- Jefferson Hotel
The Jefferson Hotel is a luxury hotel in
Richmond, Virginia . It is one of 27 American hotels withMobil Five Star and the AAA Five Diamond Hotel ratings. It is also accompanied by Lemaire, a Five Diamond Restaurant named afterEtienne Lemaire who served as Maitre d'Hotel toThomas Jefferson from 1794 through the end of his presidency.History
Tobacco baron
Lewis Ginter built the hotel in1892 and first opened it in1895 . It was designed by the same architecture firm that designed theNew York Public Library ,Carrère and Hastings . It burned in 1901 and was restored and reopened in 1907.Patrons have included presidents, writers,
The Rolling Stones andElvis Presley . For many decades, the hotel was the home ofHistoric Garden Week .In his autobiography, "The Moon's A Balloon". Academy award winning actor
David Niven described how he was on a trip from New York to Florida in the late 1930s when he decided to spend the night at the Jefferson hotel. Niven stated that as he was signing the guest registry, his eyes snapped open with amazement when he noticed a full sized alligator swimming in a small pool located six feet from the reception desk.Niven, David. " [http://books.google.com/books?id=pk3UAAAACAAJ&dq=The+Moon%27s+a+balloon The Moon's a Balloon] ." Published 1972, Putnam Publishing. ISBN 0399105573] Alligators at The Jefferson would become world famous, and the last alligator living in the marble pools of the Jefferson's Palm Court, named Old Pompey, remained there until he died in 1948." [http://www.jeffersonhotel.com/exp_history.aspx Jefferson Hotel: History] ." " [http://www.jeffersonhotel.com/ Jefferson Hotel] ." Retrieved onJuly 11 ,2007 .]Local
urban legend has it that tap dancer Bill "Bojangles" Robinson was discovered while working as abellhop at the hotel. However, this is most likely untrue. When the Jefferson Hotel opened in 1895, Robinson (then 16) was already touring with traveling shows on the black theater circuit.Another urban legend states that the Grand Staircase in the lobby was featured in the classic movie "Gone with the Wind", but again, this is untrue. According to the
concierge , the author of the novel,Margaret Mitchell , stayed at the Jefferson during the time she was writing the book, and thus the description and portrayal of the staircase in her novel is said to be inspired by the one in the hotel.References
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