This history of the Del Puerto Hotel was published in the Historical Societies publication, The Gateway —1994-95 (December ‘94)

Most of our members and the readers of The Gateway already know the basics of Patterson’s history beginning with the Mexican Land Grant in 1844.

The pre-town history is due for a more detailed review which the Editorial Board hopes will be featured in the 1995-96 Gateway.

What hasn’t been dealt with in any detail or even analysis is the period leading up to the founding of the town itself, the period right after J.D. Patterson’s death in 1902, and the actual construction of the town and the hotel.

What we have now is a clearer picture of certain aspects of that period based on correspondence and other documentation of the period in the Historical Society's files. It is clear that T.W. Patterson was very personally involved with the management of his uncle's properties and was looking for ways to maximize their profitability as early as the 1890s.

After J.D. Patterson's death, "T.W." became one of his main heirs amongst a field of more than 12, including brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews. J.D.’s estate totaled close to one million dollars. "T.W."’s share was around $124,000 with only a few other heirs receiving slightly more. J.D.’s wife, Caroline, was willed $12,000 a year from a $400,000 trust fund. "T.W." and W.W. Patterson of Westley, were named Executors of the estate.

What happened next is the interesting part, but in many respects, the least documented.

An early letter suggested that a corporation be formed among the California ranches among the various heirs. Years of discussion must have gone on between the 13 principle heirs as to what to do with the various properties.

At that point, the Del Puerto Ranch, which was being run by W.W. Patterson, another nephew and heir, was over 18,000 acres in size. The size of the other ranches is not clear, although there was a large one known as the Horse Ranch, now part of the City of Oxnard and another later became part of the City of Fruitvale.

I believe we can accurately guess that "T.W." spent those years trying to come up with the best long-term financial realization for the various properties.

Perhaps, fortunately for us, he learned a lot from his involvement in Fresno real estate and banking, which probably led to his vision for the future town of Patterson.

According to J.D. "Jack" Patterson, "T.W."'s son, a number of attempts were made to sell the Patterson Ranch to settle the estate. But none of the offers were for more than $30 an acre. It was his understanding that the ranch corporation was founded on that figure as the highest possible price for which the property could be sold.

After many discussions, it was decided that some heirs could realize a much greater return if they participated in the development of the Del Puerto Ranch into a town and small farms. Some heirs did not want to go along with the development and sold their shares to other family members, according to Jack Patterson.

For anyone who has been involved either in an estate, business or institution with multiple owners, it will be easy to understand what it must have taken for "T.W." and the others to decide to build a town in the middle of an 18,462 acre farm. He had the vision, and with the others, must have spent many hundreds of hours in letters, trips and discussions before there was sufficient agreement to go ahead with the plan involving an investment close to $1 million including land, which, even then, must have seemed like staggering sums of money, even to a family used to great wealth. Wealth is not necessarily equated with vision where investment is concerned. Fortunately "T.W." had the vision and the other investors followed his lead. ("T.W."’s estate was set at $5 million in 1914 according to the Modesto Bee.)

Finally on May 8, 1908, the Patterson Ranch Company was formed in Oakland. Initially it owned nothing and each of the 3 directors held 2 shares of stock in nothing. The directors were not members of the Patterson family.

Over the next few meetings of the brand new corporation, you can see the bigger plan that was being put in place with various heirs joining the board of directors. The financing, involving hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash, was quite complicated involving banks from both coasts.

Their plan involved promotion in order to sell the farms. They needed a town to go with the farms. At some point, it was decided that they would need a hotel both for prospective buyers and for new residents which led to the creation of the Hotel Del Puerto (its original name). The Center Building (Museum), which served as the Ranch Company headquarters and land sales office, and a few other buildings were also needed to get the town going.

What is now a little bit clearer is the overall vision and intensity of the effort by "T.W." and others to bring this dream to fruition. Without it, there would be no hotel to celebrate in this issue. Without that vision, the hotel and Center Building would have been simpler architecturally. Those of us who revere that which makes downtown Patterson a special place are thankful for the results.

