New Digital Additions to Historic Paducah Hotel Ledger Collection

The McCracken County Public Library Local and Family History staff have added to their Historic Digital Paducah Hotel Ledger Collection. The collection highlights historic ledgers from both the Richmond House and now the Hotel Lagomarsino. To explore this collections and more visit https://digitalcollections.mclib.net/luna/servlet/s/o80z5k .

The Hotel Lagomarsino, proprietor Louis Lagomarsino, opened on the corner of Broadway and 2^nd Street in August of 1902, according to the Paducah Evening Sun. The hotel had a café as well.  A fire the next fall, which the News-Democrat reported as having started around the corner at the rear of M. Livingston and Sons Wholesale Grocers extensively damaged the hotel, but building owner J.R. Smith started repairs immediately, and Hotel Lagomarsino was back in business the end of December in 1903. The hotel catered to businessmen and also to traveling troupes of entertainers. The hotel register shows hometowns of patrons from as close as the city to Chicago, San Francisco, New York City and even London and Dublin, Ireland.  The newspapers reported it was the first hotel in Paducah to have telephone service in each room. The hotel acquired a new proprietor—Bob Moshell and company—and a new name—Hotel Belvedere—in 1906, according to the Evening Sun.  Years later, the Paducah Sun said the hotel’s new name came from the Paducah Brewing Company’s Belvedere beer, which was served there. The Sun also reported that in 1915, the hotel was leased by Stuart Sinnott and renovated to serve traveling businessmen. It stayed the Sinnott Hotel until 1951, according to the Sun, when it became the Griffin Hotel.  Finally, the 48-room building, still part of the J.R. Smith estate, was sold for $10,000 in 1959.  In 2013, the McMurry and Livingston law firm bought the building at 201 Broadway.  The Paducah Sun reported the firm made a million dollars worth of renovations, and the next year the law firm took over the first four floors, with the fifth floor leased as a private residence.