Hotel Champlain
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President McKinley and Vice-President Hobart leaving steamboat landing. 1902 hotel brochure -Private collection
Hotel Champlain (continued)
The Hotel Champlain was a resort for many dignitaries. The President of Cuba and his family spent many seasons there. President McKinley and his wife spent the summers of 1897 and 1899 at the hotel. It was sometime referred to as the "Summer White House." Mrs. McKinley suffered from epilepsy and doctors advocated the air and sunshine of the region. They were mainly visits of rest. Mrs. McKinley kept mostly to the apartment; however, the President especially enjoyed walking about the hotel grounds. Other dignitaries included ambassadors, senators, governors and others.
On July 7, 1909, Hotel Champlain was the host to some five hundred dignitaries for the Tercentary celebration of the discovery of Lake Champlain. Governor Hughes and the Tercentary Commission gave a banquet in honor of President Taft. Guests included ambassadors from England and France, governors, congressmen and state officials.
On May 28, 1910, Hotel Champlain burned to the ground. The fire was discovered by Mrs. Mary Gill, a housekeeper. The sixty employees in the building escaped injury. The hotel was not opened for the season yet.
The fire apparently began in the basement where painting rags and garbage had collected. However, the exact cause is not known. Causes could have been "rats gnawing matches, poor wiring, lightning." The Plattsburgh Daily press stated, "The sight was one of desolation at daybreak. The grand and towering monument of business and railroad enterprise disappeared, and the landscape of Lake Champlain as seen from far away as Cumberland Head, south to and far, beyond Burlington was changed as in the twinkling of an eye." Loss was estimated at three hundred thousand dollars. The hotel was insured for two hundred and thirty one thousand dollars.
One year earlier, Fort William Henry, also owned and operated by the Delaware and Hudson Company, had been destroyed by fire. The company wanted to rebuild the hotel quickly so the plans for the fort were used. In the meantime, the cottages which had been saved from the fire by rain, were converted and Bluff Point became "Champlain Valley's first motel" community.
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Hotel Champlain written by Patricia Snyder, appeared previously in the Clinton County Historical Association's monthly newsletter: North Country Notes, No. 164, February 1981
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