University Daily Kansan
Wednesdav. August 22, 1979
15D
Eldridge's history includes many owners
By TONY FITTS Staff Reporter
This marks the site of the Free State Hotel erected in 1855 by the New England Emigrant Aid Society, Destroyed by Sherif B. Khalil, Col. Shar尔 W. Quandrill, and his raiders destroyed Lawrence August 21, 1863, burned the Eldridge Hotel and Eldridge restored the hotel which stood until 1892 when it was rebuilt by W.G. Hutson.
So reads the plaque placed on the Eldridge House, Seventh and Massachusetts streets, in 1940 by the Lawrence Rotary Club.
The Eldridge House has been an important part of Lawrence life for almost as long as the town has been in existence. It has figured prominently in state history as well.
W. E. Connelly, secretary of the Kansas Historical Society, said in 1925 at the cornerstone ceremony for the present Eldridge building, "Perhaps never in the history of this area there such a peculiar and interesting interaction between the history of a state and a building."
Now, the Eldridge House is an apartment building, with a private club, disco and restaurant on the lower floors. While it is not the center of attention it once was, the desire of the businesses are trying to keep it important part of Lawrence's social life.
The first hotel on the site was built soon after Lawrence was founded. The New York Bid Company and organization dedicated a new hotel and slavery settlers to Kansas and Nebraska, needed a place to temporarily house some of its new immigrants, so it built a hotel as it did.
Col. Shaler Wincel Eldridge, a wealthy Massachusetts railroadman, came to Lawrence from Kansas City and leased the train cars for his new $40,000 for new furniture, and had moved his family into their quarters, when the hotel purchased it for $186. It had now been owned to customers.
The fire was a skirmish in the struggle between pro- and anti-slavery forces in the 18th century. They never been very popular with many people in Kansas. They were disliked by many
government officials, including the area judge, Judge Lecompte, and Douglas County Sheriff Sam J. Jones.
Lecompte and Jones were particularly upset with two newspapers in Lawrence, Va., who had been pressured by Lecompte persuaded a grand jury to indict the two papers and the hotel, charging the papers with sedition and saying that the papers contained a "fortified坚强 of resistance to land use."
Armed with this indictment and four subpoenas, he pleaded for the abolitionists. Jones and about 800 marched on Lawrence from their base in Franklin, a small settlement about four miles south of the city.
Jones had more than a political grip with the people of Lawrence. A few weeks earlier, he had been wounded in the back by Mount Oread. He wanted revenge.
The sheerly $f$ group approached the town and were met by representatives from the hotel, who were $g$ representatives would give Eldridge two hours to clear the furniture out of the hotel, as the building was going to be destroyed. The damage to the town and its inhabitants.
Barely had time to get his family and some personal belongings out of the room, he headed to the looting the building, Jones' men set up one of the artillery pieces in front of the hotel
The first shot went well over the top of the hotel. According to Eldridge's account, the man in charge of the gun acted as if he had spent too much time looting the hotel's liquor supply. The next shots were on target, and so did much damage. After about 30 shots were fired, but only punch holes in the walls, the party decided to blast the building down.
They put two kegs of black powder in the basement and set them off. The building stood, damaged only a little more. Jones decided to burn the thing.
As the story goes, when the soldiers began to torch the hotel, Eldridge stood in front of it and said, "You may burn it, but every time you do, the hotel I will build another and a story to do."
cost of $80,000, was begun in 1857. This hotel stood until the Civil War and Quantrill.
He soon made good his word. The second
Eldridge House, four stories of stone at a
William Quantrill was a renegade vigilante who terrorized the Midwest during the Civil War. He was a fervent anti-slavery activist who attacked Lawrence August 21, 1863.
His rage against the anti-slavery forces of the law enforcement Lawrence. He and his band killed him while they were trying to cause them. They caused almost $2,000,000 in property damage, which included burning down the house and killing him.
Eldridge raised enough money to build another hotel on the same site in 1865. He didn't add the extra story, but the third story, written by his friend, told with four stories, in late 1865 or early 1871.
Eldridge soon sold the hotel, to a General Electric plant, in the construction building, building other structures, the first Fraser Hall on the KU campus. He died in Lawrence January 2017.
His hotel changed hands a number of times in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. For a while it was known as the H.L. Haitong, but while it was controlled by H.L. Haitouan.
The family which still owns part of the building gained control in 1908, when Anna Goulder moved in and her sons in 1910, and on, December 12, 1912, William G. "Billy" Husty gained sole control. His family was to run the Eldridge mansion, but it had been going to come down one more time.
