30 Sep Ashland Springs Hotel: 100th anniversary!
1925 to 2025.
Lithia Springs Hotel to Mark Antony Motor Hotel to Ashland Springs Hotel.
The “Grande Dame” is back!
Published September 2025.
I was honored to be asked to give a brief talk about the history of Ashland Springs Hotel during a small 100th anniversary celebration held on September 20, 2025.
I would like to share with you the stories I told, slightly edited. I will also include a few photos from the celebration and from the hotel’s long history. The top photo above shows the hotel under construction in April 1925.
For my detailed history of the Ashland Springs Hotel, which was published during its 95th anniversary year, please CLICK HERE.
I asked the audience if they were willing to step into a time machine with me. When I heard a loud “Yes,” I began by taking all of us back 100 years. Here we go.
Going back 100 years to September 28, 1925
Hello fellow Ashlanders and special guests. Today is September 28, 1925, and we welcome you to our grand opening party for the Lithia Springs Hotel.
Here in September, 1925, we have incredible community enthusiasm and support for this newly built hotel. We know it will serve the throngs of people sure to come for the healing Lithia water, white sulphur water and soda water springs of Ashland. No wonder our esteemed hotel operator R.W. Price recently said: “I have every reason to believe that Southern Oregon is sometime, within the very near future, to be the playground of the Pacific Coast.” This hotel was built with local money, because 500 of our local citizens believe in the future of Ashland and they invested in the Lithia Springs Hotel corporation.
I hope you are all as proud as I am of our small town of about 4,500 people. Ten years ago, we brought in famous park designer John McLaren of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park to create the master plan for Lithia Park, which has become the jewel of our town. Last year, in 1924, we hired famous architects Tourtellotte and Hummel of Portland, who also designed the Idaho State Capitol. They created for Ashland this magnificent nine-story building, the tallest structure between San Francisco and Portland. Yes, we have a forward-thinking community here.
Oops, this is supposed to be a brief talk and I only have a couple more minutes, so let’s push the fast-forward button. ……….
In 1927 – Southern Pacific Railroad all but closes its large Ashland railroad station and maintenance yard. The Railroad District of our town goes into a 60-year slump. The hotel suffers.
In 1929 – The Great Depression slams our entire country’s economy. The hotel really suffers.
In 1951 – The hotel was remodeled. That didn’t help.
In 1959 – The hotel was remodeled again. That didn’t help either.
In 1960 — After a contest to come up with a name that would build on the growing popularity of Oregon Shakespeare Festival, it was renamed the Mark Antony Motor Hotel. The new name didn’t boost its fortunes.
In 1978 – The hotel was remodeled again! Nothing seemed to help.
This is getting depressing. Let’s fast-forward again. ………
In 1998 — The building was bankrupt and falling apart. Doug and Becky Neuman made a huge commitment to purchase the hotel and bring it back to life. It reopened in December 2000 as the Ashland Springs Hotel, with many of the original 1925 hotel features restored. Locals and visitors alike fell in love with the combination of modern comforts, excellent service and respect for history.
Finally, here we are in September 2025, and the hotel is both surviving and thriving on its 100th anniversary. Thank goodness!
In conclusion, I love the image Becky Neuman used as she told me her early vision for the hotel: “I felt like the lady, a “Grande Dame,” had been asleep a long time and she was ready to wake up and put her party dress on, to be a light for the town.”
Well, the lady sure woke up, so let’s party like it’s 1925!
Other speakers at the 100th anniversary celebration were Becky and Doug Neuman, owners of the hotel; Katharine Cato of Travel Ashland and Ashland Chamber; and Gina DuQuenne, current City Councilor and former wedding organizer for the hotel.
References
I wrote a detailed history of the hotel on its 95th anniversary, complete with 34 photos! See link below to read it.
Carol Case
Posted at 15:53h, 02 OctoberWhen it was renamed the Ashland Springs Hotel,,my young granddaughter, now in her mid-thirties, said, folding her arms and hurumphing, “I am still going to call it the Mark Antony”.
Pam Demo
Posted at 16:20h, 30 SeptemberA stunning improvement! I remember some of those efforts to rescue the MA. T&H, coming to Boise in the late 1890s, were architects whose projects ranged from the Idaho Capitol bldg, to my modest Boise North End home, to the now-gone graceful Rapid River Bridge in the out-back of the 7-Devils mt range, Clearly, no job was too large, too small or too inconsequential, and their artful architecture remains among us.