The Mount Washington Hotel is a hotel in

Bretton Woods, New Hampshire Bretton Woods is an area within the town of Carroll, New Hampshire, Carroll, New Hampshire, United States, whose principal points of interest are three leisure and recreation facilities. Being virtually surrounded by the White Mountain National Fo ...

, United States, near

Mount Washington Mount Washington is the highest peak in the Northeastern United States at and the most topographically prominent mountain east of the Mississippi River. The mountain is notorious for its erratic weather. On the afternoon of April 12, 1934, ...

. It was designed by

Charles Alling Gifford Charles Alling Gifford (July 17, 1860 – May 3, 1937) was an American architect and a partner in the New York City firm of Gifford & Bates. He is best remembered for his resort hotels, but also designed houses, churches, and five armories for ...

. In 1944, it hosted the

Bretton Woods Conference The Bretton Woods Conference, formally known as the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference, was the gathering of 730 delegates from all 44 Allied nations at the Mount Washington Hotel, situated in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, Unite ...

, which established the

International Monetary Fund The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is a major financial agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution, headquartered in Washington, D.C., consisting of 190 countries. Its stated mission is "working to foster globa ...

and the

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Interna ...

. The area, part of the town of

Carroll, New Hampshire Carroll is a town in Coös County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 820 at the 2020 census. The two largest villages are Twin Mountain and Bretton Woods. Carroll is an important access point for recreational areas in the White M ...

, includes the Bretton Woods ski resort nearby. It is located at the northern end of

Crawford Notch Crawford Notch is a major pass through the White Mountains of New Hampshire, located in Hart's Location. Roughly half of that town is contained in Crawford Notch State Park. The high point of the notch, at approximately above sea level, is at ...

, east of the village of Twin Mountain along U.S. Route 302. In December 2015, the hotel and the

Bretton Woods Mountain Resort Bretton Woods Mountain Resort is a ski area located in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, across from the Mount Washington Hotel, which owns it. Location and terrain The resort is located on U.S. Route 302 in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Th ...

were purchased by Omni Mount Washington LLC from the

CNL Financial Group CNL Financial Group (CNL), formerly Commercial Net Lease, is an Orlando, Florida based private investment management and commercial real estate company. It was started in 1973 by James Seneff. The company has been a major player in efforts to redev ...

, of

Orlando, Florida Orlando () is a city in the U.S. state of Florida and is the county seat of Orange County, Florida, Orange County. In Central Florida, it is the center of the Greater Orlando, Orlando metropolitan area, which had a population of 2,509,831, acco ...

, and will continue to be operated by

Omni Hotels & Resorts Omni Hotels & Resorts is an American privately held, international luxury hotel company based in Dallas, Texas. The company was founded in 1958 as Dunfey Hotels, and operates 50 properties in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, totaling over 2 ...

under the official name of Omni Mount Washington Resort. It is a member of

Historic Hotels of America Historic Hotels of America is a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation that was founded in 1989 with 32 charter members; the program accepts nominations and identifies hotels that have maintained their authenticity, sense of pla ...

, the official program of the

National Trust for Historic Preservation The National Trust for Historic Preservation is a privately funded, nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that works in the field of historic preservation in the United States. The member-supported organization was founded in 1949 by ...

History

The hotel was constructed between 1900 and 1902 at a cost of $1.7 million (approximately $ million today) by

Joseph Stickney Joseph Stickney (1840–1903) was a wealthy coal broker in Pennsylvania. He was a native of Concord, New Hampshire, and made a fortune before the age of 30 investing in the coal business. Stickney was born on May 31, 1840 in Concord, New Hampshire ...

, a native of

Concord, New Hampshire Concord () is the capital city of the U.S. state of New Hampshire and the seat of Merrimack County. As of the 2020 census the population was 43,976, making it the third largest city in New Hampshire behind Manchester and Nashua. The village of ...

who had made a fortune before the age of 30 as a

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

broker A broker is a person or firm who arranges transactions between a buyer and a seller for a commission when the deal is executed. A broker who also acts as a seller or as a buyer becomes a principal party to the deal. Neither role should be confu ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. In 1881 Stickney and his partner, John N. Conyngham, had purchased the nearby Mount Pleasant Hotel (a large early hotel demolished in 1939) from lumberman John T.G. Leavitt. Subsequently, Stickney began work on his Mount Washington Hotel. He had envisioned the hotel to be a luxurious getaway for urban dwellers looking to escape the city. Stickney brought in 250

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

artisan An artisan (from french: artisan, it, artigiano) is a skilled craft worker who makes or creates material objects partly or entirely by hand. These objects may be functional or strictly decorative, for example furniture, decorative art ...

s to build it, particularly the

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

and

stucco Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and a ...

masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units, which are often laid in and bound together by mortar; the term ''masonry'' can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are bricks, building ...

