Michael Rush's Family & the Rush Hotel

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by David Parmer

Michael Rush was the youngest son of Andrew and Abalene Rush, immigrants from the County Roscommon. In 1892, he married Elizabeth Farrell, another child of County Roscommon immigrants. They were the parents of eight children who were born in Orlando, namely Andrew, Peter, Abalena, Anna, Helena, Gertrude, Bertha, and Marie.

To the left are Andrew and Elizabeth Rush with their two oldest children, Andrew (left) and Peter (right). A photo of Elizabeth in later years is at the end of this entry.

See the Feb '08 entry The Rushes From County Roscommon for more on Michael's parents.

See the Jan '08 entry A Summer Wedding for Elizabeth's sister's wedding. It includes a photo of the Farrell sisters in old age.

Entrepreneur

As the West Virginia Central and Pittsburgh Railroad was building its track from Weston down Oil Creek around 1890, Michael Rush, the third son of Andrew and Abalena Rush, recognized the economic potential of the little town of Orlando, then known as Confluence, and began purchasing land in the village. Between 1891 and 1899 Michael Rush purchased ten different parcels of land in or around Orlando. From 1900 to 1907, he bought ten additional parcels of land. These twenty parcels of real estate were in located in Braxton County. Michael also owned land on Goosepen and Indian Fork in Lewis county, as well as approximately 400 acres in Gilmer County. By 1907, when the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and the Coal and Coke Railroad were shuttling trains through the little town of Orlando day and night, Michael had become a successful businessman and one of the largest landowners in this little community at the mouth of Clover Fork. Judging from his real estate holdings, he was doing very well. Several of the parcels of real estate purchased by Rush were oil or gas producing properties.

Right are young Marie and Andrew Rush with Roy "Boss" Riffle at the Orlando train station. Boss Riffle's wife Idena & son Fred are in the Sept "07 entry Fred Riffle's Strawberries

The Rush Hotel

The Rush Hotel was one of the major investments made by Michael Rush in the Confluence community. The hotel was located on the northern (left) side of the street as you pass across the Oil Creek Bridge headed toward down town. The building was a two story frame building, approximately fifty feet long running with the street and forty feet deep, with porches on both floors, running across the street side of the building and across the eastern end of the building. The eastern end of the building faced toward the right of way of the West Virginia and Pittsburgh Railroad (Baltimore and Ohio ) coming down Oil Creek. The entrance to the hotel was on the eastern end of the building. The Rush Hotel was the first and finest hotel in Confluence at the time. Just as in the Dolan Hotel of Orlando, members of the Rush family worked in the hostelry.

The Rush Hotel.

Susie Stark of Weston, granddaughter of Margaret (Rush) Kraus who was the sister of Michael Rush, recalls that her grandmother told her that she prepared and sold lunches for passengers on the trains which stopped in Confluence to allow passengers to change trains and also for water and freight stops. Members of the Dolan family likewise made a living for many years selling packed lunches to train passengers. In the first decade of the 1900s, oil and gas exploration brought a boom to Confluence. The town was the nearest rail freight stop for equipment and supplies needed by the drillers and related trades. Teamsters were on the streets of Confluence everyday picking up supplies or oil and gas field workers, or bringing barrels of oil for shipment by rail. The Rush Hotel enjoyed the trade brought by the boom and prospects looked good for the Michael Rush family.

To the right is a photo taken from the Henline home on the hill south of downtown Orlando.

The Michael & Elizabeth Rush Home

The Michael Rush home in Confluence was originally the home of H. D. Mitchell and was acquired by Rush in 1891. This two story frame dwelling was located on the western side of Oil Creek and just south of the later-built Coal and Coke Railroad line. It was next to the later-built St. Michael’s Catholic Church which was erected on land conveyed to the Catholic Bishop by the heirs of Michael Rush. On the east side the Rush house was next to the original Dolan Hotel which was built approximately 1905.

Michael Rush's Death

The Burnsville Enterprise newspaper dated November, 1907 reported on the death of Michael A. Rush:

M. A. Rush Dead
A Well Known Merchant of Orlando
Died of Typhoid Fever

"The many friends throughout the county and all over the State will hear with regret of the death of Mike Rush of Orlando, at the home of his sister, Mrs. William McGann of Weston, last Friday noon. He went there a few days ago to take medical treatment when it was discovered that he had a well developed case of typhoid fever. He immediately took to bed at the home of his sister, where he died at noon Friday. He was a well known merchant of Orlando and leaves a wife and six children. His remains were brought to Orlando Saturday morning when his interment took place Sunday.”

