American resolve to massproduce houses, much like Henry Ford manufactured automobiles. America had, in 1946, a new mind set toward mass-produced items, having seen the benefits and efficiency of the manufacturing process first hand in the World War II effort.

Bralei Homes
Responding to the immense need for housing that could be quickly produced, a newly formed business located in North Little Rock announced its opening in early 1946. This company, Bralei Homes, Inc., advertised small, affordable houses that could be built in only a few weeks. The full-page advertisement in the North Little Rock Times on February 15, 1946, announcing formation of the company showed the first four house plans offered by Bralei Homes Inc. These homes ranged in price from $3,988 to $5,137. Sales of Bralei homes were targeted to returning veterans and FHA financial assistance was practically guaranteed. The ad stated:

“Here is the announcement that will thrill the heart of every home loving man or woman in Greater Little Rock. Right on schedule come the first BRALEI Homes from the drafting boards. Procurement of materials for these homes had started. Bralei Homes will be Precision. Built to exacting specifications. Here are several designs from which to select. Several more will be offered soon. Bralei Homes will be built by factory production methods in the big BRALEI factory and removed to your own building lot for erection, where component parts will be assembled and lost motion and wasteful methods eliminated……….BRALEI Homes are conventional in appearance, permanently built, with no indication of the production methods used. ………”

The name “Bralei” was a combination of the president and vice-president of the company’s names- Buford Bracy and Paul M. Leird. Secretary-Treasurer of the company was C.V. “Cotton” Barnes.

The Bracy family was well established in home construction business. In the late 1920s, Bracy Real Estate and Building Company erected many of the houses in the Pulaski Heights neighborhoods, particularly Hillcrest. Bracy Real Estate’s “designer” was Buford Bracy, son of the company’s founder and president, Eugene D. Bracy. Buford Bracy was well known in the Greater Little Rock area for his design of picturesque brick and stone veneered homes in Little Rock’s first suburban development. Paul Leird was owner of Leird Lumber Company in Little Rock. The combination of established design talents, experience in real estate development and the direct availability of building materials was of great value to the success of the Bralei
Company.

Despite the fact that Bufor Bracy was well known for his home designs, he did not design the Bralei houses. Instead, Bralei Company utilized some of the most talented architects in Arkansas to design the Bralei houses. The stature of the architects who designed the Bralei homes were, no doubt, a great boost to the credibility of the company. Architects of such stature as Frank Ginocchio and Ed Cromwell (successor of the firm founded by architect Charles L. Thompson), H. Ray Burks & Bruce Anderson, Yandell Johnson, and the familiar-to-Park-Hill firm of Brueggeman, Swaim and Allen. These architects were among the most prominent in the state and had among their ranks designed monumental structures such as courthouses, business
buildings and governmental buildings. The partnership of Frank Ginocchio and Edwin Cromwel was responsible for the design of the Arkansas Governor’s Mansion in 1949, only three years after the Bralei Company opened.

According to the North Little Rock Times in April 1946, just three months after the company announced their opening, 84 Bralei Homes had been constructed in Park Hill. Construction demand was huge in Park Hill and Justin Matthews provided plenty of new building sites by continuing to open more sections of his land holdings. Through the early 1950s many more Bralei Homes were constructed, comprising the majority of homes built in Park Hill in the immediate post war years.

Despite the fact that at the close of World War II Park Hill was a sizable development, it was not a part of the city of North Little Rock. The city had wanted to annex Park Hill for a number of years, but residents, led by Justin Matthews, had rejected the attempts. One of the reasons for Park Hill’s rapid growth had been that it had all of the city services– school, paved streets, water and sewers– but no city taxes. Unlike other unincorporated areas outside of North Little Rock, such as Levy, Park Hill never formed any type of community government.

The North Little Rock City Council unanimously approved an ordinance providing for the annexation of the Park Hill area in February 1946. A general election was held in April 1946 and citizens of North Little Rock overwhelmingly approved the annexation. It was estimated that about 5,000 residents were added to the city with the annexation of Park Hill.

Park Hill continued to grow through the 1950s as it expanded further north. Justin matthews’ newest residential development in the 1950s was the Lakewood area of North Little Rock. A part of his original plan for residential development, Matthews had in 1931 formed the “Lakewood Development Co.” to develop this area in the hills northeast of Park Hill. As part of the Lakewood project, eleven dams were constructed, creating recreational lakes. Included in the project was construction of Pugh’s Mill (commonly known as the “Old Mill” and listed on the National Register in the Arkansas Sculptures of Dionicio Rodriguez multiple-property nomination on December 4, 1986). It was built as a tourist attraction to lure potential buyers into the Lakewood area. However, the construction of homes in Lakewood did not begin in earnest until after World War II.

