Piedmont Springs Resort was operating as early as 1850 as a health spa and resort because of three nearby sulphur springs that varied in taste from mild to strong. Numerous drinking places and bathhouses allowed guests to move freely about the grounds. A grand four-story hotel with 100 rooms, built about 1860, became the social center for the area, where guests enjoyed billiards, poker, and horse races, and where Gen. Sam Houston once danced the minuet. In 1865, the hotel became a hospital and headquarters for John G. Walker's Greyhound Division, Confederate army. The owner closed the building after losing money in the panic of the 1870's.