In the early twentieth century, medicine was still a primitive art and preventive health care was practically nonexistent. Vaccinations, serums, and effective medicines were still decades away. Some diseases were common, unchecked and nearly all fatal. One of these diseases was typhoid fever and many deaths in the early 1900s were attributable to the disease. Michael, who in November 1907 had been married for only fifteen years and was but forty two years of age, fell a victim of typhoid fever. Michael Rush took ill in the first week of November 1907 and was dead by November 7th at the home of his sister Mary McGann of Weston. The angel of recovery did not visit Michael Rush. His body was returned to Orlando from the home of his sister in Weston and lay in repose at the Rush Hotel for the wake, with Mike Moran in charge of arrangements.

November 10, 1907 was a dark, cold and sad Sunday as the funeral procession for Michael A. Rush prepared to depart Orlando for St. Bridget’s Cemetery at Goosepen. Mike Moran's two-horse funeral wagon bearing the casket of the deceased paused briefly at the end of the Orlando Bridge so Lee Morrison, photographer extraordinaire of Orlando, could memorialize the solemn occasion of the death of Michael Rush, the prominent Orlando merchant and hotel keeper. Many kinsmen and friends, mounted upon their horses, arrayed in front and behind the funeral wagon and carriages bearing the Rush family, for the five mile trip to the burial ground. Michael’s oldest child Andrew was thirteen, his child, Marie, was seven months old. It was a long cold trip to the cemetery for adults and more so for young grieving children. But such is God’s will.
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A Change of Hotel Management

At the death of her husband, Elizabeth (Farrell) Rush had eight minor children to nurture, the youngest of which was not yet a year old. Elizabeth operated the hotel for a few years, but, determining it impossible to raise her children and operate a busy hotel, she made arrangements with Burgess V. Kelly to lease the hotel. Kelly operated the hotel for a short period and renamed it Hotel Kelly but he soon decided that the hotel trade was not for him and gave it up. Elizabeth then arranged for her late husband’s sisters, Margaret (Rush) Kraus and Ella (Rush) Kraus, to operate the hotel which they did for a short while.

To the right, an ad for Hotel Kelly from a Braxton County newspaper.

We know that in August 1917, the hotel was again known as the Rush Hotel. In his column in the Buzzardtown News, Uncle Zeke mentioned that Mrs. Solomon Mick of Rocky Fork who came to Orlando to shop “got lost in the city of Orlando the other day and mistook the Rush Hotel for Dock Means Store. Mrs. Mick will have to come to town a little oftener.” The Dock Means Store was in the building opposite the hotel.

The Rush Hotel remained in the ownership of the Rush family until 1933. The Michael Rush heirs sold the former Rush Hotel in Orlando to J. E. Riffle, C. M. Mick and D. S. Bennett, Trustees of Washington Lodge No. 194 of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, in August 1933 for the sum of $491.36 to be paid within one year. The parcel conveyed contained approximately 3968 3/4 square feet, or roughly an eighth of an acre.

The Rush Children and Memories of Orlando

Helena

“Helen” Rush, daughter of Michael and Elizabeth, married Bernard Fahey of Crooked Run. Helena and Bernard lived their married lives in Akron, Ohio and had no children. Bernard’s twin brother William also lived in Akron. William’s daughter, Anne Frey, recalls that the last time she saw Elizabeth (Farrell) Rush was at the funeral service for her Aunt Helena.

Helena (Rush) Fahey is to the right.

Gertrude & Bertha, the Twins

Robert Bramham, the son of Marie (Rush) Bramham, recalls that his Aunt Gertrude Rush frequently talked about the marvelous dances which took place in Orlando during the weekends. The top floor of the Wholesale Building owned by Mike Moran was frequently used a dance hall on weekends and undoubtedly was the site of the weekend dances.

Two photos of the twins. Double click to enlarge the photo to the left to see the patchwork quilt the girls are wrapped in.
To the right are, (L to R) Gertrude and Bertha Rush.

Elizabeth Wright, daughter of Marie (Rush) Bramham, recalls hearing conversations about Orlando among her family when she was young and recalls her aunt Bertha, known to her as “Aunt Bobbi,” talk about the “rooming house” her family owned in Orlando, and that the family was busy providing lodging to itinerant farm and oil field workers in the Orlando area.

Gertrude became a nurse and last worked in New Yourk. Bobbi worked in Clarksburg in dress shops and other retail stores.

Abelena

Abalena was a secretary. She married Peter Frederick Von Thaden from Weehawken, NJ. He was known as “Von”. His parents were immigrants: his father from Germany and his mother from Denmark. Peter was not Catholic, but on Nov 7, 1935 they were married in the Sacristy of Clarksburg’s Catholic Church

In 1936, Von and Abelena moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico where he worked in the Soil Conservation Program as an Accountant. Abelena worked in New Mexico as a stenographer for the Santa Fe Railroad.

On November 28, 1936, their only child, a daughter, was born in Albuquerque. They named her name is Martha Ann. She had strawberry blond hair and was the apple of her father’s eye. Martha can remember going on family picnics. She remembers her mother as knowing her own mind and she was willing to share it with others. Martha remembers her father a quiet and rather passive.


