Hotel at White Deer

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Hotel at White Deer, out in Carson County. Now settle in, because this one's got layers. It starts not with a hotel at all, but with a land company and a courtroom.

The White Deer Land Company, acting as trustee for court-ordered land sales in this area, got the ball rolling back in the 1890s when they established the White Deer Demonstration Farm. A demonstration farm. The name says it all, really.

Come see what this land can do. Come see what you could have. And if you needed a little more convincing, well, around 1909, they went ahead and built it.

A frame four square structure, solid and practical, put up to board prospective land buyers. You want to sell a man on the promise of the land, you let him sleep on it first. Literally.

So there it stood, doing its job, housing the hopeful and the curious, until 1913, when a man named Marvin Hughes bought the building. And just like that, what had been a place to put up land prospects became a hotel, open for business in a way it hadn't quite been before. The story didn't stop with Hughes, though.

Buildings like this tend to pass through hands, and this one was no exception. The Goodner Family took ownership in 1929, and then E. L.

Colgrove came along in 1944. Each new owner, a new chapter. And through all of it, the structure kept on serving.

A boardinghouse for a time. Apartments for a time. Even a private residence.

One building, one corner of Carson County, wearing a whole string of identities across the decades. That's the thing about a good, solid frame four square. It doesn't ask what it's supposed to be.

It just keeps standing, ready for whatever comes next.

What the marker says

The White Deer Land Company, a trustee for court-ordered land sales in this area, established the White Deer Demonstration Farm in the 1890s. About 1909 this frame four square structure was built to board prospective land buyers. Marvin Hughes bought the building in 1913 and it became a hotel. Subsequent owners included the Goodner Family in 1929, and E. L. Colgrove in 1944. The structure has served as a boardinghouse, apartments, and a private residence.