The Park Hill neighborhood did benefit from the proposed Lakewood development in the 1930s when Justin Matthews brought in Mexican-American sculptor Dionicio Rodriguez. He designed and created the Old Mill sculptures using his characteristic “rustico” style of work that was constructed of reinforced concrete. In addition to his artistic legacy at the Old Mill, Rodriguez also created sculptures for Crestview Park, at the foot of Park Hill. A rusticated shelter and a fallen tree bridge with bent tree limb railings and a plank floor are located in this small park which was immediately adjacent to the road leading to the top of Park Hill.

Though the majority of houses in the historic portions of Park Hill had been built by the mid- 1950s, there continued to be sporadic new construction on the few unsold lots, or on large tracts that were divided.

The Park Hill area of North Little Rock continued to grow as the city grew northward. The 1960s brought about considerable commercial development on John F. Kennedy Boulevard, which historically was mixed residential and commercial usage. In the 1960s a number of historic homes were demolished along this thoroughfare and replaced with “fast food” businesses. In fact, one of the first McDonald’s in Arkansas was built at 3217 J.F.K. Blvd. Residents from all around Arkansas flocked to eat at the new restaurant. During the 1960s and 1970s other changes to Park Hill’s commercial thoroughfare were made, with construction of small-scale doctor’s office buildings and service stations. A number of the historic residential properties on J.F.K. were converted to commercial use and remain today.

Despite the fact that time has not stood still in Park Hill, the neighborhood’s visual character overwhelmingly derives from two distinct periods of intense growth: the early development period of the 1920s, and the immediate post-World War II simplicity of affordable housing for an exploding housing market. Containing 563 houses and buildings, of which 481 were constructed during the years between 1922 and 1950, the composition of the Park Hill Historic District parallels that of the country and popular domestic architecture in these periods. The product of one of the most ingenious businessmen in the Central Arkansas area, Park Hill is a legacy to developer Justin Matthews. Mr. Matthews, in the process of creating his suburban development, was responsible for some of the most important city improvements in North Little Rock. Park Hill remains a viable and much desired neighborhood, comprised of a wide cross-section of residents. Because of this, Park Hill has remained a stable area since its creation in 1922, with
little demotion or construction of incompatible homes, other than along the neighborhoods’ commercial thoroughfare J.F.K. Boulevard.

The Park Hill Historic District
Boundaries
Boundary determinations of the Park Hill Historic District were based on a comprehensive twoyear survey of every structure in a defined portion of the neighborhood sponsored by the City of North Little Rock and funded through matching Certified Local Government grants. Although the surveyed area reflects the majority of the historic Park Hill neighborhood, sections that were largely developed after 1950 were excluded from the survey and consequent historic district. The surveyed area is roughly bounded on the south by John F. Kennedy Boulevard and East “A” Street, on the north by West “H” Street, and East “D” Street, Ridge Road on the west and Plainview Circle on the east.

Included within the Park Hill Historic District are 568 houses, buildings, and structures; nine of the buildings are in the Park Hill Fire Station and Water Company Complex, two are concrete park structures designed by sculptor Dionicio Rodriguez, nineteen are commercial buildings, one is a public school, one is a public clubhouse and the remaining 536 properties are residential. Boundaries of the district directly correspond to the surveyed area and although the ratio of noncontributing to contributing structures is 49 percent contributing to 51 percent non-contributing, it has been determined that these district boundaries contain the most significant portions of Park Hill first platted and developed as North Little Rock’s first suburban neighborhood. Of the 276 buildings considered non-contributing, an overwhelming majority are frame historic houses constructed in the late 1930s and 1940s in the Minimal Tradition style of architecture. A large portion of these have been covered with artificial siding.

Overview
The area known as Park Hill is located on a steep hill north of what were the city limits of North Little Rock until 1946. Park Hill is largely residential in composition and is bisected by John F. Kennedy Boulevard (formerly the Arkansas-Missouri Highway), the historic commercial corridor through the area. Though the first sections of Park Hill were platted in 1921, other sections were opened piecemeal through the 1950s and the entire Park Hill area now encompasses more than 1600 acres.