Von transferred to job in Colorado and in late 1950’s and he and Abelena retired in Melbourne, FL Abelena (Rush) Von Thaden died October 31, 1978 while she and her husband Peter were visiting relatives in WVA. She suffered a stroke. She was buried in Melbourne, Florida. Peter died of complications of Leukemia in 1983. He was buried in Melbourne next to his wife.
Above, left and right, Abalene
Left, Peter "Von" von Thaden

Marie: Love is a Carved Name

The name M A R I E .R U S H was carved deeply into the wooden steering wheel of the old Model T Ford. Tom Pumphrey was just a boy when he read the inscription. He had heard of the etched name of the young Orlando lady on the car’s steering wheel long before he saw it and he was anxious to have his first look at it. The carving was obviously done with great care and love. Many people asked to look at the mystical name embedded permanently on the steering wheel of the old car which Tom Pumphrey’s father had bought second-hand from Tom Straley in the early 1930s. Now eighty six years of age, Tom Pumphrey recalls the story well.

The Fealy farm was located at the junction of the Goosepen Road and the Three Lick Road as it came down westward off Ryan’s Hill. Ella Fealy had married Floyd Straley and the couple lived on her family’s farm. One of their children, Tom, was born in 1903. Floyd and Ella Straley bought a Model T Ford when their son Tom was a teenager. Although originally intended as a family automobile, young Tom soon found it to be a necessity for traveling to Orlando, the closest metropolis to his family’s Goosepen farm, where he spent most of his leisure time. A young lady of Orlando, Marie Rush, the daughter of Elizabeth (Farrell) Rush and the late Michael Rush, was the most beautiful thing young Tom Straley had ever seen to that point in his life and he was immediately infatuated with her. He made many a trip thereafter to Orlando.

A bashful youth, Tom, could summon up enough courage to speak with the beautiful Marie, but lacked the confidence to express his romantic interest in her. As a substitute for advising Marie of his love, Tom lovingly carved her name on the steering wheel of his car.

Elizabeth Rush, the mother of Marie and her two brothers and five sisters, had decided to move her family from Orlando to Clarksburg around 1920. Without knowing of Tom’s love for her, the beautiful Marie and her family moved to Clarksburg, far from the Goosepen farm of Tom’s youth and his heart.

Tom Straley lived the remainder of his life as a bachelor. His beautiful Marie met her future husband in Clarksburg and never returned to Orlando. Tom finally sold his old Model T with the inscription of his secret love in mellowed patina emblazoned on the steering wheel. He died in 1951 at the age of forty eight.

Elizabeth (Bramham) Wright, daughter of Marie (Rush) Bramham, when recently asked about whether her mother knew Tom Straley, her secret admirer from Goosepen, recalls that her mother used to be teased by her sisters about some boy from Orlando but she never learned his name.

Andrew Rush

John Rush, son of Andrew, says Andrew was living in Clarksburg when he was called up for service during WW I.

Pictured left and right is Andrew V. Rush.

In the 1930s and 1940s, when Andrew Rush was engaged in the insurance business in Weston, he would often find his occupation taking him through Burnsville. Andrew’s son, John, would frequently travel with his father. Andrew always made it a point to stop by the Burnsville Drug Store and say hello to Doctor Stanton Trimble who also once made Orlando his home in the early 20th century. Although Doc Trimble was a bit older than Andrew they enjoyed reminiscing about their former days in the railroad town of Orlando. John Rush, son of Andrew Rush, and grandson of Michael A. and Elizabeth Rush, recalls that his Aunt Bertha Rush, his father’s sister, worked in Clarksburg in dress shops and other retail stores after the family moved to Clarksburg.

Ann and Pete

Ann became a nurse along with her sister Gertrude. Ann died of Multiple Sclerosis at Johns Hopkins Hopsital at the age of 57.

Pete also died from Multiple Sclerosis. He died at the age of 61 in St Mary's Hopsital where his sisters had trained.

To the left is Anne, detail taken from a group picture.

To the left is Pete Rush riding a cow in Orlando, with the help of buddies. Holding the cow is Doc Henline. Behind the cow from left to right are Hob Henline, Sam Craft's son, Albert Butcher, Clyde Skinner, Dan Moran, and Sam Craft.
To the right is Uncle Pete with Andrew's son Michael.

The Widow Rush and Her Family

Leave for Clarksburg

Two of the Rush daughters, Anna and Gertrude, decided early in life that they would devote their careers to nursing. They enrolled at the St. Mary’s Hospital School of Nursing in Clarksburg about the time of the First World War.

In order to stay close to her daughters and to take advantage of the amenities of a larger city for her family, Elizabeth left the still booming town of Orlando. She moved in 1919 to 311 Jefferson Street in Clarksburg where she remained to the end of her life. Thus ended a thirty year connection between the Rush family and the town of Orlando.

