Lovejoys Hotel, New York City

1852 map showing location of Lovejoy's Hotel. Barnum's American Museum can be seen at the top left.

Lovejoy's Hotel was a New York City, New York hotel from the 1830s through 1870. It was located at the corner of Park Row and Beekman Street in a six-story building.. [The Last of Lovejoy's Hotel], The New York Times

The Astor House hotel was opposite it.

History

• Jonathan Lovejoy was the original proprietor. John P. Huggins later purchased the hotel.<ref name="lovejoy1">Mower, Henry S. [Reminiscences of a Hotel Man of Forty Year's Service], pp. 76–77 (1912)
  Huggins ran the hotel for approximately twenty years before purchasing the Cosmopolitan Hotel with his two brothers. [History of Carroll County, New Hampshire], p. 388 (1889).
• John P. Huggins (obituary)], The New York Times

In 1852, Alvan E. Bovay, a future founder of the United State Republican Party, dined with Horace Greeley at Lovejoy's during the 1852 Whig National Convention. They discussed the need for a new national party, and Bovay suggested it be called the "Republican" party.

The hotel was among those the "Confederate Army of Manhattan" attempted to burn down in November 1864.<ref name="bbcamerica">Hansen, Gretchen (21 October 2012). The 1864 Plot To Burn Down New York City, BBC America</ref>

Horatio Alger, Jr. mentions Lovejoy's in his 1868 novel Ragged Dick.

Closure

The hotel closed in 1870 and was converted into offices.<ref name="ref1"/> By now Park Row was dominated by newspapers, and subsequent tenants of the building included the New York Evening Mail and the Rural New Yorker.<ref name="eveningmail1">(15 August 1872).

The building suffered some damage in the January 1882 fire that destroyed the former Potter Building (and former home of the New York World). (1 February 1882). Surrounding Property Damaged, The New York Times</ref> But it remained standing until around 1890. [Testimony of Nelson S. Flock, Appellate Record, Storms v. New York Elevated Railroad Company, Court of Appeals of the State of New York], p. 84 (1903)]

External links

• 1860 hotel envelope with building sketch, at Columbia University Libraries

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