Portland Hotel | |
---|---|
General information | |
Type | Hotel |
Town or city | Portland, Oregon |
Country | United States |
Coordinates | 45°31′08″N122°40′45″W / 45.518872°N 122.6793°W |
Construction started | 1882 |
Opened | 1890 |
Demolished | 1951 |
Cost | $1,000,000 |
Height | |
Architectural | Queen Anne, Châteauesque |
Technical details | |
Floor count | 8 |
Design and construction | |
Architect(s) | William M. Whidden |
Architecture firm | Whidden & Lewis |
Other information | |
Number of rooms | 326 |
The Portland Hotel (or Hotel Portland) was a late-19th-century hotel in Portland, Oregon, United States, that once occupied the city block on which Pioneer Courthouse Square now stands. [1] It closed in 1951 after 61 years of operation. [2]
The building was designed by William M. Whidden, later of the prominent Portland architectural firm Whidden & Lewis, and Charles Follen McKim of McKim, Mead, & White. [3] The site was previously occupied by the Central School Building. To make way for the hotel, the school building was purchased by Philip A. Marquam, one of the hotel project's financial backers, who relocated it one block north (to where the Selling Building now stands). [4]
Railroad magnate Henry Villard financed the Portland Hotel and construction began in 1882, [5] but his finances collapsed—in part because of the Panic of 1884—and the construction stopped for five years. [6] [7] With only the foundation completed, the site became known as "Villard's Ruins" and the bodies of two murder victims were found there before construction resumed. [5] [6] George B. Markle, Jr. began a campaign to raise local money to complete the hotel. He generated enough interest and subscribers to his plan, among them Henry W. Corbett, Henry Failing, Simeon Reed and William S. Ladd, to get construction started again. [1] [6] [8] [9] Later investors included labor leader Ed Boyce. [6]
The Queen Anne, Châteauesque hotel finally opened in 1890 and had eight floors and 326 bedrooms. [1] [10] It had cost well over a million dollars and eight years to complete. [1]
The Portland Hotel stood between Southwest Morrison and Yamhill, on 6th Street (now called 6th Avenue), facing the Pioneer Courthouse. [1] Purchased in 1944 by Julius Meier and Aaron Frank, [6] the deteriorating structure was demolished in 1951 and replaced by a parking structure for the Meier & Frank Building. [1] [9] [10] The final day of operation was August 15, 1951. [2] All of the hotel's furnishings and fixtures were disposed of at a public auction on August 28–29, 1951, the iron scrollwork gates being sold to Eric Ladd, a local contractor [11] and historic preservationist (no relation to William Ladd). [12]
When Pioneer Courthouse Square was built on the site in 1984, the iron scrollwork gate of the hotel was incorporated into the design. [1] Much of the hotel's original stone foundation remains under the square's sidewalks. [9]
Eleven U.S. presidents stayed at the Hotel Portland—each time, a new set of Haviland China was purchased for the occasion. [10]
A. E. Doyle was approached about designing an addition to the hotel,[ when? ] but this never got past the planning stages. [13]
Pioneer Square South and Pioneer Square North are a pair of light rail stations in Portland, Oregon, United States, served by TriMet as part of the MAX Light Rail system. Situated directly west of the Portland Transit Mall at Pioneer Courthouse Square in downtown Portland, they occupy the sidewalk on Yamhill and Morrison streets between Broadway and 6th Avenue. The stations consist of one side platform each; trains traveling eastbound stop at Pioneer Square South while trains traveling westbound stop at Pioneer Square North.
Portland architecture includes a number of notable buildings, a wide range of styles, and a few notable pioneering architects.
Meier & Frank was a prominent chain of department stores founded in Portland, Oregon, United States, and later bought by The May Department Stores Company. Meier & Frank operated in the Pacific Northwest from 1857 to 2006.
The Meier & Frank Building is a fifteen-story, glazed terra cotta building located in downtown Portland, Oregon, across from the northeast corner of Pioneer Courthouse Square. The building is the former flagship store and headquarters building for the Meier & Frank department store chain, which was taken over by Macy's in 2006. In 2006–2007, the building's lower five floors were remodeled as a Macy's, while the upper eleven floors were renovated in 2008 into a luxury hotel known as The Nines. Macy's closed in April 2017 and the lower levels were rebuilt as office space.
Albert Ernest Doyle was a prolific architect in the U.S. states of Oregon and Washington. He opened his own architectural practice in 1907. From 1908 to 1914, he partnered with William B. Patterson, and their firm was known as Doyle & Patterson.
Henry Winslow Corbett was an American businessman, politician, civic benefactor, and philanthropist in the state of Oregon. A native of Massachusetts, he spent his early life in the East and New York before moving to the Oregon Territory. He was a prominent figure in the early development of Portland, Oregon, and was involved in numerous business ventures there, starting in general merchandise. His interests later included banking, finance, insurance, river shipping, stage lines, railways, telegraph, iron and steel and the erection of Portland downtown buildings among other enterprises. A Republican, he served as a United States senator from 1867 to 1873.