To the left is Elizabeth (Farrell) Rush.

To the right are Andrew, Abelena, Elizabeth, Gertrude, Bertha, Helen, Marie and Peter. Ann took the photo.
Below right, Elizabeth with daughter Abelene, granddaughter Martha and great-grandson Josef.


Elizabeth sold some of the real estate holdings owned by her late husband in the Orlando area however she continued to hold other real estate and the oil and gas leases which she had executed with the Pittsburgh and West Virginia Gas Company and the Hope Natural Gas Company on about 270 acres in Braxton County and on her interest in the Farrell property on Rocky Fork which consisted of about 600 acres.

Although Elizabeth occasionally returned to Orlando for visits and stayed at the Dolan Hotel, she lived the rest of her life in Clarksburg and died in 1970 at age 98. She was buried at St. Bridget’s Cemetery.


comment 1: The St. Mary’s School of Nursing, which was affiliated with St. Mary’s Hospital, was chartered in 1905 and continued graduating nurses until 1968. It was operated by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Wheeling.

To the right is the St. Mary Hospital about the time the Rush sisters were there.



comment 2: The Rushes' Orlando home, which they purchased from businessman H. D. Mitchell, was later the home of Charley Knight. Later, the buildning's materials were used to build the home of Coleman and Helen (Frame) Jeffries. The home built from the materials of the Rush house is featured in the Feb '07 entry
Childhood in Orlando: Early Remembrances of Hauling Lumber.

Notable Traveling Guests of the Dolan Hotel

by David Parmer

For information on the Dolan Hotel see the Nov '07 entry The Dolan Hotel.

Other entries about the Dolan Hotel of Orlando mentioned some of the guests who stayed or ate meals at the venerable establishment. For example, guests mentioned in the Nov '07 entry Visitors to the Dolan Hotel included W. E. Chilton, United States Senator and publisher of the Charleston Gazette. John Wolverton, United States Congressman, Marshall “Little Sleepy” Glenn, former West Virginia basketball player and coach, and Bessie Boyd Bell, longtime Glenville State College professor.
Professor Bessie Boyde Bell is to the right.
The hotel is in the center front of the photo to the left.
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This entry provides biographical sketches of other notable guests of the Dolan Hotel.
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Frank R. Yoke was the Superintendent of the Weston public schools during the 1920s. He was involved in the state-wide effort to encourage thrift in the public schools, a necessity first recognized during the involvement of the United States in World War I.
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Ronald Moist was a prominent attorney of Clarksburg. A veteran of World War I, Moist was a Reserve military officer, and also served as law clerk to the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals in Charleston.
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E. H. Morton was long a prominent attorney in Webster County and in Democrat politics. Morton represented Webster County as a State Senator in the West Virginia Legislature for many years.
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D. L. Powell was an executive with the Gowing Veneer Mill in Burnsville during the early 1900s. When the veneer mill left Burnsville for the Tidewater area of Virginia, Powell transferred with the mill to the Old Dominion.
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Waitman T. Talbott was another prominent attorney of Webster County who represented Webster County in the House of Delegates in the West Virginia Legislature.
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E. W. Hefner of Flatwoods was a notable Braxton County banker and businessman and also served as a longtime Clerk of the Braxton County Court.
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Harry B. Clark was a wealthy coal baron of northern West Virginia. He was a banker and had various business interests all over northern West Virginia.
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William Armstrong was a mayor of Sutton and a long time attorney in Braxton County.
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James Henry Brewster of Weston was the President of the Sun Lumber Company which had extensive timber interests all over West Virginia.
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Paul Hardman was a pioneer of the pure bred cattle industry in West Virginia. He also served as the Clerk of the County Court of Clay County. He specialized in Aberdeen-Angus cattle.
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Governor George W. Atkinson was governor of West Virginia from 1897 to 1901. He also served as United States attorney for southern West Virginia and was appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt to the United States Court of Claims. Governor Atkinson and his family were frequent guests of the Dolan Hotel in Orlando. (pictured to the right)
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Dr. E. R. Hatfield was the son of Anderson Hatfield who owned over 8000 acres of valuable coal land in southern West Virginia. Doctor Hatfield and his family who lived in Charleston stopped often and partook of the hospitality of the Dolan Hotel. Doctor Hatfield had various business interests outside of the medical profession.
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Lorena Hefner was a native of Burnsville born in 1908. After teaching school for seven years she and two partners formed the Auto and Industrial Supply Company in Charleston, WV. She was a very successful businesswoman and a thoughtful philanthropist. Among her gifts, upon her death in 1997, Lorena bequeathed over one million dollars to Glenville State College to fund scholarships for students from Braxton County.
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W. D. Zinn of Barbour County was a notable farmer, writer and lecturer on agricultural matters in West Virginia and adjoining states. The Story of Woodbine Farm is his autobiographical work.
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Hunter Whiting was a long time professor at Glenville State College, serving from 1913 until 1954. Professor Whiting and his family stopped often at the Dolan Hotel.
Professor Hunter Whiting is to the right.
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McClellan Leonard was a prominent Pennsylvanian historian. He had extensive business interests in southwestern Pennsylvania and was a founder of the Uniontown Public Library.
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R. Moore Dodrill was an early principal of Burnsville High School. He also established high schools at Webster Springs, Berwind and Elkhorn in McDowell County, and a Negro high School in McDowell County. He was a superintendent of schools in McDowell County and served as secretary to the State Board of Education in Charleston. Dodrill was also heavily involved in I.O.O.F. activities in West Virginia. He served as President of the West Virginia School Superintendents Association.
R. Moore Dodrill is to the right.
W. D. Cooper is to the left.
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W. D. Cooper was a professor at Glenville State College for many years and was a frequent guest at the Dolan Hotel.
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Mary Davis was a well traveled teacher at Glenville and taught the fifth grade in connection with Glenville State College.