In 1921, businessman Justin Matthews platted the first section of Park Hill and began offering lots for sale in early 1922. Growth in Park Hill was steady through the 1920s, then interrupted by the Great Depression in the 1930s. Due to Park Hill’s proximity to Camp Joseph T. Robinson
and the demand for housing for soldiers and their families during the years of World War II, there was a considerable amount of construction in Park Hill in the early 1940s. The nationwide building boom in the immediate post war years also greatly affected Park Hill.

Of the 568 properties included in the Park Hill Historic District, the overwhelming majority are residential. Construction of housing in Park Hill falls into two distinct periods: 1920s and 1940s. There are nineteen buildings constructed for commercial use: a concrete pavilion and footbridge in a neighborhood park, one public school, one public clubhouse and a historic fire station and water company complex.

Architectural History of Park Hill
The Park Hill Historic District is the earliest suburban development in the city of North Little Rock. The neighborhood is located on a hill overlooking the city’s downtown, the Arkansas River, and downtown Little Rock. The Park Hill neighborhood is bisected by John F. Kennedy Boulevard (formerly the Arkansas-Missouri Highway), the commercial corridor through the area. The first lots in Park Hill were platted in 1921 and sales of property began in early 1922. Park Hill’s developer, Justin Matthews, headed the Park Hill Land Company, which marketed, sold and developed the area. The Park Hill Land Company had a sizable staff, which included an architect/designer, brick mason, horticulturist and landscape artist, and a superintendent of road
construction, to name a few in addition to construction workers. The Park Hill Company also built and operated a complete wood working plant.

Within months of announcing the opening of Park Hill, there were some thirty houses constructed. These first few houses were followed by hundreds of others within a few years. Matthews was a cautious businessman and Park Hill was platted bit by bit as he waited for several houses to be built in one section before opening another section for development. Streets in the Park Hill Historic District were generally laid out in a grid pattern. Derivation
from the typical grid is found along the crests on the hill.

Growth and development of Park Hill were firmly established in the 1920s, interrupted by the Great Depression and begun again in 1940. Of the 481 structures constructed in park Hill from 1922 to 1950, the number is almost equally divided in the two distinct periods of growth. During the 1920s and 1930s, the period when the first development began, there were 245 (43 percent of the district) houses and buildings constructed. Of these, 160 were constructed in the 1920s and 85 during the 1930s. The second period of intense growth in Park Hill began in 1940 and ended in 1950. In this decade, 236 (42 percent of the district) houses were built.

Construction in the 1920s
The opening of Park Hill in early 1922 quickly proved to be successful. In the first eight years of development, 159 houses and a school were constructed. Park Hill was designed to be an affordable neighborhood, and under the tight control of its developer, Justin Matthews, its early composition grew to be modest versions of architectural styles popular throughout the country in the 1920s- Craftsman, Craftsman Bungalow and the Period Revivals.

Matthews’ Park Hill Land Company constructed the majority of houses built in Park Hill during the 1920s. The company’s architect/designer Frank Carmean did not begin work with Matthews until 1927. The houses built in Park Hill prior to Carmean’s association are largely of the Craftsman and Craftsman Bungalow style. Perhaps because the Park Hill Land Company had among its ranks a brick mason, the majority of these Craftsman influenced houses are brick veneered and their appearance remains much the same as originally. There are sections where a glimpse of this deliberate brick pattern is still visible such as seen in the west sides of the 3200- 3500 blocks of North Olive Street. Since a number of the brick houses have been painted, particularly the buff colored ones, the sense of a brick color alternation is somewhat diffused.

The influence of the Craftsman style in Park Hill is most discernible with a total of sixteen Craftsman style houses and sixty-one Craftsman Bungalows. These seventy-seven Craftsman influenced houses display the style’s key features such as a low pitched, gabled roof accentuated by a wide unenclosed eave overhang with exposed roof rafters, and tapered square columns on pedestal porch supports. There are no grand style or exaggerated versions of the Craftsman style in Park Hill, but the modest Craftsman style common to the neighborhood is exemplified in the houses found at 225 E. “A” Street, 282 Plainview Circle, 3307 Poplar and 3212 Magnolia. A two-story brick version of Craftsman is commonly seen in Park Hill. With a front facing gable or clipped gable roof, this house form is seen in red brick at 143 Crestview and 3317 Olive. Buffcolored brick covers the same two-story Craftsman house plan and is seen at 276 Plainview Circle and 419 West “D”.

