Valley Girl Views: The Old City Hotel

The Hotel Edison does not, in Spring of 2024, currently have a restaurant open inside. Which is a shame, because the last time I was there, there was so very much to see inside. Memorabilia, as well as beautiful architecture and furnishings.

Edward T. Drumheller build the City Hotel in 1871, first opening in January of 1872.

August 1872

This historic building is not the same one that Thomas Edison first wired with the first electric three wire light. Unfortunately, that City Hotel building was destroyed in a fire in 1914. See photos of the fire here:

https://susquehannavalley.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-city-hotel-fire-sunbury-1914.html

[It was very cold, and the ice on the half destroyed structure makes for really interesting photos]

After the fire, Drumheller restored the building and changed its design and also added a fourth floor. The rebuilt hotel has 52 rooms and 15 rental apartments, and for many years, had a restaurant on the ground floor. It had one of the first commercial elevators in the U.S. Hotel system.

Thomas Edison on the platform in front of the City Hotel in Sunbury, where he had successfully demonstrated his first three wire electric light on July 4 1883. The hotel was renamed for him at the ceremony shown above, in July of 1922 when Edison returned for Sunbury's Sesquicentennial celebration.

But Edison came back to visit this new building, rebuilt at the same location, in 1922. At that time, the City Hotel was renamed the Hotel Edison.

This plaque is on the outside of the building reads:

"This tablet commemorates the installation at Sunbury PA., of the first three-wire central station incandescent electric lighting plant in the world. On the night of July 4, 1883, Thomas A. Edison, the creator of the incandescent lamp, and inventor of numerous mechanical and electrical devices necessary for a complete system of electric light, heat and power. Acting in the triple capacity of Chief Electrical Engineer, mechanical expert and Superintendent of Construction, turned over to the Edison Electric Illuminating Company of Sunbury, PA., a completed operating central station electric plant.

The City Hotel, then on this site, was the first building in the world commercially wired and illuminated by electricity. Dedicated during the Sesquicentennial Celebration of Sunbury, PA., July 1, 2, 3 and 4, 1922."

Here are some photos from when we were inside, for lunch, in 2016:

The hotel's carriage house, which was built as a separate structure around the same time as the City Hotel, was situated behind the hotel[8] and operated as a 19th-century transit center, housing horses and carriages that transported passengers to and from the hotel and key points in the city, including Sunbury's wharf and Third Street railroad station. A fire tower constructed after World War II physically connected the carriage house to the hotel. As automobiles rose in popularity, the carriage house [which faced court street] was converted into office and retail space.

Charles E. Duffy, proprietor of the hotel beginning in 1939, opened a 26 room addition in 1949.

In 1963, the hotels bar and grille was expanded and renamed the Hobnail Bar. At the time, the cocktail lounge was decorated in Pennsylvania Dutch decor.

This was the $5 lunch special, one of them, the day we were there. Just $5. And it was good.

Memorabilia on the Walls

"The Drumheller family owned the hotel into the 20th century, but on January 14, 1914, a fire destroyed a large portion of the building. The cause of the fire was never determined. After the fire, the family restored the building and changed its design and also added a fourth floor. The building had been known as the City Hotel for nearly 50 years, but in July 1922, Edison returned to Sunbury at the occasion of the city's Sesquicentennial and the dedication of a plaque at the entrance to the Edison Hotel." - http://pabook2.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/HotelEdison.html

=================

The Carr China

"The ID for this plate is based on a 1950s menu that has the exact same town crier logo as on the plate, holding a sign that says Edison Grill. In addition, this menu mentions that the Edison Grill had Hohenadel Beer on tap. Hohenadel Beer was a brewery in Philadelphia, Penn., that closed in 1953.

The hotel’s present owner, Randi Buehner, who has worked at the Edison for over 30 years, bought the hotel in 1994. She confirmed that the Edison had a grill for a short time back in the 1950s, though she was unable to positively identify this china pattern since it predated her association with the hotel."

https://carrchinacompany.com/topmarked-html-docs/edison-hotel-and-grill.html

================