Mary Wolfe was another elementary teacher at Glenville and was a traveling companion of her fellow teacher Mary Davis.
Mary Davis is to the left, Mary Wolfe is to the right.
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Henry Clinton Murphy represents a tragic footnote to traveling guests of the Dolan Hotel. Murphy, who lived at Burnsville, was a traveling salesman and from 1919 until 1927 stopped many times at the Orlando hotel. After moving to Parkersburg around 1928, Murphy became a casualty of the Great Depression. Subsequent to financial reverses, Murphy committed suicide by drinking carbolic acid in the lobby of the First National Bank in Huntington in 1933.

The Dolan Hotel guest register for the years from 1919 to 1930 provided the names of the travelers. Thanks to is current owner Oscar Hawkins for sharing it.

Comment 1

Lorena Hefner, the Charleston business woman and philanthropist who was a visitor to the Dolan Hotel, was from Orlando's nearest neighbor, Burnsville. Lorena’s dad W. C. Hefner was the brother of Burnsville blacksmith Benjamin Luther Hefner. The photo to the right shows her uncle's shop, just west of the mouth of Oil Creek, with a poster on the wall advertising the Orlando auction of the lots in the Rusimisell-Fury Addition.

See the Jan '07 entry The Rusmisell & Fury Addition

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Also, the other Hefner who stayed at the Dolan Hotel, banker and businessman Ernest W. Hefner, was Lorena's first cousin, once removed. (Ernest's father Samuel C. Lorena's grandfather William S. were brothers.)

The Dolan Hotel

by David Parmer

The Dolans did Orlando a great service when they opened their hotel. The railroad lines had created a demand this little community was unprepared to meet. With the railroad to transport them, lumber, coal and other natural resources could be harvested. That meant there was lots of work, and workers who came into town needed somewhere to sleep and eat.
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The railroad also meant there were travelers needing meals and lodging. Travelers heading in certain directions had to change train lines in Orlando. That meant a delay as baggage was removed from one train line and loaded on the other. Orlando was the place to get off the train for an hour or so in the middle of the day, or the place to spend the night.
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Left, Joseph Bernard “Bern” Dolan, brother of the owners Nell, Jo and Mary Dolan, sits on the front steps of the (second) Dolan Hotel.
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The First Dolan Hotel

For a short time, from possibly 1919 to 1922, the Dolan family operated a hotel that sat next to the Rush Hotel, near the Catholic Church. The hotels were opposite of the mouth of Clover Fork. Dolan brother John C. Dolan was a primary worker at the hotel. (A Dolan Hotel register that has been preserved by Oscar Hawkins III begins with 1919 and records more than a decade of guests.)
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Right, The 1st Dolan Hotel, sitting tightly next to the Rush Hotel.
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The Second Dolan Hotel

In 1922, three Dolan sisters, Nellie, Mary, and Jo, purchased the large two story frame home belonging to Dr. Benjamin W. Peck who had been practicing medicine in Orlando but was relocating to Burnsville. Dr. Peck was the third owner of that house which was built on property that was originally a part of the Alexander Skinner holdings.

