Lafayette Hotel building, 1974

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Creator

Collection

Portland Press Herald Still-Film Negatives Collection

Document Type

Still Image

Call number of Original

124491

Contributing Institution

Portland Public Library Special Collections & Archives

Location

Portland, Cumberland, Maine, USA

Creation Date

1-3-1974

Format of Original

35mm gelatin silver negative

Description

Full exterior view of the Lafayette Town House apartment building (formerly the Lafayette Hotel), 638 Congress Street, from northeast. Park Street at left. Congress Street in foreground and at right.

The Lafayette Hotel was built in 1903 by developer and hotel proprietor James Cunningham. The hotel was named after the Marquis de Lafayette, an important ally of George Washington during the American Revolution; at its opening, the hotel was decorated with French motifs. The building was constructed to be fireproof (with regard to the devastating fire Portland had endured less that forty years prior- in 1866), such that "underwriters had made the insurance rate lower than any other building in Portland," in 1903.

The Lafayette Hotel also included 162 luxurious hotel rooms, a billiard hall, a large dining room on the 7th floor, and its own pharmacy (on the Congress Street side, called The Lafayette Drug Store).
The building was sold and converted by 1967 into an apartment building, called The Lafayette Town House.

Photo published in the Portland Press Herald, on 3 January 1974

[See Additional Files link- below- for a print of the Lafayette Hotel, published in the Portland Sunday Telegram, on 7 June 1903.]

Recommended Citation

"Lafayette Hotel building, 1974" (1974). Businesses & Buildings - Portland Newspapers (Guy Gannett) Still Film Negatives. 516.
https://digitalcommons.portlandlibrary.com/pphnegs_images_business/516