Massasoit House
Life Spam: 1857-1871
Location: SE corner of Old Central Avenue (N. Beaubien Court) and E. South Water Street
Architect: W. W. Boyington
- Halpin & Bailey’s City Directory for the Year 1863
Massasoit House, Hirem Langley, proprietor, cor. S. Water and Central av., nr. Great Union depot
Edwards’ Annual Directory in the City of Chicago, for 1870
Massasoit House, Hirem Langley, prop. Water cor. Central av.
Weekly Chicago Times, January 8, 1857
A new hotel, called the Massasoit House, built of brick covered with mastic, 130 by 40 feet, and four stories high. Being only 80 fee distant from the great passenger depot of the Illinois Central railroad, it is the most convenient place in the city for travelers to stop who arrive late at night and wish to go to bed immediately, or who, on arriving, only wish to stop in the city a short, time.-It is designed and fitted up with special reference to the comfort of the traveling public, and is already reaping a rich reward in the popularity it has so soon attained. It is fitted up with all the modern improvements, and is, in all respects, a first class hotel. Gage, Drake & Gage, proprietors. Boyington & Wheelock, architects: cost $30,000.
Chicago Tribune, May 27, 1857
A Benefactor About To Leave Us.– Dr. Tilton, now stopping at the Massasoit House, Room No. 11, Chicago, is about, we are sorry to say, to proceed to Boston. For some weeks he has been actively engaged in dispensing the extract of Cannabis Indica, a medical preparation made from the leaves of the East India Hemp plant by his father-in-law, old Dr. H. James. The old Doctor discovered this infallible remedy for consumption, asthma, bronchitis, nervous debility, &c., in Calcutta. The Doctor will leave here the first of June. After he leaves the medicine can be obtained of Dr. Fesler, 207 Randolph street, until his return, which will be in the fall.
Dr. Thomas Tilton,
Room No. 11 Massasoit House.
Chicago Tribune, April 4, 1863
Sale Of The Massasoit.—The Massasoit House was sold yesterday at public venue for $28,000. The furniture went out piecemeal at very high figures.
Chicago Tribune, April 4, 1863
Fire At The Massasoit House.—At twenty minutes past four o’clock yesterday morning, fire was discovered in the crockery room adjoining the dining room, in the second story, on the south end of the Massasoit House, corner of South Water street and Central avenue, and the alarm given. The fire department, with its usual promptness, was soon at the scene of conflagration, and, through its efforts, the main portion of the building was saved from destruction.
The damage done to the building by fire has been estimated at $2,000, and a good deal of a temporary damage was done to the walls and floors by water. From the crockery room the fire worked its way through the floor and spread into the kitchen, pantry and boiler rooms, on the first floor. Of course there is the usual amount of charring of wood work, breakage of door panels, windows, &c., but the building is otherwise not materially injured. Most of the furniture in the dining room was saved.
All agree that the building was fired by some person or persons unknown, and the object in doing so is equally unknown.
On Wedneeday last the House was sold under the hammer of Mesers. W. A. Butters & Co., at auction, for the sum of $26,000. The purchaser was Mr. Fagan, of this city. The furniture, or a goodly portion of it, was also sold in small lots at auction at the same time, but a part of it remained upon the premises. The house, consequently, was left almost vacant.
London Illustrated News, August 22, 1863
History of Chicago. A. T. Andreas, 1885
THE MASSASOIT HOUSE, situated, before the fire, at the southwest corner of Central Avenue and South Water Street, was built, in 1857, by David A. and George W. Gage, and was opened, the following year, by John C. Parks and John W. Humphreys. In appearance, the house nearly resembled the Massasoit of later years. The old Massasoit, however, though built of brick, was plastered on the outside, and then tiled in imitation of stone. It was five stories in height, contained seventy -two rooms. and cost, originally, $32,000. In 1851, John W. Humphreys, who had previously purchased his partner’s interest, sold out to William Cox, who, in turn, was succeeded by Killian Winne. In the spring of 1863, Hiram Longley purchased the house, paying for it $35,000. Mr. Longley kept it until the fall of 1871, when, his health failing him, he leased the property for a term of years, and returned to Shirley, Mass., his native town, to spend his declining yeas Through the courtesy of A. W. Longley, of this city, a nephew of the old hotel man, the following letter from Mary A., widow of Hiram Longley, has been furnished for publication in this History. ‘The letter is dated April 3, 1884, and reads as follows:
- Dear Sir,-Your favor at hand. Will try to answer a few of your questions. Mr. Longley was born in Shirley, Mass., in 1807, and spent his early years as a manufacturer in Dover, N. H., and in his native town, where he first went into business for himself in 1835. In 1853, he went to Chicago, and in the following year purchased the old Rock Island House, situated on Clark Street, at the corner of Twelfth. Here he was burned out in August, 1856; and in November of the same year he went into the Sherman House, and remained there two years. From there to the Clarendon House, on Randolph Street, where he remained until the spring of 1863, when he purchased the Massasoit House. He paid for it $35,000. In the spring of 1871 he returned to the East; and you know what took place in the fall of that year. In May, 1873, his nephew, A. W. Longley, of Chicago, began rebuilding the house, and opened it in the fall; Mr. Longley, senior, also returned to Chicago during that year, and remained there until the spring of 1875, when he once more came East, to his native town, where he died February 15, 1877. He was married, in 1838, to Mary A. Farnsworth, of Harvard, Mass.; he died childless. I have no cut nor picture of the old house; we had one, but it was destroyed at the time of the fire.
“Very respectfully, yours, MARY A. LONGLEY.”
- Massasoit House
SE corner of Old Central Avenue (N. Beaubien Court) and E. South Water Street
Created by E. Whitefield for the map-making concern of Rufus Blanchard
1862
- Massasoit House
Sanborn Fire Insurance Map
1869
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