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Patrick F. Kennedy, the first owner of the retail store that would eventually become Charlie Knight’s place, built the house, shown in the circa 1904 photo at the right.
Left: the panorama shows the 2nd Dolan Hotel, center, photographed from The Rusmisell & Fury Addition.
Right, the Kennedy house circa 1904, long before the Dolans added the wing of guest roooms to make it the 2nd Dolan Hotel. For more on Orlando ca. 1904, see the Jan ’07 entry The Store That Became Charley Knight's

In 1907 George W. and Ann (Barbe) Bennett purchased Kennedy’s property and house and over the next few years enlarged the property with land purchased from Ann Skinner and Nathan Parmer. After his wife Ann died in 1910 George lived in the house until his death in 1914.
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In 1917 the executor of the estate of George W. Bennett, sold the property to Dr. Benjamin W. Peck and Dr. Peck sold the property to the Dolan sisters in 1922.
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B. W. Peck is on the left, G.W. Bennett is on the right.
For more on G. W. Bennett see the Nov ’06 entry The IOOF Funeral Of Geroge W. Bennett

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This house, located on the street running parallel with the B. & O. Railroad track, was enlarged with a rear wing and converted into the Dolan Hotel. The Dolan Hotel had nineteen rooms, eleven of which were bedrooms. The hotel would be a landmark in Orlando for the next twenty five years. Although the photos below were taken a couple decades after the hotel closed, they show the the building as it was laid out when it was the Dolan Hotel.
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Left is the house in the 1960s with its addition photograhed from the Orlando Cemetery, to the northeast. An outbuilding blocks the view of the porch along the addition.
To the right is the house with the addition of six small guestrooms up and workarea below. This photo was taken more than 20 years after the Dolans owned it, but no alterations had been made to the exterior.

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Below is a floorplan of the Dolan Hotel. It was drafted by Donna (Witzgall) Gloff whose grandparents Oras and Edith (Skinner) Stutler bought the house from the Dolans. The plan has been drawn from dim memory, and while it is generally correct, we are told there are numerous small errors in it. We welcome all coorections from others who knew the house during or after the Dolans' time there. Double click on the floorplan to enlarge it.

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The Dolan Girls

The second hotel was owned by Nell, Mary and Jo Dolan. Everyone in Orlando referred to the sisters as the “Dolan girls,” and they were well respected.
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Elizabeth Ellen “Nell” Dolan
Nell taught school at Grass Lick but she worked in the dining room of the hotel, too. She also did some of the cooking at the hotel.
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Mary Dolan
Mary Dolan had charge of the laundry for the nineteen room hotel, which was quite a task when the hotel was fully occupied. She did the laundry every Monday using a gasoline powered washing machine with a hand wringer. Mary also was the primary gardener, although Jo also spent a lot of time in the garden.
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Elizabeth Josephine “Jo” Dolan
Jo was a marvelous cook and baker, but she seems to be remembered as the public face of the Dolan Hotel. Decades after the Hotel closed, people recall Jo in particular when mention is made of the Dolan Hotel. However, the Dolan girls all worked together and equally shared the tasks in the operation of the hotel.
Right: On the right side of this photo is hotel co-owner Jo Dolan. On the left is her sister Rose.

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.Family Members Worked at the Hotel.

John C.
John worked at the first location of the hotel next to the Roman Catholic Church. In the 1920 census and on his marriage license in 1921 he listed his occupation as “hotel business”. He later was a driller for one of the gas companies, and retired from the gas company.

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Joseph “Bern” Bernard
Bern was a supervisor of road work for the state, but he was involved in the life of the hotel. Bern lived on the family farm where hogs and cows were raised for the hotel, and folks recall that Bern helped out at the hotel itself, when he had the time. After his wife’s death their daughter Bernadette spent summers at the hotel and helped do housework and also worked in the kitchen. In the winter she lived with her Aunt Maggie and Uncle Owen in Weston.
Bern’s picture is on the left, his daughter Bernadette’s is on the right.
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Bridget “Biddie” (Dolan) Francis
Biddie helped clean the hotel, serve at the table, clean up and anything else that needed done. Bridget and husband Perry Francis (whom she met when he was living at the hotel) had two daughters, Sarah Elizabeth, known as “Betty”, and Mary Margaret. In 1939, while her daughters were still teenagers, Bridget passed away. With the passing of their sister, Mary and Jo took charge of Betty and Mary Margaret. they lived at the Dolan Hotel until they finished school.

Left: Bridget “Biddie”. Right: Biddie’s daughters Betty and Mary Margaret.
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Rose (Dolan) Dyer

Rose married when she was thirty one years of age. Betty (Francis) Rainer recalls that Rose worked at the hotel until she married. Rose and her husband Frank moved to Oklahoma, where his job was located.
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Margaret Abalene “Maggie” (Dolan) Dolan
Maggie was married and lived in Weston when her family went into the hotel business. While she often visited her family, there is not evidecne that she ever worked at the hotel.
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Employees

While the family provided most of the labor, the Dolan Hotel also provided employment for others. Daisy Blake worked at the hotel as a chambermaid. Nellie Godfrey and her sister Wilda also worked at times at the Dolan Hotel. After Mary’s death, Jo contracted Nellie and Wilda’s mom, Bridget “Biddie” (Heater) Godfrey to wash and iron the hotel linens and other laundry.
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Left tot right are Biddie Godfrey, then her daughters Wilda and Nellie. See Daisy (Heater) Blake and her husband Charlie in the Jan ’07 entry Charlie Blake, Master Woodworker
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Pets

And finally, at least three critters were part of the household at the Dolan Hotel. In the photo at the right, Curley is the dog, the cat in front is Fluffy and the cat in the shadows is Bill.
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Operations

The Hotel Dining Room
Many people remember the dining room in the Dolan Hotel. The dining room had one long table in the large dining room, The table could seat twenty or more persons which made for a more homey and familiar meal. The table was set home style, meaning the bowls and dishes of food to be served were set out on the table and the guests would pass the food among themselves.