The Ladd Carriage House is a building in downtown Portland, Oregon, at Broadway and Columbia. It is one of the few surviving buildings forming part of the former grand estates which once stood in the downtown core. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
William Sargent Ladd was an American politician and businessman in Oregon. He twice served as Portland, Oregon's mayor in the 1850s. A native of Vermont, he was a prominent figure in the early development of Portland, and co-founded the first bank in the state in 1859. Ladd also built the first brick building in Portland and was a noted philanthropist. Part of his former estate, the Ladd Carriage House, is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Portland City Hall is the headquarters of city government of Portland, Oregon, United States. The four-story Italian Renaissance-style building houses the offices of the City Council, which consists of the mayor and four commissioners, and several other offices. City Hall is also home to the City Council chambers, located in the rotunda on the east side of the structure. Completed in 1895, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 21, 1974. City Hall has gone through several renovations, with the most recent overhaul gutting the interior to upgrade it to modern seismic and safety standards. The original was built for $600,000, while the 1996 to 1998 renovation cost $29 million.
William Marcy Whidden was a founding member of Whidden & Lewis, a prominent architectural firm in Portland, Oregon, United States.
Pioneer Courthouse Square, also known as Portland's living room, is a public space occupying a full 40,000-square-foot (3,700 m2) city block in the center of downtown Portland, Oregon, United States. Opened in 1984, the square is bounded by Southwest Morrison Street on the north, Southwest 6th Avenue on the east, Southwest Yamhill Street on the south, and Southwest Broadway on the west.
The Gus J. Solomon United States Courthouse is a federal courthouse located in downtown Portland, Oregon, United States. Completed in 1933, it previously housed the United States District Court for the District of Oregon until the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse opened in 1997. The Renaissance Revival courthouse currently is used by commercial tenants and formerly housed a U.S. Postal Service branch. In 1979, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places as U.S. Courthouse.
The Jacob Kamm House, also called the Jacob Kamm Mansion, is a French Second Empire style mansion in Portland, Oregon, built in 1871. It was moved from its original location on SW 14th and Main to its current location in Goose Hollow in 1950 to make room for Lincoln High School's campus. It was purchased by preservationist Eric Ladd for $1,000 at auction and moved to its present location, along with two other houses Ladd was interested in preserving, at SW 20th and Jefferson, which was called "the colony."
The First Presbyterian Church is a church building located in downtown Portland, Oregon, that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Construction began in 1886 and was completed in 1890. The building has been called "one of the finest examples" of High Victorian Gothic architecture in the state of Oregon. It includes stained-glass windows made by Portland's Povey Brothers Art Glass Works and a church bell cast with bronze from captured Civil War cannons.
Allow Me, also known as Umbrella Man, is a 1983 bronze sculpture by John Seward Johnson II, located in Pioneer Courthouse Square in Portland, Oregon, United States. The sculpture, one of seven Allow Me casts, was donated anonymously to the City of Portland in 1984 for display in the Square. It depicts a life-sized man dressed in a business suit, hailing a cab and holding an umbrella. Constructed from bronze, aluminum and stainless steel, the sculpture stands six feet, ten inches tall and weighs 460 pounds. The sculpture is one of many works of art generated by the city's Percent for Art program, and is considered part of the City of Portland and Multnomah County Public Art Collection courtesy of the Regional Arts & Culture Council.
Frank Manley Warren Sr. was a prominent American businessman from Oregon who made his fortune in the salmon canning industry. The community of Warrendale, Oregon, the site of one of his canneries, was named for him. He died in the sinking of Titanic.
Henry Ladd Corbett was an American businessman, civic leader, and politician in the state of Oregon. He was born into one of the wealthiest and most influential families in Oregon. Corbett attended Harvard University and then returned to Oregon to manage family business interests. Over the years, he served as president of the Portland Chamber of Commerce and president of Portland Port Commission. He also represented Multnomah County in the Oregon State Senate, serving two terms as President of the Senate. He served as acting governor of Oregon twice in 1927.
Hamilton Forbush "Ham" Corbett was a prominent Portland, Oregon businessman and in his younger years was a leading amateur American football player. He played college football for Harvard University and was a consensus first-team selection to the 1908 College Football All-America Team.
Ernest Boyd MacNaughton was president of the First National Bank of Oregon, then chairman, president of The Oregonian publishing company, and president of Reed College. He is the namesake of the ACLU E.B. MacNaughton Civil Liberties Award.
The Nordstrom building in downtown Portland, Oregon, occupies a city block next to Pioneer Courthouse Square and houses a Nordstrom store.