The actual details of the construction of the hotel are as follows: T.W. Patterson, Patterson's founder, and the Patterson Ranch Company let the contract for the Del Puerto Hotel on November 27, 1909. According to Ranch Company minutes it was completed on October 29, 1910. The cost of construction was $25,000. "T.W." built the Center Building in Patterson's circle at the same time although it was completed perhaps a few weeks earlier than the Hotel. These were the first buildings started in the new town along with the Evans-Cripe house in the same block as the hotel (later moved to 5th and E Streets).

Arthur Burnett Benton was the architect for both the Center Building and the Hotel. He was a prominent Los Angeles architect and was known as a promoter of the Mission Revival style which dominated California architecture during the first decade of the century. He was hired to do major additions to the renowned Mission Inn of Riverside in 1902, perhaps the premier historical landmark in that style and it is listed in the National Registry.

After its opening, and as intended, the Hotel housed prospective land buyers and future residents. It also served as a place for the Patterson family and others to stay who came to the new town on business.

Traveling salesmen, "drummers" (as they were known), used the Hotel as a regular stop as Patterson had very few stores during the first few years. The rooms where the bar is now were filled with tables for the salesmen to display their wares. A door, located near the present handicap ramp landing, allowed people to enter without going through the lobby.

Later, these rooms were used by Dr. Fields for his patients when he rented those rooms for his medical practice.

This door was the main bar entrance from around 1940 until the major remodeling of the bar area during the Cummins Group's possession, about 1979, when the bar area was expanded, and the door was sealed up.

The irregular shaped room on the north side of the lobby, now called The Library, once served as the towns library in the first decade. Vada Fink served as the librarian. During the 1951 remodeling by Fred Seely, it was outfitted as a bar and decorated in a circus motif. Some have called it the "Founders Room" and others the "Round Room." During the '50s it was listed as the "Plaza Room." It was named "The Library" in 1993. It has an arched doorway, probably added in the '51 remodeling, opening into the Colony Dining Room.

From 1957 to 1960 Frank Soares broadcast his daily hour long show, "West Side Party Line," over radio station KTRB from this room. The studio started in a back room at first and then moved to this room.

This room was later used as an office by various individuals. In about 1963 this room was divided into two rooms. It has since been returned to its original size.

The main dining room, named the "Colony Room" in 1951, has remained basically as originally laid out. The two doors which opened into the kitchen were relocated to their present location during Hazel Saylor’s 1977 remodeling. Two pillars in the middle of the room were removed in 1951 or before. Two trusses were installed to support the rooms above. The rooms original oak floor is now covered with carpet although it was severely damaged during the 1991 rainstorm when the roof covering was in process of being removed.

The dining room served as the main community gathering place for many years with numerous clubs holding their first meetings there. In 1923, the Study Club held one of its important first meetings there and met there numerous times over the years. One of Patterson's oldest organizations, the Chamber of Commerce, has held most of its meetings and banquets at the Hotel. On April 15, 1937, the first Business Girls business session was held in the dining room.

The Hotel and its banquet facilities have been the location for numerous wedding receptions. This tradition continues today and now even the weddings themselves are held in the lobby.

There have been numerous testimonial and retirement dinners held here, including one for long time City Attorney Bill Logan on March 19, 1973.

Many people have arranged to meet for the first time in the Hotel. One of those historic meetings occurred between Dr. Allen and Dr. Goutiere when he was considering coming to Patterson.

These are only a few that can be listed here.

The small room next to the kitchen, sometimes called the "coffee shop" (where the kitchen doors are now) was originally a kind of separate dining or service area. It had an outside door and Virginia Carr Delphia remembers going in that entrance to eat lunch during the '40s. She remembers sitting at a counter facing the kitchen. There was a bank of high windows facing the court area which were not sealed up until the Reunion Room was added in 1955. These windows were still visible from inside the room until 1977. At various times this room has been used as an ice-cream parlor and breakfast room. A 1951 neon sign on a pole in front of the Hotel advertised "Club Del Puerto" and below in smaller letters, "Coffee Bar." The lower sign may have referred to this room.