(A platter of fried chicken is to the left.)
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Boxed Lunches
The Dolan Hotel was well-known, if not famous, for the boxed lunches the hotel prepared for train passengers and train workers. Jo Dolan would meet each train stopping at Orlando with boxed lunches which had been ordered ahead by the engineers, firemen, conductors, and baggage handlers. Orders for lunches would come in at the telegraph office at the depot. The telegrapher would send the orders to the hotel by messenger where they would be filled. The lunches would be waiting when the passenger train arrived in Orlando. There were also boxed lunches for sale to train passengers who preferred to eat their lunch on the train. The lunches, according to Mary Margaret (Francis) Yahn, would include fried chicken or ham, mashed potatoes, vegetables, and cake or pie. Occasionally some lunches would include sandwiches, cookies, and fruit, and quartered tomatoes, salted and peppered, according to Helen Jeffries. Nieces Mary Margaret (Francis) Yahn and Betty (Francis) Rainer, when free from school, would help their aunt sell the box lunches to train workers and passengers, as would their cousin Bernadette Dolan, daughter of Bern Dolan, who spent her summers at the hotel. The cost of the lunches was from thirty five to fifty cents.
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Hotel Laundry
Before she passed away in 1945, Mary Dolan was the laundress of the hotel. Pat Reckart recalls that Jo Dolan, after Mary’s death, contracted with Pat’s grandmother, Bridget Godfrey, to wash and iron the hotel linens and other laundry. Pat remembers that her grandmother used old flat irons to iron the sheets and pillow slips. This involved the use of at least two irons, the one being used and the other which was being heated on the fire to be used when the first iron became cold.
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The Hotel’s Vegetable Garden
The Dolan sisters maintained a huge garden to serve the hotel. Dale Barnett, who grew up on the farm next to the Hotel property, remembers that Jo Dolan seemed to always be in the garden whacking away at weeds and gathering fresh produce to serve her guests. The garden looked to be at least an acre. It was maybe the best tended in downtown Orlando, and it it was very productive. Betty (Francis) Rainer, daughter of Bridget (Dolan) Francis, who lived with her aunts a the hotel, recalls that during her time at the hotel, her Aunt Mary seemed to be in the garden most frequently.

Green beans, ready to be strung, to the left. Summer squash, still growing in the garden, right.
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Cows and Hogs and Chickens
The Dolan sisters kept a cow or two that grazed on the hilly area behind the hotel. Hogs were also kept in the rear of the hotel property. the girls had two chicken houses, one for the young chickens and one for the older chickens. In the spring, they would get chicks in the mail and keep them in the sewing room until they were old enough to be let outside. They also kept cows and hogs at the Dolan farm on Grass Lick, and ther brother Bern Dolan looked after them and took care of the butchering.

Home cured, thick sliced bacon (right). Seeing home cured meat does not go far toward the experience of it. To know about home cured meat, you must be able to smell it.

Rural Free Delivery made it possible to mail the chicks. The July '07 entry The Plight of the Rural Mail Carrier talks about the RFD program.
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The End of an Era

Nelle died in her sleep in 1934. With Mary’s death in 1945, Jo Dolan was the last surviving member of her family. Rail passenger service was in decline. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad had closed the Orlando Depot in 1941. North and south automobile traffic was bypassing Orlando on Route 19 to the east and on Route 119 to the west. Jo Dolan recognized the economic realities of the loss of business and decided to close the Dolan Hotel. In 1946, Josephine Dolan and her sisters’ heirs sold the Dolan Hotel to Edith Stutler, bringing to an end, the history of the Dolan Hotel in Orlando.
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Edith (Skinner) Stutler, granddaughter of former owner George W. Bennett, and her husband Oras moved there from their little place on Oil Creek and lived for thirty years in the house Kennedy built and the Dolans made famous. Oras worked in the natural gas fields. In the 1950s the Stutlers added electricity and plumbing to the house. They kept a large, neat garden, chickens, hogs and a milk cow.
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To the right: Oras and Edith (Skinner) Stutler with grandchildren Gary and Nancy Stutler on the porch of the house in the 1960s.
For more on the Stutler household, see the May ‘07 entry The Dolan House, When the Stutlers Lived There
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Oras Stutler died in the 1960s. After Edith’s death in 1976 the home was sold to Ervin Crim who lived in the former hotel building for a while but later had the venerable building torn down and replaced it with a double-wide trailer.
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Comment 1. When the Dolan family sold the Dolan Hotel property to Edith Stutler, the grantors of the deed of conveyance were Margaret Dolan, John Dolan, Bernadette Dolan, Betty Rainer, Perry Francis, Rose (Dolan) Dyer, Edward R. Dolan, and Josephine Dolan.

