LOT Davis Brothers Auction  /  4th Annual Black Friday Weekend Extravaganza  / 

541

Montana Hotel Anaconda Montana Dining China Plate

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Western Americana Start Price:10.00 USD Estimated At:100.00 - 150.00 USD
Montana Hotel Anaconda Montana Dining China Plate
A bid placed on our auctions is a legal contract – it cannot be revoked or cancelled for any reason. By registering for our auctions, you grant us permission to waive your right to execute any chargebacks against our company for any reason. Auctions will be sold with and without reserve. If a lot contains a reserve price, it will be clearly noted in the corresponding catalog. All items are sold as is, where is with no guarantees expressed or implied.
ALL SHIPPING IS HANDLED IN HOUSE.
7 1/8" diameter. The grand opening of the Montana Hotel in Anaconda on July 1, 1889 was praised loudly by the Butte Miner, which reported a thousand guests at the reception, banquet, and ball associated with the opening. Special trains were run from Butte and Helena to carry the revelers to Anaconda. The women were dressed in European styles in bewildering variety, including Marie Antoinette and Pompadour fashion. For example, Mrs. Siegel was clad in an elegant costume of silver and white faille Francaise, with silver and steel passementerie, representative of the silver interests of Butte; decollete bodice and superb diamonds. And she was just one of 131 ladies whose dresses were described by the Miner’s correspondent. But William Clark’s Butte Miner newspaper did not mention that the grand new hotel was owned by Marcus Daly, and Daly’s newspaper, the Anaconda Standard, didn’t begin publication until the following September. Technically, the hotel was owned by a corporation, the Montana Hotel Association. But Marcus Daly was its president and his friends William L. Hoge, banker and Anaconda’s first mayor, and W.M. Thornton, also a banker and Daly’s partner in many ventures, were vice-president and secretary-treasurer, respectively. Daly spent $200,000 on the building and $60,000 more on the furnishings, easily at least $8 million in today’s dollars. The woodwork was red oak and imported mahogany, and the hotel was staffed by nearly 100 waiters, bellboys, chambermaids, kitchen workers, and others, but they rarely served many people during Daly’s years. The lodging rate, $3.50 a night when miners in Butte and smeltermen in Anaconda could get a week’s room and board for $7, made the Montana Hotel the playground of the rich. Often enough, the 500-seat dining room catered only to Daly himself or Daly and a guest. All 185 rooms had outside exposure, and many had their own fireplaces. The hotel boasted of its running water, steam heat, fire alarms, and electricity. The huge lavish building, 120 feet square, was designed by Butte architect D. F. McDevitt, assisted by W.W. Boyington of Chicago. The hotel was electrified from the start and the open spaces all had sparkling chandeliers. Butte painter Charles Schatzlein did the general decorating and painting, but Daly commissioned an artist named Newcomb from New York to create a hardwood inlay in the barroom floor portraying Daly’s favorite racehorse, Tammany. The thousand-piece execution cost $3,000. The hotel was renamed the Marcus Daly Hotel in 1962 and closed in 1976, after which time the top two floors were removed. It is now owned by the Anaconda Restoration Association which has plans to restore it.
Sign In to Bookmark Lot