Elton Hotel

History

The Elton Hotel is located at 30 West Main Street in downtown Waterbury, Connecticut, United States. It is an early 20th-century building by local architects Griggs & Hunt in the Second Renaissance Revival architectural style.

It was built in 1904 to replace a lavish hotel lost in a fire that destroyed much of downtown Waterbury two years earlier. To the surprise of its investors, mainly prominent local businessmen, it turned a profit within a year of its opening. F. Scott Fitzgerald was a guest, and James Thurber is said to have written "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty", during a stay of his. On the eve of the 1960 election, John F. Kennedy gave an early-morning speech from the hotel that was credited with helping him win Connecticut. It continued to be used as a hotel until the early 1970s.

In the late 1970s, when the Downtown Waterbury Historic District was created, the hotel building was included as a contributing property. In 1983, it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places individually. Since then it has been converted into professional office space and senior housing.

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