The Craftsman Bungalow is the type of house most often built in Park Hill in the 1920s. The American Craftsman Bungalow became the “cottage” of the early decades of the twentieth century. A wide diversity of stylistic influences show links with many popular American architectural styles. The American Bungalow adapted itself to widely divergent environmental and climatic conditions, made use of numerous kinds of local building materials and ranged in size from rambling weekend retreats to small, low-income residences. During the rapid growth of Park Hill in the 1920s, sixty-one small-scale Craftsman Bungalows were constructed. Although there are several different variations of 1920s Bungalows in Park Hill, a common theme in their design links them. The Bungalow is set low to the ground; it nestles into and becomes part of its environment. The house at 315 West “F” is an example of the compatibility of the Bungalow with its setting.

Inspired by the California architects Greene and Greene, Craftsman-type bungalow designs in the early part of the twentieth century were popularized by extensive publicity. The affordability of the Craftsman Bungalow led it to become the small house design of choice throughout the country. The Bungalows in Park Hill employ the same Craftsman characteristics such as the use of rustic materials on the exterior and low pitched roof with wide eaves and extended rafter tails as those being built all across the country in the 1920s.

Examples of the Craftsman Bungalow form common to Park Hill include those found at 119 West “G,” 3318 Cypress and 3317 Poplar. Employing a variety of Craftsman details such as multiple roof planes and horizontal bands of windows, these houses feature clipped gable and gable roofs and combinations of rustic materials such as natural stone and rough-hewn timbers in their detailing. The houses located at 3401 and 3405 Olive are examples of the most commonly seen Bungalow form in Park Hill. These houses are brick veneered with front facing gable roofs and porches with cross gable roofs and utilize stucco on the walls of the prominent gable ends.

Another form of the cross-gabled roof type Bungalows is most often associated with “California Bungalow” features a single second-story room affording a panoramic view of the sky, hence the name “Airplane Bungalow.” The houses at 3216 Poplar and 3614 Ridge Road display this characteristic hipped roof second story room with wide eaves and accentuated exposed rafter ends along with the typical porte cochere and short battered columns on brick piers.

Virtually unaltered since its construction in 1922, the John A. Rossi House at 201 West “D” Street is a textbook example of the Craftsman style bungalow, incorporating elements such as a trellised roof over side porch, multiple roof planes and extended rafter tails under wide eaves. Situated on a highly visible corner lot, the Rossi House was the second to be constructed in Park Hill.

Period Revival Styles
Nationwide in the 1920s an eclectic flavor of design emerged. Building design began incorporating many of the “romantic” styles of the past. English and Spanish influences were some of the most common historic styles incorporated into these picturesque houses.

The largest group of “Period Revival” houses in the Park Hill Historic District falls into the English Revival category. In the 1920s more than fifty houses of English Revival style were constructed in small versions best expressed as the “English Cottage.” One-story brick homes with steeply pitched gable roofs and prominent front facing gable porches, tapered chimneys on front facades and a mix of materials such as stone and bricks are commonly seen in the Park Hill neighborhood.

An outstanding interpretation of the English Revival cottage is located at 135 Crestview. This house features rough-face rubble stone on exterior walls and gablet roof with a wrapped edge, which was intended to give the impression of a thatched roof. Exemplary small versions of the English Revival cottage more typical to Park Hill are found at 127 West “F” and 236 West “B.” These homes utilized the steep front facing gable and round arched openings as their primary design element. More elaborate versions of the English Revival style are seen in three houses located on Plainview Circle. Houses at 249 and 255 Plainview Circle are denoted by their clipped gable roofs covered with green tiles, fieldstone clad exterior walls and the use of roundarched openings. The one-story with rear easement brick and stone house at 211 Plainview Circle is a more horizontally emphasized English Revival design, which features steep gable and clipped gable roofs on its facade. All three of the English Revival “period” houses on Plainview Circle feature elaborate fieldstone walls and site features in their sloping rear yards. At least two of these houses are known to have been designed by Justin Matthews’ architect, Frank Carmean. Discretely written on the concrete sidewalk in front of 211 Plainview and 249 Plainview are the words “Carmean Did It.”

There are eight “Spanish Revival” style houses in the Park Hill Historic District. Stucco walls, terraces and patios, flat roofs with raised tile ridged parapets, arcaded wing walls, and decorative use of ceramic tiles exemplify the 1920s period adaptation of the historic Spanish style. Examples of Spanish Revival influenced designs in Park Hill houses include 505 West “F” Street, 501 West “F”, 237 East “A” and 3617 Ridge Road. After architect/designer Frank Carmean was brought into the Justin Matthews Co., this style house was offered to the buyer. However, most of the grand-scale Spanish Revival style homes in Park Hill were constructed in the more affluent Edgemont section of the neighborhood.

