While working on our upcoming podcast concerning the Department of Corrections historical collection housed at the Old State House Museum, I encountered a series of spectacular photographs of the construction of the state’s current capitol building.

The Old State House served as Arkansas’s original capitol building, housing the Governor’s Office, House and Senate Chambers and other government offices into the 20th century. Beginning in the 1890s, some elected officials began to call for the construction of a new capitol. In 1899, Governor Daniel Webster Jones suggested the site where the Arkansas State Penitentiary was located saying that land was “too valuable” for a prison. Work began shortly thereafter, with prisoners constituting the majority of the labor. The Old State House Museum has the collections of the Department of Corrections, including photographs of the construction. The photographs were taken in 1910, depicting the nearly finished capitol building.

Click the thumbnails below to see full-sized images.

Click “Read More” to see all of the photographs…