Joseph Smith Hyde erected a hotel on this site in 1858 in anticipation of Ridgway’s growth, and it officially opened with a grand ball in 1859 as a 125-room hotel overlooking the town center. As Ridgway became a bustling business center and thriving community, with 2,500 people in 1895 and a peak population of 6,700 fifteen years later, the hotel served as a hub of community life for celebrations and business meetings. Hyde sold it only a few years after building it, and later owners altered it: in 1890 one portion was turned to face Broad Street, in 1891 fire destroyed another section, and in 1912 Milton Wood modernized it with an elevator, new water and heating systems, a telephone in every room, and new entrances on Main Street and North Broad Streets. Ridgway’s economy flourished for decades after the hotel’s construction and reached its apex in the early 1900s, but by 1920 the hemlock bark used for tanning leather and the large-diameter hardwoods and softwoods used for lumber milling were largely depleted, leading industry and population to decline. In 1965 the hotel was leveled for a planned national chain hotel that was never built. Hyde’s wider rise in Ridgway began after his arrival in 1837 with little but determination; he dug ditches, farmed, and worked in lumber camps, married Jane Gillis in 1842, bought a small sawmill and 400 acres of timber land in 1847, and went on to build a series of successful enterprises until his death in 1888.