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Photographs of the Gladys Inn, Clifton Forge, Virginia, 1891, Accession #11279, Special Collections Dept., University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, Va.
These photographs were purchased by the Library from Heartwood Books in Charlottesville, Virginia, on December 10, 1996.
There are six photographs, ca. 1891, of the construction site of the Gladys Inn in Clifton Forge, Virginia. The photographs consist of three overall views of the hotel building, two of a group of the workers posed on the porch and stoop of the building, and one of a small side building. The construction workers are seen in all six photographs.
According to Elizabeth Hicks Corron's Clifton Forge Virginia [Rare Books F234.C63C6 1971], the Chesapeake and Ohio Development Company commenced the erection of many business buildings in West Clifton Forge during the early 1890s. M. E. Ingalls, president of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway Company, gave the dedication address in 1891 for the large frame hotel erected by C & O, which was named the Gladys Inn in honor of his daughter. Mr. C. P. Nair and his family came from Glasgow, Virginia, where he had been the manager of the Natural Bridge Hotel, to operate the inn. In 1896, the Gladys Inn was remodeled into the C & O Hospital, and the Gladys Inn moved into a new building erected on Ridgeway Street, Clifton Forge. This new establishment housed the C & O passenger station and a restaurant and became the leading hotel in that section of Virginia.