I first heard about the hotel in an email from longtime blog contributor Rick Kurish. He wrote, "I ran across an interesting picture postcard today on Ebay that I had never seen before. It is a postcard of the Buckeye Hotel in South Amherst circa 1910.”
That’s the vintage postcard at right.
"The little that I currently know is that the Buckeye Hotel was owned and operated by the South Amherst Sandstone Quarries,” continued Rick. "I’m not sure of the years of operation, but I have run across references to the building from about 1900 until the 1920s. I believe that the hotel served travelers, visitors to the quarries, as well as quarry employees.”
Rick did some research on the hotel and was able to find out a lot about it.
"The first thing that I wanted
to do was identify its location,” he noted, "which I have been able to do with certainty.
“I believe that the hotel dates to circa 1900, which
is about the time that a Chicago banker named John R. Walsh purchased some
sandstone operations in South Amherst and incorporated the Ohio Quarries
Company. At that time (1903) he greatly expanded both the quarries and the
stone cutting operation.
"One of the quarries that was part of the Ohio Quarries
Company was the “Buckeye” quarry reputed to be the deepest quarry in the world
at the time. This quarry was probably the genesis for the names Buckeye Street
and Buckeye Hotel, which were associated with the Ohio Quarries.
"An early mention
of the Buckeye Hotel appears in the Elyria Chronicle of November 15, 1907. The article would indicate that the hotel served more as a boarding
house for quarry employees, and closed during the winter when the quarries were
inactive.”
So where was the hotel located?
Rick observed, "That the Buckeye Hotel was located on the southwest corner
of Buckeye street and South Amherst Road, also known as Lake Street, can be
confirmed to my satisfaction by several sources.
"First, the postcard shows the
Hotel facing South Amherst Road with a large home behind it. That home still
exists on Buckeye Street. In fact the south side of buckeye street is lined
with about ten homes of identical construction, which indicates to me that they
were built by the quarry company.”
Here’s a vintage photograph (courtesy of Drew Penfield) showing that row of similar homes on Buckeye Street that Rick is talking about.
Here’s a vintage photograph (courtesy of Drew Penfield) showing that row of similar homes on Buckeye Street that Rick is talking about.
Rick confirmed his hunch by checking census records. As he noted,"The 1920 census enumeration lists the
occupants of the homes on Buckeye Street and the next enumeration, listed as
being on South Amherst Road, is the Buckeye Hotel.
"A Howard Hunt was listed as
the proprietor of a boarding house and lived there with his family and thirteen men
identified as boarders who worked at the quarry. An article from the Amherst
newspaper of April 17, 1919 indicates that Mr. Hunt had been
given a lease to run the hotel/boarding house, and that the hotel was
undergoing extensive renovations and would reopen shortly. That would seem to
indicate that the hotel had been closed for a period of time.
"Another snippet
from the Amherst newspaper of April 6, 1922, under "South Amherst News," indicates that the Ohio Quarries had donated property just south of
the Buckeye Hotel as athletic grounds for South Amherst High School. This was
the property that South Amherst High School used for football and track before
they were consolidated with the Firelands School System. This athletic field is
still there, just south of Buckeye Street.”
Tomorrow: the rest of the story
