Northwestern Hotel
About this property
The Northwestern Hotel is a historic building located in the East Village of Des Moines, Iowa, United States. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984. In 2017 it was included as a contributing property in the East Des Moines Industrial Historic District. Opening in 1916, the Northwestern Hotel was built to serve the needs of railroad employees and passengers from the nearby Chicago and North Western depot, and other people of modest means. It was particularly popular with people during the Iowa State Fair. The hotel also had an arrangement with the railroad to accommodate its employees in their rooms. This building replaced a previous hotel with the same name in the same location. It was built by Otto Starzinger, whose parents Frank and Anna built and ran the hotel before him. Other businesses housed on the first floor included a restaurant, cigar stand, and a drug store. Eventually, the building went into a slow period of decline before Polk County officials forced it to close in 1982. A group of lawyers remodeled the building for office use in 1983. The building currently houses retail space on the first floor. The building was designed by the prominent Des Moines architectural firm of Proudfoot, Bird & Rawson. It is a three-story structure with a decorative cornice at the roofline. Most of the building's decorations were limited to the lobby of the hotel when it was constructed. The first floor housed retail space in addition to the hotel's lobby. A ballroom, with its own skylight, and guest rooms were on the second floor. The guest rooms of the second and third floor were generally small and were arranged around spaces with skylights. Some of the larger suites, which had a view of the capitol building, had their own bathrooms. The other guest rooms shared bathrooms. The building was originally designed to be six stories high, but it had to be scaled back to three. However, the underpinnings of the building exist to support additional stories, and cast concrete supports and a fourth-floor fireplace are located in the attic.
Location
Categories
Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).
Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Everything a full report reveals about Northwestern Hotel
This page lists Northwestern Hotel. A full Aubrey report for an address near it pulls together this listing alongside battlefield records, land patents, and every other historical record within a chosen radius:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Questions about this property
When was Northwestern Hotel listed on the National Register?
Northwestern Hotel was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 12, 1984.
What type of historic resource is Northwestern Hotel?
Northwestern Hotel is classified as a building in the National Register of Historic Places.
What is the period of significance for Northwestern Hotel?
The period of significance for Northwestern Hotel is recorded as the industrial era.
Can I research the history near Northwestern Hotel?
Yes. Aubrey Research reports search National Register listings, battlefield records, land patents, and other primary historical sources within any radius of a US address. A report for an address near Northwestern Hotel will include this listing and all other historical records in the area.
More in Polk County
Historic places, battles, and census history across Polk County.
Explore PolkCounty ›Research the history near this site
An Aubrey US report for an address near Northwestern Hotel will include this listing alongside battlefield records and other historical sources within your chosen radius.