Built for the ages

by Bruce E. Johnson

When the Grove Park Inn opened in the summer of 1913, newspapers across the country christened it "the finest resort hotel in the world." Through the efforts of its owner, Edwin W. Grove, and its architect, Fred L. Seely, the Grove Park Inn drew the rich and famous to Asheville, North Carolina, where they basked in the panoramic views and soothing climate of the Blue Ridge Mountains. In the resort's early years, the Grove Park Inn served as a summer retreat for Presidents Woodrow Wilson, Calvin Coolidge, and Herbert Hoover and also welcomed such noted personalities as Henry Ford, Harvey Firestone, Thomas Edison, Will Rogers, and John D. Rockefeller Jr. After struggling through the Great Depression and serving the nation during World War II, when the United States government used it as a relocation Center for Axis diplomats, the Grove Park Inn teetered on the brink of obscurity. In 1955 the Texas businessman Charles A. Sammons purchased the 42-year-old hotel and instituted a restoration