Galveston’s Hotel Galvez & Spa, A Wyndham® Historic Hotel and National Trust Historic Hotel of America, will celebrate its 98th anniversary on Wednesday, June 10. The hotel will serve complimentary cake and punch in the lobby from 4 to 6 p.m. as well as offer tours of the spa (reopening very soon).
The Hotel Galvez was built as a symbol of Galveston’s resilience following the Great Storm of 1900. A group of businessmen pulled their resources and raised $1 million to open the hotel on June 10, 1911 at 6 p.m. This elegant beachfront hotel was immediately proclaimed “Queen of the Gulf.”
The hotel has a colorful history from serving as a temporary White House for President Franklin Roosevelt to serving as a working facility for the U.S. Coast Guard during World War II and as a headquarters for the Pageants of Pulchritude, the beauty pageants that were predecessors to the Miss America Pageant. The Hotel Galvez is now one of the most popular choices for brides, hosting an average of 120 weddings every year.
In 1937, President Franklin Roosevelt spent ten days at the hotel and held a meeting with newly elected Congressman and future president, Lyndon B. Johnson. President Dwight Eisenhower was also a guest in later years. In the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, the Hotel Galvez was the social hub of Galveston then known as the “Playground of the Southwest.” Bandleader Phil Harris and actress Alice Faye married at Hotel Galvez and numerous celebrities including Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Duke Ellington, Frank Sinatra and Jimmy Stewart stayed at the hotel.
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