The Fones House, located at 902 West Second, has two areas of significance.  Architecturally, the house is a leading example of the Victorian Italianate style, which is rare in Little Rock.  Secondly, the builder, Daniel G. Fones, was a leading Little Rock businessman.

The two and one-half storey Fones House is constructed of red brick.  The exterior features a bracketed frieze topped by a steep gabled roof with wrought iron cresting, decorative window heads in several different styles and ornately railed balconies.

Daniel Gilbert Fones was born in Decatur, Georgia, on August 19, 1837, the eldest son of Alvan T. and Adelia A. Cone Fones.  Though raised in relatively luxurious surroundings, after his father’s death he was apprenticed as a tinsmith at the age of 15.  In 1855, he came to Pine Bluff, and in 1859, moved to Little Rock.  That year, he formed the Fones Brothers’ partnership which would eventually became known as Fones Brothers’ Hardware and existed until 1987.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Fones enlisted in the Confederate Army; after the war he returned to Little Rock.  He remained a civic leader throughout the rest of his life.  The Fones House was constructed in 1878 for Fones and his wife.

Fones was president of the Fones Brothers’ Hardware Company, President of the Arkansas Building and Loan Association, Vice President of the Equitable Building and Loan Association, President of the German National Bank and was associated with many other financial enterprises.  He served as an alderman in Little Rock and in 1916 was elected to the Little Rock School Board.

Fones married Texanna Dustan Reaves on May 30, 1867, who died in 1893.  In 1899 he was married to Mrs. James Hennegan Tucker.  Fones, who had no descendants, died May 28, 1916.

The Fones House was added to the National Register of Historic Places on August 19, 1975.