Courtesy Lord Elgin Hotel
Then-prime minister William Lyon Mackenzie King and then-Ottawa mayor Stanley Lewis at the laying of the cornerstone.The Lord Elgin Hotel, built not only to alleviate a chronic wartime shortage of visitor accommodations in the city but also to reflect then-prime minister Mackenzie King’s vision of a vibrant modern capital, is celebrating its 75th anniversary this summer.
“When there was a major event in town the city basically had to organize a system of billeting with private homeowners,” says Carleton University journalism professor Randy Boswell.
To mark the anniversary, the hotel commissioned Boswell to author a book titled The Lord Elgin Hotel: Mackenzie King’s capital vision and the birth of a landmark in order to capture the history behind the building.
The book will be placed in each of the Lord Elgin Hotel’s guestrooms.
During the unveiling of the National War Memorial in 1939, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth visited the capital and hundreds of visitors were forced to rent rooms in homes due to a lack of hotels.
“The need for the hotel was quite profound at that time because Ottawa simply didn’t have enough hotel accommodations for the kind of city it would become in terms of tourism and its role at the centre of the Canadian government,” Boswell says.
As a result, King grew attached to the project.
“King ensured that the hotel would not just be a run-of- the-mill brick building,” Boswell says of some of his findings during research for the resulting more than 60-page book.
“It would be something special so that it fit into his evolving vision of a world-class capital city.”
On the day of the opening on July 19, 1941, King struggled to give an emotional speech.
“As I concluded, I almost broke down,” he wrote in his diary. “It was all part of a plan.”
King’s involvement in the hotel’s construction, naming, and design was both intense and feverish, Boswell says.
The Ottawa community grew attached, too. So much so that a viewing platform was set up so that people could line up to safely watch its construction.
“It was a big deal for Ottawa at the time,” says Ann Meelker, the hotel’s director of marketing.
But now the hotel is turning its attention to the anniversary in July.
It is undergoing a $13-million renovation ahead of this summer’s events, which are intended to celebrate both the hotel’s history and its staff.
“We all know the staff is a big part of any hotel and ours, many of them have been here for a long time so we need to celebrate with them and celebrate them because they are totally what the hotel is all about,” Meelker says. “A hotel is about customer service and your staff, you have to celebrate them.”
Lord Elgin Hotel general manager David Smythe is excited about the celebrations.
“We are thrilled to be showcasing the remarkable story of our hotel in this anniversary year,” Smythe said in a news release. “We are so proud of our rich history.”
After this summer’s anniversary, the hotel and its staff will turn their attention toward Canada’s 2017 celebrations, which mark 150 years since Confederation.
“We’re fortunate enough to have a fascinating location so we’re pretty much front and centre for things going on here in Ottawa,” Meelker says.
“The plans are pretty exciting and given where we are right on the ceremonial route we will be a busy hotel next year.”