Construction in the 1930s
Construction in Park Hill during the 1930s mirrored the nationwide economic downturn. Only eighty-two houses were constructed in the Park Hill development in the 1930s. The styles of these houses included scaled down versions of the same Craftsman, Craftsman Bungalow and Period Revival styles, which had been built there in the 1920s. The Colonial Revival style was introduced to Park Hill for the first time in the late 1930s. The six Colonial Revival style houses built in Park Hill in the 1930s are located in the western section of the neighborhood. The J. Wayne Pickens House at 3723 Ridge Road was constructed in the mid-1930s from a house plan in a national magazine. This two-story Colonial Revival style frame house with fieldstone foundation and detailing remains unaltered with te exception of a gable roof carport which was added in the 1950s.

Constructed in 1938, the house at 500 W. “F” Street is a version of the gambrel roof subtype of the Colonial Revival style. This house features a symmetrical facade with first floor bay windows and two dormers extending from the side facing gambrel roof. The houses at 3127 and 3131 Magnolia were constructed in 1939. They are one-story frame houses with a rear basement, and feature symmetrical facades with evenly spaced dormers and windows. A stylish Colonial Revival entry on the house at 3127 Magnolia features a curved fanlight above the door and leaded glass sidelights. A larger, two-story version of 1930s Colonial Revival design is located at 3309 Poplar.

The Solon Humphries House at 3100 Magnolia is an example of the “Garrison Colonial,” a style popular in the United States from about 1935 to 1955. This subtype of the Colonial Revival style features a second-story overhang on the facade of the house. Although the Humphries House has been covered in synthetic siding, the width matches the original wood boards.

Mediterranean style influence is seen in the design of the Park Hill Fire Station and Water Company Building built in 1938 at 3417-3421 Magnolia. The architectural firm of Brueggeman, Swaim and Allen was employed to design these facilities. Included in the complex, which was listed on the National Register in 1993, are nine structures, six of which are historic and contribute to the district. The complex covers a large portion of the block on the west side of Park Hill and in addition to the fire station and water company office. There are two flat-roofed field stone pump houses and two 100 foot by 44 foot concrete water reservoirs. The project was constructed with the assistance of WPA labor and includes numerous fieldstone sidewalks, retaining walls, benches and other site features.

The McCord House at 3201 Magnolia was also designed by the Brueggeman, Swaim and Allen firm and built in the late 1930s. The house is similar in design to the Fire Station and Water Company buildings with fieldstone wall material, red-tile roof and cast-concrete detailing. Arched openings on a side screened porch features whimsical simulated spider webs of wood with wooden spiders. Also, constructed in Park Hill during the 1930s were a concrete pavilion and footbridge in Crestview Park on the southern edge of the neighborhood and a Boy Scout clubhouse in a triangular-shaped block on the northeastern edge of Park Hill.

Construction in the 1940s
In the late 1930s an architectural form emerged which was utilitarian and economy oriented. As a reflection of the economic crises of the 1930s, designs of this small home form attempted to reflect the various revival styles popular in the 1920s but lacked decorative detail. Roof pitches are generally low and eave rakes close. Houses of this type were built all over the country immediately preceding and following World War II. But unlike most American cities during the years of World War II, North Little Rock experienced a building boom due to demand for affordable housing near Camp Joseph T. Robinson. As a direct result of the dramatic increase in the need for housing for military families, between 1940 and 1943 there were 137 houses built in the nearby Park Hill neighborhood. The majority of these houses are of Minimal Traditional style. Typical examples of this type of house include those at 3316 Olive, 3220 Poplar and 3317 N. Pine.

With the end of World War II in 1945 and the return of veterans to their hometown with government assistance available for home purchase, construction companies sprang up all over the country to take advantage of the great demand for housing. One such company called Bralei Homes, Inc. began operation in North Little Rock in 1946, offering affordable homes that could be built within a matter of weeks. Bralei Homes were prefabricated in their local factory, then moved to the building site where assembly was completed. The Bralei Company advertised that their homes were “conventional in appearance, permanently built, with no indication of the production line methods used.” On the building site reinforced concrete foundations were set on concrete footings. The water lines laid at Bralei houses were mass-produced by a local plumbing company. Bralei boasted that all foundation lumber including sills, joists and sub-floors were wolmanized lumber, guaranteed to be rot and termite resistant. Lumber for exterior siding was guaranteed to be kiln dried to proper moisture content.

