Hotel Touraine (1897-1966) in Boston , Massachusetts , was a residential hotel on the corner of Tremont Street and Boylston Street, near the Boston Common. The architecture firm of Winslow and Wetherell designed the 11-story building in the Jacobethan style, constructed of "brick and limestone;" ^[1] its "baronial" appearance was "patterned inside and out after a 16th-century chateau of the dukes of Touraine ." ^[2] It had dining rooms and a circulating library. ^{[3] [4]} Owners included Joseph Reed Whipple and George A. Turain. ^{[5] [6]}

Directly across the street were the clandestine district headquarters of the Boston Communist Party mentioned in Herbert Philbrick's 1952 book "I Led 3 Lives".

Among the guests: explorer Ernest Shackleton, boxer Max Baer , actor Stanley Bell, ^[7] Diamond Jim Brady , ^[8] George Gershwin , ^[9] Ernest Wadsworth Longfellow , ^[10] Pietro Mascagni , ^[11] Mitch Miller , ^[12] Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. , ^[13] railroad builder and operator Sir William Cornelius Van Horne , ^[14] and Henry Bradford Endicott . ^[15] Events included an exhibition in the 1960s of the Boston Negro Artists Association, ^[16] and performances by the "Theater Company of Boston." ^[17] The hotel closed in 1966 and became an apartment building. ^{[18] [19]}

Images [ edit ]

• 
  Detail of 1890s map of Boston, showing Hotel Touraine
• 
  The hotel's fleet of chauffeured cars, 1906
• 
  Hotel library, ca.1910
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  Hotel Touraine (at right), Masonic Temple (at left), 1903
• 
  Former Hotel Touraine (at right), Masonic Temple (at left), 2010

References [ edit ]

External links [ edit ]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Hotel Touraine (Boston) .

• Bostonian Society:
  • Photo of construction projects at the corner of Boylston and Tremont Streets, 1896
  • Photo of construction of Hotel Touraine , Tremont and Boylston Streets, 1897
• Boston Public Library. Max Baer looks thoughtful in his room at the Hotel Touraine , photo, 1935

42°21′8.44″N 71°3′51.91″W  /  42.3523444°N 71.0644194°W  / 42.3523444; -71.0644194