Hotel Cortez
National Register of Historic Places

Hotel Cortez

El Paso, El Paso County, Texas
Listed
September 23, 1980
Type
Building
Period
Industrial
Ref No.
80004105

About this property

The Hotel Cortez is a historic eleven-story building in El Paso, Texas. The Hotel Orndorff in El Paso was built in 1926 for Alzina Orndorff DeGroff. DeGroff purchased the Vendome Hotel at the corner of Mills and Mesa Streets in 1899. In 1900, she renamed it the Orndorff Hotel. In 1925, she demolished the hotel in 1925 to make way for a new Hotel Orndorff, that would later become the Hotel Cortez. The Hotel Orndorff was designed by Trost & Trost. It cost $1.4 million to build. Reportedly, DeGroff put up $1 million of her own money to build the new hotel. However, she unexpectedly died just one month before its completion, The Orndorff family continued to operate the hotel until 1933 when it was purchased by Harry L. Hussmann and the Hussmann Hotel Company and renamed the Hotel Hussmann and then the Hotel Cortez in 1935. President John F. Kennedy stayed overnight on June 5, 1963. The hotel closed in 1970 and became the El Paso Job Corps Center, by lease with the Department of Labor. The structure was fully converted to an office building in 1984. It has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since September 24, 1980.

Location

300 N. Mesa St.
El Paso, El Paso County, Texas
31.75984, -106.48787

Categories

ARCHITECTURE
National Register nomination ›
Sources

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.

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The Soldiers
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Native Heritage
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Settlement
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Nearby Historic Sites

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Questions about this property

When was Hotel Cortez listed on the National Register?

Hotel Cortez was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 23, 1980.

What type of historic resource is Hotel Cortez?

Hotel Cortez is classified as a building in the National Register of Historic Places.

What is the period of significance for Hotel Cortez?

The period of significance for Hotel Cortez is recorded as the industrial era.

Can I research the history near Hotel Cortez?

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