The old United States Hotel, a portion of which is now used as a station of the East Side elevated road, was at one time the biggest hotel establishment, the boss tavern of New York; and thereby hangs a tale.
There was a man called Holt, a very nice man, who had kept a very nice restaurant near the Fulton Ferry for years. There were then three popular restaurants down town; all of which are now forgotten. They were George W. Brown’s Auction Hotel restaurant in Water street, Clark and Brown’s in Maiden Lane, and Pearsall’s under Fulton Market. Pearsall’s was especially in favor, and no wonder; for he gave a tip-top dinner for twenty-five cents, such as you would pay a half a dollar for now, and be glad to pay it. Pearsall himself was a clever fellow, made money fast, and had a big farm on Long Island. Holt considered himself Pearsall’s rival, and tried to give even a better dinner for the same money, but somehow didn’t quite succeed, or at least didn’t quite succeed in convincin’ the public that he did. Still, Holt had a big run of custom, and some very big bugs of customers, who took quite a fancy to him personally, and pecuniarily. It was this last fact which brought him to grief. It isn’t often that havin’ friends willin’ to advance one money brings one to ruin, but this is just what happened in Holt’s case, and this is how it happened.
Holt took it into his head that New York wanted a big, first-class, stylish hotel near the Fulton Ferry, and that he was just the man designed by Providence to build and run that hotel. He really did believe all this, but he went into the idea chiefly to get ahead of his rival, Pearsall, who had no ambition at all, was perfectly satisfied with his lot and his luck, and didn’t believe in goin’ outside of his regular business of keepin’ a restaurant.
So Holt got the idea of this big hotel into his head and once in he never was able to get it out again. It was like the idea that Ben Butler has always had of bein’ some time or other Governor of Massachusetts–it was bound to come. Holt was bound to build that big hotel and take the shine out of ploddin’ Pearsall.
Holt’s wife was a sensible woman, and women when they have sense at all have a good deal of it. Mrs. Holt was chock full of it and she advised her hubby to stay where, and what, and as he was. She advised him to let hotels alone and stick to the restaurant; she told him a story about a chap who was always pretty well but wanted to be better, took a lot of quack medicines and died. But Holt had Pearsall on the brain, and hotel on the brain together, and the two were too much for his brain. He went hotel wild, and bein’ a good talker and really a good fellow, got a good many of his big bug customers to look upon the hotel scheme favorably, and to advance him money to carry it through–securin’ themselves on the land and buildin’ of course.
For two years the buildin’ was in course of erection–the papers were full of accounts of it. It was written up as if it was one of the wonders of the world. It attracted quite as much attention as the Brooklyn Bridge does now, and Holt held his head high up in the air, thinkin’ Pearsall’s nose was out of joint. But Pearsall had a level head, and kept his thoughts to himself, held his tongue, and still kept on givin’ the best dinners in the city for twenty-five cents.
At last, just fifty years ago, the hotel–now the United States, then called Holt’s Hotel–was finished. It was considered an imposin’ structure and the papers couldn’t make enough of it. They blew Holt’s horn all the time. And for a while at least Holt realized his ambition, and rose from bein’ a mere restaurant keeper to bein’ a famous man.
It was intended to open the hotel to the public on New Year’s day, but things were not quite ready then of course, and the grand openin’ was postponed to the third day of January, and it was a “grand” affair indeed.
There was any quantity of pomp and ceremony. The city corporation in a body took part in the ceremonies. Walter Bowne was Mayor then, and the procession of dignitaries started from his private residence on Beekman street. A. T. Stewart, who then lived in Warren street; John Jacob Astor, who lived in a house on the present site of the Astor House; his son William B., who lived on Broadway near White street; Washington Irving; Chancellor Kent and other men of mark were present at the openin’. So was Chief Constable Jacob Hays with his gilded staff. So was the Recorder. So were the Aldermen–every one of the Aldermen.
A splendid “feed” was provided, and toasts were drunk and speeches were made and all was glory for Holt, who felt just then that he had not lived in vain. Pearsall had been invited particularly to “the grand openin’,” and Pearsall, like a sensible fellow, accepted the invitation, and drank to his rival’s prosperity at his rival’s expense, while his restaurant under the old market still gave its good dinners for twenty-five cents.
Holt didn’t go to bed at all the night the hotel opened; he was too full of glory; but his wife didn’t share his raptures, and only looked at what all this glory was goin’ to cost.
And unfortunately before long it cost all that Holt had in the world. Business at the hotel didn’t come up to the expectations–the debts contracted on it and for it had to be paid. The friends who had originally advanced him money now began to feel shaky and to fall back on their securities, and in short–in a few years–poor Holt was “ruined,” his wife found that all her forebodin’s were realized, while Pearsall still kept on coinin’ money slowly but surely, givin’ the best dinners in town for twenty-five cents.
Among the crowd that attended the openin’ of Holt’s Hotel was a very handsome young man, just then barely of age, by name William Wheatley. This youngster afterwards became the most popular light comedian on the American stage, and one of the most enterprisin’ managers ever known either in Philadelphia or New York. He was a very good lookin’ individual, and had tremendous luck with women. The girls were all more or less, crazy about him, and a book of his adventures with the fair sex would have been beaten Don Giovanni. He settled down and married Beck’s daughter, the janitor of the Musical Fund Hall, Philadelphia, one of the finest lookin’ ladies of her time. By his first wife he had several children, and one of them to-day is a conductor on one of our horse-car lines–the Fourth avenue line, I think.
This younger Wheatley is blond, and somewhat resembles in looks his father, but is very quiet and retirin’. He never had any taste for the stage, and for a while kept a grocery store on Third avenue near Fifteenth street. He sold good groceries, but he didn’t have good luck; got into a difficulty; paid up all debts like an honest man, though he gave up all he had in the world, and then tried to start in business once more. But luck has always gone against him, and so he was glad to get a conductor’s position on a horse-car.
It does seem to me rather suggestive that the buildin’ itself, the old United States Hotel, still stands in tolerable preservation, though it ruined the man who built it, while since it started a mere boy, who was president at its openin’, became a great actor and manager, has died and been almost forgotten, and his son is now a car conductor.
