DUANE
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Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about this corner of Wichita Falls. Now, every good story needs at least two men with big ideas and enough nerve to act on them, and this one's got exactly that. Joseph Alexander Kemp, born in 1861, was a merchant right here in Wichita Falls.
His partner was Morris Lasker, born in 1840, a native of Prussia who had made his way to Texas and eventually served as a state senator from Galveston. Two men from very different roads in life, and in 1892 they shook hands on a partnership with one clear purpose: build a hotel on this very site. They brought in a builder named Myles O'Reilly, and one year later, the St.
James Hotel was standing. Three stories tall, which in 1893 was no small statement. Now, a hotel lives or dies by what it offers, and the St.
James made sure it offered something worth talking about. Good food, for one. And music.
An honest-to-goodness hotel orchestra playing for the guests. Word got around, and the St. James became the center of social events for the whole area.
People came to see and be seen, to eat well, to listen to something finer than the wind off the plains. For a stretch of years, this was the place. But here's the thing about a place that defines its era: the era doesn't hold still.
New hotels started opening up around the area, and the crowds began to drift toward newer walls and fresher paint. Business declined. And in 1929, the building that Myles O'Reilly had raised for Kemp and Lasker came down.
Demolished. Kemp had been born in 1861 and would live until 1930, just long enough to see it go. Lasker, born in 1840, had passed in 1916 and was spared that particular sight.
The St. James Hotel is gone, but right here on this spot, the marker keeps the memory honest.
What the marker says
Joseph Alexander Kemp (1861-1930), a Wichita Falls merchant, and Morris Lasker (1840-1916), a native of Prussia who later served as state senator from Galveston, formed a partnership in 1892 for the construction of a hotel at this site. Built by Myles O'Reilly, the three-story St. James Hotel was completed one year later and became the center of area social events. Guests were attracted by the good food and by the music of a hotel orchestra. Business began to decline as new hotels opened in the area and in 1929 the building was demolished. (1980)