When the Delphia’s bought the Hotel in 1954, there were 4 pine tables with upholstered benches next to the walls. During most of the years the Delphia’s owned the Hotel, this room was used as a service area with a table for employees to eat and for linen storage. Desserts and salads were served from there also.

When the Hotel was built, there was a stairway from the kitchen to the second floor. It started in the kitchen and went upwards above the basement stairs. By 1951 there was a refrigerator blocking the door and the area was not combined into the kitchen area until Hazel Saylor’s remodeling of 1977. Part of the stairway still exists above the basement stairs. In the 1951 remodeling of the rooms upstairs, this stairway area was used to create one additional room to complete the present 19 guest rooms on the second floor.

There was also an elevator next to the back kitchen door opening onto the outside back porch. You can still see the elevator doors on the second floor back porch. The elevator probably also went to the basement but it was primarily used to get to the second floor.

While it is not obvious to most observers, there is an extensive basement under the Hotel. The first part lies below the entire kitchen. It is divided into various store rooms and compartments. There was an original walk-in refrigerator in the basement which was restored by John Delphia.

A corridor under the dining room leads to the second basement area which is under about half of the lobby. This area originally held a coal-fired boiler which heated steam for all the rooms. When gas forced air heat was added to the guest rooms, the boiler and most radiators were removed. In its place was a huge refrigeration unit which cooled the Reunion and Colony Rooms.

Part of the floor in this section is wood, probably over what was the coal bin. This section of basement also contained the refrigeration equipment for the bar. Even today it contains bar service equipment.

There are many stories of early kitchen staff members living in the extensive basement. The area was definitely used for illegal consumption of alcohol. Many old Prohibition era bottles were found during periodic cleanups in the 1960s. During one of those cleanups, original oak paint buckets were found behind a foundation wall.

Room guests who stayed there and later became prominent citizens are too numerous to mention. Many teachers, such as Dorothy Harrison, later a Modesto Bee reporter, stayed there before finding regular lodging. Many people lived in the Hotel while their future homes were being prepared or built. Again too many names to list here.

(Excerpts from an article appearing in the Patterson Irrigator written by Maddy Houk.)

Tom and Kate Gravestock lived with their two daughters, Lillian and Katheryn, in Rogers Park in Chicago, Illinois, in the early 1900s. Tom worked for the B&O Railroad there.

Lillian's uncle, a shoe salesman who lived in New York, traveled around the country. "He found Patterson and fell in love with it," Lillian says. At the uncle's urging, the Gravestocks came West in 1912 settling on 20 acres on Apricot and Sycamore avenues, three miles out of town. The family had never lived — or worked — on a ranch. "It was a new experience for all of us. We had no experience in irrigation or that type of thing," Lillian says.

"Somehow, Dad met someone from the Patterson Ranch Company, who offered him a job managing the Hotel."

The family sold the ranch and moved into the Hotel in about 1913. "We lived in the area that is now the ladies' restroom and the bar. In those days they were bringing in carloads of farmers from the Midwest. (The Patterson Ranch Company) was selling a lot of property and there was a lot of business and work until it finally died down."

Lillian remembers that the Hotel's front porch looked large to her, and that there was a huge fireplace in the Hotel. "But," she says, "I go back now and the porch doesn't look so big." The family entered the building on the Del Puerto Avenue side where the bar is now located. Lillian recalls that there was a beautiful fence there near the alley covered with roses. (This was removed in the late '50s when a small piece of the property was sold to Hazel Cronin for a dress shop and beauty parlor.)

"Mother helped manage the Hotel, supervised the waitresses and made the beds. There were 18 rooms upstairs and also rooms downstairs on the Del Puerto Avenue side. Where the banquet room is now was an open space to park cars and to keep the logs for the big fireplace. "The first Hotel cook was a Norwegian who loved cats, and fed all the cats in the neighborhood. The next cook was Wong Sing, the father of Patterson businessman Hank Wong.

