Pugh's Mill Memorial Park, (sculpture).

Pugh's Mill Memorial Park, (sculpture).

Rodriguez, Dionicio, 1891/93-1955, sculptor.

Carmean, Frank, architect.

Pugh's Mill Memorial Park, (sculpture).

T. R. Pugh Memorial Park, (sculpture).

Old Mill, (sculpture).

Digital Reference:

Colored cement over reinforced concrete, and stone.

Overall: approx. 25 ft. x 250 yds. x 150 yds.

Eleven separate sculptures form a rustic mill site, including: vine-covered bridge; mill house with running water wheel; small bridge; fallen tree bench; tree bridge; rain barrel; pump and trough; bridge; mushrooms; staked fence; and large bridge. The park also includes benches. The sculptures are comprised of "faux bois" tree trunks, split planks and rope. All of the sculptures are made of reinforced concrete, finished with a veneer of neat cement colored with inorganic pigment to resemble various bark and wood surfaces. The pieces are placed along a stream and two pools.

Homage -- Pugh, Thomas Robert

History -- United States -- Westward Expansion

Architecture -- Industry -- Mill

Architecture -- Bridge

Architecture -- Detail -- Fence

Object -- Vegetable -- Mushroom

Object -- Other -- Container

Object -- Tool -- Pump

Outdoor Sculpture -- Arkansas -- North Little Rock

Administered by City of North Little Rock, Parks and Recreation, 2700 North Willow Street, North Little Rock, Arkansas 72116

Located T. R. Pugh Memorial Park, Head of Lake #3 of Lakewood Subdivision, bounded by Lakeshore Drive & Fairway Avenue, North Little Rock, Arkansas

Pugh's Mill Memorial Park, or T. R. Pugh Memorial Park, was commissioned by North Little Rock developer Justin Matthews of Justin Matthews Company, and is commonly known as "Old Mill." It was conceived and constructed by Matthews and his company to be a focal point of his then-new residential subdivisions. The park was to serve as a tribute to early Arkansas pioneers, specifically Thomas Robert Pugh, a noted plantation owner and settler of Ashley County. The mill house was designed by Frank Carmean, architect of the Justin Matthews Company, who chose the site. The narrow bridge below the mill pond is made of two bent swamp persimmon trees joined together. The footbridge near the mill house is a twisted black locust tree. The park was featured in the opening credits of the 1939 motion picture Gone With The Wind, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. IAS files contain the 1986 nomination form for the National Register of Historic Places for the Arkansas sculptures of Dionicio Rodriguez, which includes the park sculptures.

(Plaque to proper left of front entrance:) PUGH'S MILL MEMORIAL PARK/CONSTRUCTED: 1933/IN HONOR OF THOMAS R. PUGH/ARCHITECT: FRANK CARMEAN/ARTIST: SENOR DIONICIO RODRIGUEZ/BUILDER: JUSTIN MATTHEWS COMPANY/ON THE NATIONAL REGISTER/OF HISTORIC PLACES.

Save Outdoor Sculpture, Arkansas survey, 1993.

The information provided about this artwork was compiled as part of the Smithsonian American Art Museum's Inventories of American Painting and Sculpture database, designed to provide descriptive and location information on artworks by American artists in public and private collections worldwide.

Inventories of American Painting and Sculpture, Smithsonian American Art Museum, P.O. Box 37012, MRC 970, Washington, D.C. 20013-7012

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