Carroll County Courthouse, Western District

Berryville was Carroll County’s first seat, but because Eureka Springs’s population and commercial activity had outpaced that of Berryville by the early 1880s, town leaders agitated for transfer of the county seat or, at least, the construction of a second courthouse. In 1883, the Arkansas General Assembly approved the petition; consequently, the county has two seats. Kansas-born Perkins, who designed the new courthouse, built many commercial and residential buildings in the town. The three-story courthouse is tall and tightly massed in order to fit on its constricted site. In style it tends toward Italianate with its tall round-arched windows and deep bracketed eaves, but the rusticated limestone walls add a suggestion of Romanesque Revival. A square tower marks the arched entrance, which is accessed by a double flight of stairs rising directly from the narrow sidewalk. The tower concludes with a domelike roof pierced by enormous dormer windows. Inside, the spacious third-floor courtroom is unaltered and has vaulted pressed-metal ceilings.