Courtesy of the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal
BIG SPRING, Texas
The historic Hotel Settles celebrated a return to its former grandeur Friday night with a ceremonial floor-by-floor lighting of the hotel, capped off with the neon red sign on top.
The hotel will serve its first overnight guests Saturday, but only current and former Big Spring residents can stay until Tuesday, when it opens its doors to other guests.
Brint Ryan, a former resident and native of Big Spring, formed the Settles Hotel Development Co. in 2006, bought the downtown landmark and restored the building.
Originally completed in 1930 just as the Great Depression was beginning, the Settles is said to have cost $500,000, an extraordinary amount at the time.
It was built by W.R. and Lillian Settles, and designed in the Art Deco style by David S. Castle, a prominent West Texas architect, according to the National Register of Historic Places. The Settles, poor local ranchers until oil was discovered on their land, gave Big Spring the biggest hotel between Fort Worth and El Paso.
Many prominent people of the day stayed there while crossing the country, often by train. Agnes du Pont of the famed du Pont family from New Jersey stayed at the hotel. Other guests included Drs. William J. and Charles H. Mayo of Mayo Clinic fame, Charles Wrigley, Elliot Roosevelt and President Herbert Hoover.
By the late ’70s, the hotel had fallen on hard times and was abandoned and shuttered. Now, almost four decades later, it has been restored to its original elegance.