Comment 2. A gasoline powered washing machine is running in the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIWswiLaMbY. The machine Mary Dolan used on Mondays may have been round rather than square, and the ringer may have been either hand operated or engine driven, but it certainly sounded like the one in the video and it would have had the ringer perched on the side like this one.
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Comment by Mary Margaret Francis Yahn
When I was growing up in Orlando in the late 1930s and early 1940s, I often helped by aunts Josephine and Mary Dolan in the kitchen at the Dolan Hotel My aunts cooked on a cream and green enameled Magic Chef gas range with four burners. There was also a gas refrigerator in the kitchen. The kitchen had built in shelving for all of the serving bowls, plates, glasses and cups. The kitchen sink was in the corner of the room with two windows looking out onto the driveway. There was a coal stove in the kitchen for general heating. A large and heavy swinging door led into the dining room from the kitchen. A very large dining table was located in the dining room which took up much of its floor space.
After my aunts closed the hotel, they had an auction sale to dispose of the personal property in the hotel. At the time of the sale, I was in Chicago with my future mother in law visiting my fiancé who was in the military service. The large dining table was sold at this sale, along with the rest of the hotel furniture.

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Comment by Dorothy (Riffle) Weckbacher
When I was growing up on Three Lick during the late 1930’s, the gas company was laying a large pipe line through the Orlando area. The pipe line crew parked some of the equipment being used on the job at my family’s home. (Mr. and Mrs. Arch Riffle) Many of the workmen laying the pipe line stayed at the Dolan Hotel in Orlando. The hotel packed lunches for the men who stayed there. I remember that some of the workmen would share their lunches with my brothers and sisters. One item of the lunches I recall is egg sandwiches.
Dorothy’s father is the subject of the March ’07 entry Arch A. Riffle – Orlando Nimrod and Groundhog Nemesis .

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Comment by John Jeffries

My father, Coleman Jeffries, bought the former Rush Hotel located beside St. Michael’s Catholic Church in the late 1940s. At this time the old building had already been partially dismantled. My father, my older brother, Tom Jeffries, and I completed the dismantling of the old building and hauled the lumber to our farm on Oil Creek by wagon where the lumber was used to later build our home.
See the Feb ’07 entry Remembrances of Hauling Lumber

My great uncle, E. R. “Heaterhuck” Henline, told me that the original Dolan Hotel which was located beside the Rush Hotel, had, in the early 1920’s, also been dismantled and the lumber was used by the Dolan family to build the long wing on the Dr. Peck home which had been purchased by the Dolan sisters for use as the new Dolan Hotel. Uncle Heaterhuck told me that the old site of the Dolan Hotel was too flood prone so the Dolan family decided to move the site of their hotel from the mouth of Clover Fork.
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Comment by Laurence Dyer, Jr of Jensen Beach, Florida
Rose Dolan was married to my uncle Frank Dyer. He and Rose lived in Ada, Oklahoma. They were both pleasant and likeable people.
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Comments by Dale Barnett
Before the bridge was built over Oil Creek in Orlando, the road from downtown Orlando going west toward Burnsville went directly in front of the original Dolan Hotel and Rush Hotel which were beside where the brick St. Michael’s Church was later built.
Bern Dolan, brother of the Dolan girls, was a WPA Supervisor during the Depression, and later became a Supervisor for the Department of Highways in Weston.
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Comments by Ethel Doyle
When Bern Dolan’s daughter, Bernadette, would come from Weston to Orlando on the weekends, I was working in Weston at the State Hospital. I would give her a ride to my home on Three Lick. Her Aunt Jo Dolan would pick her up and take her on down to Orlando.

When commenting on an inquiry about the food at the Dolan Hotel, Ethel said “Betcha a dollar the food was good.”

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Thanks for the following Orlando folks who contributed their own memories to this entry.

Juanita (Bennett) Buchanan, who is 86 years of age, and grew up just across the railroad tracks from the first Dolan Hotel.

Dale Barnett, Juanita Bennett’s cousin who lived next to the second Dolan Hotel.
Nieces who lived and worked at the Dolan Hotel.
. . Betty (Francis) Rainer
. . Mary Margaret (Francis) Yahn

Nellie Ruth (Godfrey) Hopkins

John Jeffries .
Pat Reckart, grand-daughter of Bridget Godfrey, who did laundry at the Dolan Hotel.
Ethel Doyle, a neighbor

Helen Jeffries