The Alexander Inn, originally known as The Guest House, is a historic building in

Oak Ridge, Tennessee Oak Ridge is a city in Anderson and Roane counties in the eastern part of the U.S. state of Tennessee, about west of downtown Knoxville. Oak Ridge's population was 31,402 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Knoxville Metropolitan Area. Oak ...

that was built during the

Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...

to house official visitors and that later was used as a

hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a ref ...

. It is included on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

as a contributing property in a

historic district A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries or jurisdictions, historic districts receive legal protection from c ...

History

The Guest House was built in 1943. A wood-framed building, similar to many other

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

period “H-plan” buildings, it served as guest quarters to a number of dignitaries during the top-secret

, including

Enrico Fermi Enrico Fermi (; 29 September 1901 – 28 November 1954) was an Italian (later naturalized American) physicist and the creator of the world's first nuclear reactor, the Chicago Pile-1. He has been called the "architect of the nuclear age" and ...

Robert Oppenheimer J. Robert Oppenheimer (; April 22, 1904 – February 18, 1967) was an American theoretical physicist. A professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, Oppenheimer was the wartime head of the Los Alamos Laboratory and is often ...

and General

Leslie Groves Lieutenant General Leslie Richard Groves Jr. (17 August 1896 – 13 July 1970) was a United States Army Corps of Engineers officer who oversaw the construction of the Pentagon and directed the Manhattan Project, a top secret research project ...

. In 1949, a 44-room addition was completed. The name was changed to the Alexander Inn in September 1950. The hotel was sold by the government to Mr. W. W. Faw for $34,000 in 1958. At that time, private bathrooms and a

ballroom A ballroom or ballhall is a large room inside a building, the primary purpose of which is holding large formal parties called balls. Traditionally, most balls were held in private residences; many mansions and palaces, especially historic man ...

were added, and the kitchen was expanded. The property was added to the

in 1993 as a

contributing property In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distri ...

in the

Oak Ridge Historic District Oak Ridge Historic District (also known as Clinton Engineer Works Townsite) is a historic district in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Roughly bounded by East Drive, Outer and West Outer Drives ...

.National Register of Historic Places Registration Form for Oak Ridge Historic District
, July 18, 1991 The Alexander Inn ceased operating as a hotel in the mid-1990s. Since that time the building had fallen into serious disrepair. On December 18, 2009, the Oak Ridge Revitalization Effort, a local

nonprofit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

, announced that it had purchased the historic property. In March 2010, the East Tennessee Preservation Alliance listed the inn at the top of its first East Tennessee's Endangered Heritage list of endangered historic buildings and places in a 16-county region of

East Tennessee East Tennessee is one of the three Grand Divisions of Tennessee defined in state law. Geographically and socioculturally distinct, it comprises approximately the eastern third of the U.S. state of Tennessee. East Tennessee consists of 33 count ...

. The previous, no-interest mortgage of $353,700 expired on June 30, 2011, after that date the property was to revert to its former owner. The Oak Ridge Heritage and Preservation Association (ORHPA), a group concerned with protecting the city's history, them began working with ORRE to develop a new non-profit organization that would focus entirely on restoring the Inn. The Alexander was for a while on the endangered list by East Tennessee Preservation Alliance. The Oak Ridge Industrial Development Board endorsed, and the Oak Ridge City Council approved, a 90 percent, 10-year tax break for the project to convert the hotel into Senior Living by a private developer. In November 2015 the building re-opened as a senior living center, after an $8 million renovation via Dover Development. The facility offers memory-care and assisted-living housing.

In popular culture

The Alexander Inn and its grounds are central elements for the

crime novel Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professional detective, of a crime, ...

''Bones of Betrayal'' by Jefferson Bass (the writing team of Jon Jefferson and Dr. William Bass), published in 2009 (, ). The book mentioned a below-ground pool that had been left abandoned, filled with water and debris, and was a hazard. Shortly after the book was published, this pool, which did exist prior to the building's conversion into an assisted living center, was drained and filled in with dirt.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Alexander Guest House
(website for the assisted living facility} Hotel buildings completed in 1943 Buildings and structures in Anderson County, Tennessee Hotel buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Tennessee Oak Ridge, Tennessee Historic district contributing properties in Tennessee 1943 establishments in Tennessee National Register of Historic Places in Anderson County, Tennessee