title: [The Hexagon Hotel], Southside
date: 1897/1959
language: English
description: This photograph is a cleaned-up version, by A.F. Weaver, of the
 Hexagon Hotel, at approximately the time of its completion. (The site has been
 cleaned, and the trash removed.)  
     
     Construction of the Hexagon
 Hotel started in 1895, and it opened for business in 1897, to ameliorate
 Mineral Wells' torrid summertime heat years before air-conditioning became
 available, its design was such that it could catch every vagrant breeze, and
 cool the
 hotel.                                                                                               A DC generating plant (seen behind and to the left of the hotel) furnished power to an electric light in each room.  It was the first electrically-lighted hotel in Mineral Wells.  the plant was operational when the hotel opened.  There was also a steam laundry and an ice house, as well.  The ice house produced its first block of ice in 1903.  
     The builder/owner, Mr. David G. Galbraith (along with five other men) held the patent for acetate.  Mr. Galbraith was a prominent cattleman from Colorado City, Texas.  He came to Mineral Wells in hopes of curing a sever attack of rheumatism.  He took the  baths, and found that they helped him, so he decided to remain in Mineral Wells, and open a hotel.                                                                                                                                                                         
      The original photograph, included in the A.F. Weaver collection, shows evidence of construction-related activity and debris along NW Holland Street (now [2007]: NE 6th Street).
subject: Architecture - Landmarks
subject: Business, Economics and Finance - Hotels
coverage: United States - Texas - Palo Pinto County - Mineral Wells
coverage: New South, Populism, Progressivism, and the Great Depression,
 1877-1939
coverage: 1897/1959
rights: Public
type: Photograph
format: Image
identifier: local-cont-no: AWV_0025P
identifier: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth20301/
identifier: ark: ark:/67531/metapth20301