Douglas, AZ - Home to the Gadsden Hotelwhich first opened in the town in 1907. The tallest building in Douglas, the hotel experienced a fire then was rebuilt in 1929 when all but the staircase burned down. The hotel features a lobby that has a 42 foot Tiffany-inspired glass mural. Gadsden used to be a mining industry. 

Gadsden Hotel Rooftop Sign
Douglas, AZ
Photo by RoadsidePeek.com

The tallest building in Douglas is the Gadsden Hotel, a five-story landmark that still rises above the old border-town streets like it owns the place. Step through the front doors and the outside world suddenly feels a long way off. Pink marble columns climb toward a stained-glass ceiling, gold-leaf capitals catch the light and a broad Italian marble staircase sweeps up toward the mezzanine. It is the kind of lobby that makes even a quick look around turn into a much longer stop.

The original Gadsden opened in 1907 and was named for the Gadsden Purchase, which brought this corner of southern Arizona into the United States. Douglas was booming with copper smelters, cattle ranches and railroad traffic, and the 160-room hotel became a gathering place for miners, ranchers, businessmen and travelers. At one time, the nearby smelters processed nearly half of Arizona’s copper, so there was plenty of money and activity passing through town.

Gadsden Hotel
Douglas, AZ
Photo by RoadsidePeek.com

Disaster arrived in 1928 when a fire tore through the hotel. Nearly everything was destroyed except the great white Italian marble staircase. Architect Henry Trost returned to design the grand replacement, which opened in 1929 with an even more impressive lobby built around that surviving staircase.

Four huge marble columns support the room, each topped with Corinthian capitals covered in 14-karat gold leaf. Above the mezzanine stretches a 42-foot stained-glass desert scene created by Ralph Baker, an artist who studied under Louis Comfort Tiffany. Beneath it hangs Cave Creek Canyon, a large landscape painting by Arizona artist Audley Dean Nichols. Between the marble, gold, glass and paintings, the lobby almost feels more like a small palace than a hotel in an Arizona mining town.

Even the elevator is part of the show. The Gadsden still has an old Otis elevator operated by a hand lever, reportedly one of the oldest manually controlled elevators still running west of the Mississippi. Riding it feels less like going upstairs and more like briefly joining the hotel’s history.

Plenty of famous names passed through the Gadsden over the years, including Eleanor Roosevelt, Amelia Earhart and John Wayne. Playwright Thornton Wilder arrived in 1962 after his car needed repairs and ended up staying for two months because he liked the hotel and Douglas so much. The Gadsden also appeared in movies such as The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean and Terminal Velocity.

Room 333 at the Gadsden is said to be haunted. The story is that a young boy fell out a window and died and now haunts the room.

Gadsden Hotel Billboard
Douglas, AZ
Photo by RoadsidePeek.com

Then there are the stories that cannot be proven quite so easily. A famous local tale claims Pancho Villa rode a horse into the lobby and up the marble staircase, leaving a chip on one of the steps. The mark is real, but whether Villa and his horse had anything to do with it is another matter. Still, it gives visitors something to look for on the way upstairs.

Room 333 has an even stranger reputation. According to hotel lore, a young boy fell from one of its windows and still haunts the room. Guests have reported televisions turning on and off by themselves, knocks coming from the radiator and odd sounds when no one else is around. No historical record has been found confirming the boy’s identity or the accident, but the story has been repeated for years and helped earn the Gadsden appearances on paranormal television shows.

Of course, old hotels are excellent places for ghost stories. Pipes knock, elevators groan and footsteps travel down long hallways at night. Whether Room 333 has a ghost or simply a building full of 1920s noises may depend on how well the guest sleeps. Either way, it is probably not the room for anyone who checks every unexplained sound at three in the morning.

Gadsden Hotel
Douglas, AZ
Photo by RoadsidePeek.com

After losing some of its shine, the Gadsden appeared on Hotel Impossible in 2013. The program remodeled Room 101 and the registration area, and later work updated the bar, restaurant and guest rooms while keeping the great lobby intact. More recent owners have continued bringing rooms back into service without polishing away all the old character.

UPDATE: The Gadsden Hotel remains open and continues to welcome overnight guests. Its Italian marble staircase, gold-trimmed columns, stained-glass mural and hand-operated elevator survive, while Room 333 continues to collect ghost stories from anyone brave enough to spend the night. 09-26

Here's a current view of the Gadsden Hotel courtesy of Google Maps.

Google Street View Image

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