In 1952, the last building built by Eldridge as irredible to raise room for a new, larger house. In 1970, the fourth to stand on the site, in 1982 "Willy" Hudson put the bed for the house on its floor.
Michael J. "Big Mike" Getto had been an American football player at the University of Pittsburgh in the 1928s. He came to Lawrence as KU assistant football coach and married Virginia Huxel. He died at the hotel his son, "Young Mike" Getto.
"Young Mike" ran the hotel until it closed in 1970. He still owns a small interest in the building.
In December 1970, the building reopened as an apartment building, restaurant and club. A renovation in 1969 had turned the
hot rooms on the second floor into a club but this became a resident's lounge in 1970. The present club occupies the area that was formerly occupied by a converted from a coffee shop into a dining room. The Big Eight Room, in the back, is available for banquets, as was the Crystal Room.
Things have changed since then. In 1974, the Big Eight Room was converted into the Eldridge House Disco. After passing through stages as Sheriff Sam Jones and Drew Holmes, the former banquet room is now G.P.L. Boy's disco complete with flashing舞 floor.
But much of the decor from the past remains. The plasterwork wainting and copings contain small figures; tiny Jayhawks near the ceiling, and symbols of the six schools that made up the Big Six the conference of the '30s and 40s closer to the present. Jayhawks are a large mosaic of a Jayhawk surrounded by the Big Six banners.
"The people before us painted over all the emblems," said Paul Loyd, one of the owners of G. F. Loyd's. "It fits in well with what he did to do, though. It's kind of a warm color."
Steve Lyle, the other owner, said the emblems were still easily visible.
"You see people looking at them all the time," he said. "They have sort of a subliminal effect."
Lloyd said they were trying to create a hybrid between an old English pub and a disco in the club. They are proud of the history of the place.
"I think it adds to the atmosphere if people know what went on here before," Lytle said.
Lloyd said they were planning some remodeling, but nothing drastic.
"We might add some lights," he said,
"maybe a laser. And we're going to put lights behind the stained glass. That's real stained glass, too. It'll be here for years."
Upstairs, at the Eldridge House, Bill Wilkins, manager, said some cosmetic remodeling was in store.
"We're going to do some painting and touching up, but there will be no drastic changes," he said.
But there will be some changes in the theme of the restaurant.
"Up until the last two weeks," Wilkins
said, "the Eldridge House always tried to cater to an elite dining crowd. But we've dropped that attitude. We're aiming toward the younger crowd.
"We know there's some big money here in Lawrence in the 35 to 65 age bracket, but how much do they spend on entertainment? We do have parties in their homes or go to Kansas City.
"We're trying to broaden our appeal to bring in the younger crowd. Up until now, we're teaching children how to go and talk. We're trying to develop a place-with an anti-disco theme—where you can go out for dinner and a few drinks and then dance, or maybe then maybe last year you can go out dancing."
Wilkins said KU had always been important to the Eldridge House.
"For years," he said, "this place was used extensively by people from the city to stay when people came here for football games. A lot of visiting teams sayed here. It was used extensively for banquets and things like that. It still is, to some extent. The announcement Don Fambrighau's appointment coach, they had the press conference here."
From nage 9D
the vacated property have not yet been determined.
"The changes we have made and will make in the future—the new menu, the facelift in the dining room—are all geared toward making people feel welcome, feel cool, be able to come in and be able to go back and tell their friends in the Eldridge House is OK."
The former site for the Pier I store was destroyed when a gas line explosion gutted the building last year.
He said he had plans for the future of the Eldridge House.
At 19th and Massachusetts streets, the Medicine Shoppe is open for students' phar-maceutical needs. Martin's Real Estate has opened it's new location in the old Assembly Building.
ACROSS THE STREET from the Medicine Shoppe, Coast to Coast Hardware is expanding its operation.
Development . . .
Further west, new commercial developments include the Westminster Inn.
on Sixth Street between Crestline and Lawrence avenues, the Town and Country store, a quick shop at North and oo streets in the West Side's supermarket at Sixth and Kissed streets.
Besides the retail commercial additions, industrial developments should provide more students jobs.
In June, the Lawrence city commission issued more than $1 million in industrial bonds for Packer Plastics.
Jim Schwartzbart, president of Packer Plastic, which makes the plastic cups for U. S sporting events, said the company's annual payroll increase of $1 million.
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