Fort Armstrong Hotel is a historic building located in downtown

Rock Island, Illinois Rock Island is a city in and the county seat of Rock Island County, Illinois, Rock Island County, Illinois, United States. The original Rock Island, from which the city name is derived, is now called Rock Island Arsenal, Arsenal Island. The popul ...

, United States. It was individually listed 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 ...

in 1984. In 2020 it was included 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 Downtown Rock Island Historic District. The hotel was named for

Fort Armstrong A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...

, a fortification that sat in the middle of the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...

near the present location of the

Rock Island Arsenal The Rock Island Arsenal comprises , located on Arsenal Island, originally known as Rock Island, on the Mississippi River between the cities of Davenport, Iowa, and Rock Island, Illinois. It lies within the state of Illinois. Rock Island ...

. The building now serves as an apartment building.

History

Rock Island was in need of a modern hotel downtown, and to that end over $450,000 was raised in local stock purchases in a week. The total cost of constructing the hotel in 1925-1926 was $800,000. Jacob Hoffman was the hotel's first General Manager. The hotel became the center of business and social functions for the city. However, not all were welcome to stay in the hotel. Jazz clubs along Second Avenue regularly featured African-American entertainers such

Louis Armstrong Louis Daniel Armstrong (August 4, 1901 – July 6, 1971), nicknamed "Satchmo", "Satch", and "Pops", was an American trumpeter and vocalist. He was among the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades and several era ...

and

Ella Fitzgerald Ella Jane Fitzgerald (April 25, 1917June 15, 1996) was an American jazz singer, sometimes referred to as the "First Lady of Song", "Queen of Jazz", and "Lady Ella". She was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phrasing, timing, in ...

. They had to stay at boarding houses across the Mississippi River in

Davenport, Iowa Davenport is a city in and the county seat of Scott County, Iowa, United States. Located along the Mississippi River on the eastern border of the state, it is the largest of the Quad Cities, a metropolitan area with a population of 384,324 and a ...

because the area hotels would not serve them.

Nat King Cole Nathaniel Adams Coles (March 17, 1919 – February 15, 1965), known professionally as Nat King Cole, was an American singer, jazz pianist, and actor. Cole's music career began after he dropped out of school at the age of 15, and continued f ...

was refused a room at the Fort Armstrong on one of his visits to the

Quad Cities The Quad Cities is a region of cities (originally four, see History) in the U.S. states of Iowa and Illinois: Davenport and Bettendorf in southeastern Iowa, and Rock Island, Moline and East Moline in northwestern Illinois. These cities are t ...

. The public spaces in the hotel were renovated in the 1980s and the hotel was converted into an apartment building for senior citizens. Green space for the residents was created after the adjacent commercial buildings were torn down.

Architecture

The

Renaissance Revival Renaissance Revival architecture (sometimes referred to as "Neo-Renaissance") is a group of 19th century architectural revival styles which were neither Greek Revival nor Gothic Revival but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range o ...

building was designed by Chicago hotel designer Charles W. Nicol. It is a nine-story building that rises to a height of . It features deep corner setbacks above the second floor that keep the building from dominating the street and allow plenty of light into the rooms. The first two floors of the building are constructed in cast concrete while the upper floors of the building are constructed in brick and trimmed in white

terra cotta Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense as an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous. In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta ...

. The hotel contained 160 guest rooms and ten apartments on the top floor when it opened in 1926. It also featured a banquet room, three dining rooms, a bar, bowling alley, billiard room, barbershop and seven storefronts.

References

{{NRHP in Rock Island County, Illinois Hotel buildings completed in 1926 Buildings and structures in Rock Island, Illinois National Register of Historic Places in Rock Island County, Illinois Hotel buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois Renaissance Revival architecture in Illinois Individually listed contributing properties to historic districts on the National Register in Illinois

History

Architecture

See also

References