The Dayton Grand Hotel was originally opened as the Algonquin Hotel in 1898. The luxurious hotel featured 400 rooms, which at the time was such a big thing for Dayton, that it led to the city no longer being pointed to as a one-street city. Over the course of its life, this 124-year-old hotel underwent not only many name changes, but physical changes as well.

During its early years, the hotel’s rooftop played a big part as it came to be a major attraction for visitors. At this time, the city of Dayton was seeing a rise in popularity for roof gardens. During the summer months, rooftops were the place to be. Not only was the rooftop beautiful from an outside perspective, but the views from the roof proved to be some of the best the city had to offer at the time, growing wildly popular with hotel guests and other visitors to the city.

In a Dayton Sunday News article from July 1, 1917, it was said that the rooftop “offered the best accommodations for a modern summer roof of any hotel in this section.”

From the newspaper:

“It is at the top of a building rising to the height of ten stories which gives the patrons a view of the city to be had from the top of but few buildings in Dayton. The combination of dancing floor and expansive garden space gives it the exclusive call over the other roof gardens in the city, offering the combination of alternating between refreshments and tripping the light fantastic on an excellent dancing floor

The appearance of the roof is as though the arrangements had been assigned to some fairy, assisted by a master gardener. Along the edge of the roof huge flower boxes are suspended, which gives the roof the appearance of a real earthen paradise.

Looking down on Dayton in the daytime and at night is a different sensation. Thousands of lights sparkle from neighboring buildings in the uptown section. Below, in the street, can be heard the spurt, spurt of automobiles and the laughter of people passing along. Above, the stars can be seen, and somehow the beholder feels brought nearer than the height of ten stories to them.On the roof all is quiet except for the strains of the music or the voice of a singer as he frollicks in the syncopated tune or touching ballad, with now and then a peal of laughter from one of those dining on the roof.”

    In 1913, Dayton would experience the Great Flood, which left 300 guests stranded inside the hotel. As water levels continued to rise, hotel staff moved supplies to higher floors, and guests followed. Safely above water levels, guests continued to be served regular meals during the flood.

Five years later in 1918, the hotel was purchased by developer Michael Gibbons. At this time, the hotel had seen a name change, being known then as the Gibbons Hotel. For over forty years into the 1960s, the hotel would operate under this name. During the 1960s, the name would change again, and the hotel would become the Dayton Inn. The name changes during the 1960s didn’t stop there though. The name would be changed again to the Daytonian, and once more to the Daytonian Hilton, when the Hilton chain purchased the building. Over these years of name changes, the building was heavily transformed. Alterations and modifications were made to bring the building into a more modern look. An aluminum facade was placed atop the building’s original limestone masonry, and large portions of the building were torn apart to make space for the addition of a parking garage and new, more modern rooms.

In the 1990s, the hotel was operating under a different name again, then known as the Radisson Inn & Suites. In 1997, a new company, City Hotels USA, took ownership of the hotel and made the decision to bring it back to much of its traditional look, and rename it to the Doubletree Hotel.

The company had plans to bring back as much of the building’s original elegance as possible, restoring the original two-story lobby design, adding a grand marble floor entryway and marble front desk. Throughout the building they planned to decorate with upscale furnishings and lighting. The rooms would also undergo huge renovations, along with the swimming pool located on the 7th floor.

Unfortunately the project had to be halted in May of 1998, when a brick wall fell on a construction worker, severely injuring him. In addition to this, issues had been found with the elevators, which caused another delay. As if those two instances weren’t enough, a small fire broke out, and more repairs were needed.

Of course delays didn’t stop there. Just as they had been reorganizing to push further with the project, two separate times, groups of vandals set off the sprinkler system, damaging the top five floors of the hotel. It cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to repair all of the water damage caused. The reopening was delayed once more.

Through all of these hurdles, on January 16, 1999 the hotel was reopened, now offering 184 rooms. Mayor Mike Turner was quoted saying “this is the beginning of the revitalization of the downtown” and “this is a grand hotel that will bring more people into our city.”

Many residents and city officials were excited about the reopening, thinking it would continue to bring great things to the city of Dayton. However, into the early and mid-2000s, Dayton would start to see a decline, and many of the city’s anchor companies fled. This hit Dayton pretty hard, and caused quite an economic nosedive for the city.

The hotel remained in operation for a bit longer, and in the 2010s had alternated between operating as a Hilton Double Tree and the Dayton Grand Hotel, which it was last known as before closing. For a short moment, it was converted back to a Hilton property in 2013, though was quickly switched back. Only eight months after switching back to the independent Dayton Grand Hotel, they had lost 80 percent of their business.

This still didn’t stop the independently run hotel from attempting one more major renovation. In 2013, an announcement was made that the hotel would undergo this renovation, with hopes that the hotel could once again become a jewel of downtown Dayton. As you could probably guess, this did not happen. Two years later in 2015, they were set to begin the renovation project. Now with stronger management, they hoped to push forward, but shortly after the announcement that renovations would begin, the hotel was closed for good. 

In August 2017, one of the hotel’s general managers had claimed that renovations were still taking place, but offered no other updates from there. Since then, no progress has been made other than the inclusion of boards on the lower level windows and doors. 

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