. Construction started in 1900 on the Y-shaped hotel, which opened on July 28, 1902. At its completion, the hotel boasted over 2,000 doors, 12,000 windows, and over eleven miles of plumbing. At the opening ceremony, Stickney told the audience, "Look at me, gentlemen ... for I am the poor fool who built all this!" Within a year he was dead at the age of 64 due to a heart attack.Joel J. Bedor, ''The Mount Washington Hotel & Resort -- a Heritage of Optimism;'' A Newcomen Society Address, 2003 His wife, Carolyn Stickney, spent her summers at the hotel for the next decade, adding the Sun Dining Room with guest rooms above, the fourth floor between the towers, and the chapel honoring her late husband. Under its capable first manager, John Anderson, the hotel was a success. But the advent of

income tax An income tax is a tax imposed on individuals or entities (taxpayers) in respect of the income or profits earned by them (commonly called taxable income). Income tax generally is computed as the product of a tax rate times the taxable income. Tax ...

Prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic ...

, and the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

curtailed the hospitality business. In 1936, Mrs. Stickney's nephew, Foster Reynolds, inherited the hotel, but it closed in 1942 because of

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 ...

. In 1944, a Boston syndicate bought the extensive property for about $450,000. The

Bretton Woods Bretton Woods can refer to: *Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, a village in the United States **Bretton Woods Mountain Resort, a ski resort located in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire *The 1944 Bretton Woods Conference, also known as the "United Nations Mo ...

monetary

conference A conference is a meeting of two or more experts to discuss and exchange opinions or new information about a particular topic. Conferences can be used as a form of group decision-making, although discussion, not always decisions, are the main p ...

took place that year, establishing the

and the

. The owners were paid $300,000 for the loss of business and promised a daily room charge of $18 per person for the 19-day conference. Subsequently, each bedroom carried a plaque outside its door identifying which country's representative at that conference had stayed in that room. The Mount Washington Hotel and Resort is one of the last surviving grand hotels in the White Mountains and includes an 18-hole Donald Ross-designed golf course, as well as the hotel's original 9-hole course designed by A.H. Findlay. It was declared a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

in 1986. and The hotel opened for its first winter season in 1999. Before that year the hotel would close to guests late in the fall and open in the spring. The entire hotel was overhauled before the winter, with efficient windows installed in the entire hotel. In January 2009 the Mount Washington Resort completed a addition that includes a spa and a conference center. In November 2010 it was revealed that the hotel's then-owner, CNL, had sought to

trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a type of intellectual property consisting of a recognizable sign, design, or expression that identifies products or services from a particular source and distinguishes them from others ...

the Mount Washington name, which upset area business owners. CNL said they were just directing their efforts against other hotels in the area that have the mountain's name and not other businesses that also have it.

Culture

The hotel was featured in two episodes of the television series '' Ghost Hunters'', when it was searched by the TAPS paranormal investigation team on February 6, 2008. The Mount Washington Hotel, Bretton Woods, NH.jpg, The hotel c. 1910 Hemicycle, The Mount Washington Hotel.jpg, The Hemicycle c. 1910 Assembly Hall from Ballroom, The Mount Washington Hotel.jpg, Assembly Hall, looking from the Ballroom c. 1910 Mount Washington Hotel Presidential Wing View.jpg, Mount Washington Hotel Presidential Wing view, 2014 The Gold Room - Bretton Woods Mount Washington Hotel.jpg, The Gold Room where the

and

were established during the 1944

Omni Bretton Arms Inn

The Omni Bretton Arms Inn is 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 ...

in the larger resort which was built as a house in 1896. The Bretton Arms served as staff housing for many years. It has been separately named to the

program of the

References

External links

Omni Mount Washington Resort
— official website

at historic-hotels-lodges.com
"The Grand Hotels, the Glory and the Conflagration"
at WhiteMountainHistory.org
Historic Print Shop
on the site described by Rick Russack, earmarked for restoration {{NRHP in Coos County, New Hampshire Hotels in New Hampshire Historic Hotels of America Hotel buildings completed in 1902 Golf clubs and courses designed by Donald Ross National Historic Landmarks in New Hampshire Buildings and structures in Coös County, New Hampshire Reportedly haunted locations in New Hampshire Hotel buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in New Hampshire Tourist attractions in Coös County, New Hampshire National Register of Historic Places in Coös County, New Hampshire Carroll, New Hampshire 1902 establishments in New Hampshire

History

Culture

Omni Bretton Arms Inn

See also

References

External links