Of particular significance is the fact that Bralei Homes were designed by local architects of considerable experience and prominence. The firms of Frank Ginocchio & Edwin Cromwell, H. Ray Burks & Bruce Anderson, Brueggeman, Swaim & Allen, and Yandell Johnson designed the Bralei houses.

Located in the boundaries of the Park Hill Historic District are thirty-nine houses that have been identified as Bralei constructed. All but four of these houses have been covered with siding, some of which appears to have been among the earliest applications of artificial siding in Park Hill. Thirty-one of these Bralei homes, although artificially sided, retain their original appearance with similar width of siding. Since the houses had little decorative detail, those which have been sided appear much the same as their original appearance. Despite the fact that Bralei Homes Inc. Boasted of their superior product, it was discovered early on that the exterior of the houses would not hold paint. Although the majority of the Bralei houses within the Park Hill Historic District are covered in artificial siding, their collective significance is important to the architectural history of the Greater Little Rock area.

Multi-Family
The Patricia Apartments at 3126 John F. Kennedy Blvd. Is the only historic apartment building located within the boundaries of the Park Hill Historic District. The two-story brick building with a hipped roof was designed by the Brueggeman, Swaim & Allen firm and constructed in 1941. Three other two-story brick apartment buildings were constructed on J.F.K. Boulevard in the early 1950s, but are not included in the historic district. Several duplexes are located in the district (some by Bralei Homes, Inc.) and were constructed in the late 1940s. Other sections of Park Hill, north of the historic district were opened in the 1950s and contain large numbers of duplex residential structures.

Residential Construction after 1950
Some of the early forms of the Ranch style house were constructed in Park Hill in the early 1950s. Popularity of the style continued well into the 1960s as evidenced by the thirty-six ranch houses included in the historic district that were built in the neighborhood in this period. Only a few homes have been built in Park Hill after 1970 since Justin Matthews’ plan of filling every lot had been largely met. Those houses that have been built in recent years occupy portions of original two-lot of more properties, which have gradually been divided and sold for development.

Schools

Park Hill Elementary School at the corner of J.F.K. Boulevard and “H” Street was constructed in 1923-24. The original two-story brick building with flat roof and parapet, faced east and a grand fieldstone stairway led to the street below (Arkansas-Missouri Highway, now J.F.K. Blvd.). As the population of Park Hill grew, additions were made to the school in 1930, 1948, and 1953. Unsympathetic window replacement on the historic building renders the school non-contributing to the historic district.

Commercial
Of the nineteen buildings in the district constructed for commercial use, only one was constructed prior to 1950. The building at 3723 J.F.K. Blvd. was built to house two retail establishments. For many years a grocery store occupied the southern portion of the building. The entire building is now occupied by a dry-cleaning company that began business in a small space on the north side of this building in the 1950s. Most of the commercial structures, all located along J.F.K. Boulevard, were constructed in the 1960s when fast-food restaurants became popular. Some of the largest picturesque Period Revival homes in Park Hill were demolished for construction of one of the first McDonald’s restaurants in Arkansas. Located at 3217 J.F.K.
Blvd., construction of McDonald’s was soon followed by a Kentucky Fried Chicken reatuarant next door at 3101 J.F.K. Blvd. Other commercial buildings were built in the 1960s and 1970s to accommodate professional offices. Two branch banks were also constructed on J.F.K. Boulevard in this time period. A number of the original 1920s residences located along this thoroughfare have been converted to commercial use and now house professional offices and a variety of specialty retail shops.

The majority of the buildings and houses in the Park Hill Historic District are in good to excellent condition. The neighborhood has remained stable and is a popular residential area. Despite the changes to the historic fabric of the area’s main thoroughfare, John F. Kennedy Boulevard, the residential blocks of Park Hill remain intact. Some demolition has begun to occur in the blocks close to Park Hill Baptist Church as the city’s largest congregation grows and has increased need for parking.

The 568 houses, buildings and structures located within the Park Hill Historic District certainly convey a sense of the time and place in which the neighborhood grew and developed. An eclectic mix of 1920s and 1930s Craftsman and picturesque Period Revival architecture and 1940s Minimal Traditional style housing combine to effectively convey the sense of Park Hill’s two periods of intense growth.

–Sandra Taylor Smith