West Baden Springs Hotel - West Baden

West Baden

When Lane opened his hotel in 1852 near the settlement of Mile Lick, he named his establishment the Mile Lick Inn. The community was renamed West Baden in 1855 (after Wiesbaden, the German city known for its mineral springs), and the hotel name was changed likewise. In 1887, the Monon railroad built an extension to take guests to the hotels and springs at French Lick and West Baden, who competed tooth and nail to offer the best service, entertainment, food and mineral water. West Baden marketed their water under the brand name, “Sprudel Water” with an elf named Sprudel. French Lick sold "Pluto Water" using a red devil trademark.

In the late 1800s, guests arrived from across the country on seven separate railroads for relaxation and the alleged curative powers of the mineral water. Sidewalks led from the hotel to seven numbered springs, all of which were covered by open wooden shelters.

A group that included Lee Wiley Sinclair from Salem, Indiana, purchased the hotel and 667 acres (2.70 km2) in 1888 for $23,000 and over the next few years, he bought his partner's interest. Sinclair turned the facility into a cosmopolitan resort, including a casino advertised as "The Carlsbad of America", an opera house and a two-deck, covered, one-third-mile oval bicycle and pony track. A lighted baseball diamond in the center of the track became the spring training grounds for several major league teams including the Cincinnati Reds, Chicago White Sox, Chicago Cubs and Pittsburgh Pirates. The whole structure burned down in the summer of 1901. No guests were injured, but Sinclair was forlorn. He invited Thomas Taggart, who owned the French Lick Springs Hotel, to buy the West Baden property, but Taggart rebuffed the offer, boasting that he would expand his facility to handle more guests. Sinclair was outraged and declared that his new hotel would be fireproof and would have the world's largest dome. Most building professionals rejected a 200-foot (61 m) skylight as impossible, but unknown West Virginia architect Harrison Albright designed the building and Oliver Wescott, a bridge engineer, designed the dome trusses. To complete the structure before the first anniversary of the fire, a 500-man crew worked six days a week in 10-hour shifts for 270 days,at a total cost of $414,000.