Wheeling’s Stratford Springs Hotel
Once upon a time in Woodsdale, just off Edgwood Street, stood a grand hotel.
Nearly a block long and composed entirely of wood, this playground of the elite offered 84 guest bedrooms, a spacious lobby, numerous elegant dining rooms, sweeping verandas, a billiard parlor, bowling alley, tennis courts, a writing room, three sun parlors and a grand ballroom where formal dances, concerts, and elaborate costume balls were held. The “Gem of Wheeling,” said the Wheeling News Register, “was beautifully located near the foot of Woodlawn hill and nestled in a perfect bower of trees and shrubbery that made it a beautifully cool and sequestered spot during the sultry days of mid-summer.”
This was no fairy tale, this was the Wheeling’s nationally famous Stratford Springs Hotel. But, like a comet streaking across the midnight sky, the Stratford’s existence was brilliant and brief.
Healing Powers
Opened on May 1, 1907, she was built as a spa resort near a natural “saline-chalybeate” spring said to have “certain healing powers,” powers to cure everything from headaches, indigestion, and rheumatism to “kidney trouble” and even “bad teeth.” In addition to being used to make carbonated beverages, the pure spring water was bottled and sold as an “invigorating and health giving” tonic. Stratford Springs Bottling Company was thus an outgrowth of the hotel.
Vacationing at resorts built around mineral springs, such as Saratoga Springs in New York, was quite fashionable in that era, and the Stratford’s reputation grew. The mineral spring drew visitors from all over the country to Wheeling, but when the novelty peaked, Wheeling’s rich and famous descended on the Stratford. As the News-Register reported in a retrospective piece, “many of the well-to-do Wheelingites found that the hotel, which was located near their National Road mansions, could provide a better life in the winter as they closed their own homes and moved into the elegant quarters of the Stratford Springs.”
The hotel was full of such notables — all 84 guest rooms were occupied by 125 people, with names like Stifel, Paxton, and Hazlett — who were “wintering” away from their mansions during a record cold spell, when disaster struck.
A Midnight Fire and a Roaring Furnace
Near midnight on Sunday, January 13, 1918, faulty electrical wiring (“crossed wires,” as the News-Register called it), or perhaps an overheated motor, sparked a fire in the Stratford’s boiler room in the northeast corner of the structure. Fortunately for the mostly sleeping guests, the fire’s spread was inhibited by a strong westward blowing, winter wind, affording the guests time to escape. Many fled the burning hotel “scantily clad” in various states of undress, in robes or in pajamas, some with only bed blankets wrapped around them in haste, and many with no shoes. Local residents helped, inviting survivors into their homes for warmth and tea, and providing hot coffee for the firemen.
Still transitioning from the horse drawn steam pumps, the Wheeling firefighters arrived, only to find no nearby fire plugs. The water pressure was inadequate to douse the flames and the hose water froze into a massive sheet of ice on the steps and steep grade in front of the hotel. With the guests safe and accounted for, the firemen and some local residents went to work trying to salvage the hotel’s fine furniture, pushing grand pianos, couches, a Victrola, rolled up rugs, and huge mirrors out the door. All “slid down the hill toboggan fashion to the lawn below,” while some continued to slide on the ice sheet all the way to Edgwood Street.
The all-wood structure was soon a “roaring furnace,” throwing heat too intense for anyone to be near. The glow of the flames could be seen all the way to downtown Wheeling.
A “Monster Comet” Crossed the Sky
Newspaper accounts include reports of a “a monster comet” that was seen streaking across the midnight sky even as the Stratford burned. Said to be “unusually luminous” with a long tail, many of the witnesses thought the comet was a reflection of the fire in the smoke and mist filled sky.
By morning the Stratford Springs Hotel was a smoldering ruin. Two brick chimneys and an iron beam jutted oddly from the ashes. The hotel’s cash register and safe stood on the sprawling lawn surrounded by piles of rescued furniture.
Just ten years after it opened, the grand hotel was gone.
The spring house, where the water and carbonated beverages were made by the Stratford Magnesia Springs Co., survived the fire and continued to bottle product for several years.
Sources
Callin’s Wheeling City Directory, 1913, 1914.
“Souvenir: Eighteenth Annual Session of the United Commercial Travelers of America,” 1914.
Wheeling Intelligencer, January 14 and 15, 1918.
Wheeling News-Register, January 14 and 15, 1918, 1938.
Loved this. Lived on Edgewood st and wished I had explored the woods behind our house. The carriage road made a terrific sled riding run!
The spring still exists. It runs out of the wall behind the Stratford Arms apartments and across the rear parking lot.
We built our new home in 1954 on Stratford Rd., probably what would have been the east wing of where the hotel originally stood, We would often find broken pieces of hotel china while excavating our back yard. We used to call the spring the Witches Well and would make our way carefully through the weeds across the steep slope above the bottling company to see it. Unfortunately at 6 yrs. old, I did not understand that we were living on such historic land. But what a great gift to grow up there and explore the woods, the well. and the vista that the area had to offer!
Hello Robin,
I live at 23 Stratford Rd, the “middle” house. Was kinda wondering which house you were referring to! I still dig up china, nails, glass, and old tiles when I’m gardening. It’s so interesting!
Rhiannon Jump
What a great memory. My Grandparents live at 37 Stratford Road in the 70’s. I lived in St. Clairsville, but spent many weekends on Stratford. The bottling building was still standing. Although is was declared “Off Limits” to a teenager, that was an open invitation. We always explored that place, just waiting for a scare of a past spirit. We found all kind of bottles, punch boards, the conveyor line was still intact. Back then, I had no idea of the history of the Hotel. What a great find to add to such a fond memory of Stratford Road.
Robert, thank you for your kind words and for sharing these memories.