A photo of the Hotel French courtesy of the Allen County Historical Society shows the hotel in the 1880s. It was on the east side of the Cincinnati, Hamilton and Dayton (later the B&O) railroad, just south of its crossing with the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago (later the Pennsylvania) railroad. The C.H.&D. depot was on the other side of the railroad tracks from the hotel while the P.Ft.W.&C station was a stone’s throw to the northwest of it.
Courtesy of Allen County Historical Society
Much had changed in the three decades since the day in 1885 when Abner LaFevre stepped off the train in Lima.
Then, he was a young traveling salesman lured to Lima by a report in a Cleveland newspaper that Lima was the place to make money, that “every little piece of land was saturated with oil.”
“Arriving here he found everything as represented,” the Allen County Republican-Gazette wrote in 1915. “Everybody had money.”
LaFevre made his headquarters at the Hotel French, the “best hostelry between Pittsburgh and Chicago then,” the Republican-Gazette wrote, adding, “Traveling men used to telegraph ahead to make reservations for rooms. It was the Waldorf-Astoria of the oil fields.”
Through an oil promoter, LaFevre sank his stake into a piece of land that, it turned out, was not saturated with oil. Disillusioned, his savings gone, he traded the land for an acre in Oklahoma City and headed west.
Now, in March 1915, LaFevre, who, in the words of the Allen County Republican-Gazette, was “on the home stretch of life’s marathon,” decided to stop off at Lima for a sentimental stay at the Hotel French while on a trip to visit relatives in Philadelphia.
“When the big locomotive tremblingly came to a halt at the Pennsylvania station, LaFevre stepped to the platform, looked about him for his ‘bearings’ and then turned his steps eastward, across the C., H. & D. (Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton) tracks and up to the French House. But the place was dark,” the Republican-Gazette wrote.
The posh hotel LaFevre remembered from the days when his dreams seemed within reach had closed a half dozen years earlier. As for LaFevre, shortly after finding the Hotel French had closed, he received a message that the land in Oklahoma City he had traded for 30 years earlier had sold to a big manufacturer for $5,000 (more than $151,000 today).
The Hotel French (or French House) was one of a handful of Lima hotels, among them the Cambridge, the Florentine, which was next door to the French, the Erie, and the Holleran, which had close ties to Lima’s rail passenger stations. None was closer than the French. The C.H.&D., the Pennsylvania, and the Ohio Southern (later the D.T.&I.), which had a depot at the intersection of East Wayne and Jackson streets, all were within a stone’s throw of the French. Before moving across the tracks to the C.H.&D. station, the Lake Erie and Western maintained a waiting room and ticket office in the French. Another station, the ornate Erie, was at South Main and First streets.
“Because the hotels were located close to the railroads, they were particularly popular with commercial travelers,” the Lima News wrote in April 1951. “But they also drew patronage from others, particularly when trains halted 20 minutes for meal stops.”
The Hotel French was the first and most notable of the hotels built. According to an April 1925 story in the Republican-Gazette, the hotel was built by John French “soon after 1856, when the Dayton and Michigan (which became the C.H.&D.) railroad was built through Lima making a crossing with the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago (later the Pennsylvania) …” French built his hotel in the southeastern angle of the crossing.
“This was before the days of the dining car and the call ‘twenty minutes for dinner’ was in vogue,” the newspaper added. “An employee in front of the hotel pounding on a huge copper gong as the train approached was the signal to guide hungry passengers into the hotel for a hurried luncheon, and business at such times was always good.
“Thus, it was not unusual to see such prominent personages as Maude Adams, Lillian Russell, Rose Melville, Ethel Barrymore, Robert Mantell and other stage celebrities” in the French, the News wrote. “James J. Corbett, John L. Sullivan and Bob Fitzsimmons ate extra-thick steaks. Mark Twain, James Whitcomb Riley, William Jennings Bryan, Mark Hanna and Ohio Gov. James B. Foraker were among other distinguished personages who dined at the French hotel.” In September 1879, President Rutherford B. Hayes stopped at the hotel for dinner and a short speech.
“Railroad men, too, were among the steady patrons,” the News wrote. “Their credit was good – at least until the pay car had come to town and distributed its stacks of gold coins among the employees. It was not unusual for hotel keepers to collect $2,000 in gold coins at one time …”
Between 1856 and 1875, the hotel burned down three times. After the 1875 fire, the building was replaced by a brick structure and came under the management of Charley Phinney, who would guide the French during its heyday.
“This famous hotel, which enjoys a reputation which, indeed, is by no means confined to this section of the country, is situated at the depot, is built of brick, three stories high, and for years under the management of that prince of hotel men, Charley Phinney, has steadily grown in public favor especially with commercial travelers, till today many of them will come miles out of their way to stop over Sunday at this palace hotel,” Lima’s Democratic Times gushed in May 1880.
No less effusive with praise was an industry publication, the Hotel Register. “The dining hall, with which thousands of travelers are no doubt acquainted, is a new model of pleasing effects; not the smallest of which is an elaborate menu that might teach even some of our metropolitan houses their advanced classes in catering,” the paper wrote in February 1885.
The French continued to prosper into the late 19th century. In June 1885, the Democratic Times wrote that the hotel “averages over 50 registered guests every day,” adding, “this does not include those who take dinner from the noon train.”
But time and technology caught up with the French. Dining cars, which negated the need for a rushed meal at the French, and better accommodations in newer hotels downtown doomed it. In July 1903, the News noted that the “old French hotel which was at one time one of the most popular places in this city as well as one of the most widely known hostelries in the country seems in late years to be a ‘Jonah.’” The newspaper added that the “place again presents a lonesome appearance.”
In February 1910, the Republican-Gazette reported that the Shappell Truck and Storage Company planned to “convert the long deserted French House into one of the most modern and fully equipped storage houses in the state.”
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SOURCE
This feature is a cooperative effort between the newspaper and the Allen County Museum and Historical Society.
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See past Reminisce stories at limaohio.com/tag/reminisce
Reach Greg Hoersten at [email protected].