When business from the Ranch Company customers started to dwindle, tradesmen took their place. "The tradesmen came in on the night train, stayed all night, and left at noon," Lillian recalls. They came from Stockton, San Francisco, Modesto and Los Banos. When better roads were built, the salesmen who lived near Patterson would go home and... once again business dwindled.

The small room (now called The Library) located on the right as you enter the Hotel was where the drummers (traveling salesmen) displayed their wares and conducted much of their business.

"The dining room had hardwood floors, and in one corner J.D. Patterson (a cousin of T.W. Patterson and one of the principle partners in the Patterson Ranch development) had a table reserved for him," says Lillian. Patterson, who lived at the Hotel, made a fuss over Lillian and her younger sister, Katheryn (now deceased). "On hot summer afternoons we would go for a ride sometimes along the ditches near the peach orchards."

Lillian left Patterson after graduation to attend University of California, Berkeley in 1920. Her parents moved to Manteca around 1923 to be with their daughter. The Hotel was then managed by a Mrs. Quigbaum.

Lillian met George Hatherell at Berkeley when she was a freshman. The couple spent most of their 61 years of married life in the Los Angeles area. She taught until 1960 when she retired to enjoy traveling.

Lillian, who is 93 (in 1994), retired to the Covenant Village in Turlock in 1992, a few years after George's death. "Patterson has always held a very dear spot in my life," she says. "My life really started there."

"T.W."'s son, J.D. "Jack" Patterson took over ownership of the Hotel when the Ranch Company was dissolved. When Jack's Sycamore Avenue mansion was severely damaged by a fire in 1944, he moved his family into the Hotel where they lived for a number of years.

For most of the early years, even before Prohibition, Patterson did not allow bars or the sale of liquor. So a bar was not part of the original Hotel.

In about 1940 Charles and Mabel Gervasoni leased the Hotel and obtained the first liquor license for the bar. Mabel remembers that the Hotel was full of sailors and their families who were connected with the nearby Crows Landing Naval Air Base during World War Two.

The Gervasonis left the Hotel in 1946 or 1947 to establish the Aloha Club (now the Red Lion) on 3rd Street.

In December 1948, Jack Patterson sold the Hotel to its third owner, Paul Arambel. In 1992 Paul reminisced that he really wasn't interested in its operation and had thought the town would grow faster than it did. John Johnson was a manager during part of this time.

In September 1951 Arambel sold the Hotel to Fred Seely of Modesto. Seely owned the Modesto Chrysler dealership and had founded McHenry Village and later built the Seely Tower at the corner of 12th and J Streets.

Seely undertook the first major remodeling in the Hotel's history, adding bathrooms to each of the upstairs guest rooms and redecorating all the public rooms. Until this time the upstairs area only had two private baths and two public baths although each bedroom without a bath had its own sink. The new baths were carved out of one corner of the large rooms. This worked well in some rooms and not so good in others. In some bathrooms there was only a foot or more between the toilet and sink. Repeat overnight guests learned which rooms to avoid.

He hired a well known interior decorator from Carmel who painted the lobby Forest Green with white ceiling and accents. The linoleum floors were covered with dark green wall-to-wall carpet. White plaster pedestals and white marble tables were placed around the lobby. The original dining room, which he named the "Colony Room," was decorated with gold patterned Colonial period wallpaper. Brass accents were placed throughout the lobby with brass lions heads mounted on the check-in counter along with solid brass banding for accents. All three fireplaces featured brass plates, planters and copper food warmers. A mid 40s photo shows lattice Craftsmen Style lanterns mounted above the mantle in the dining room. The lobby fireplace probably had similar fixtures.

Another bedroom was added to the bar area and the south end was paneled in solid knotty pine boards. Five round murals painted by Joe Miniachi were framed in pine. Of all the public rooms, the bar perhaps maintained a closer resemblance to the old style of the Hotel with dark stained door and window frames. The bar itself had a definite 40s and 50s feel that remained until 1977.

The original lobby Spanish style tin wall light fixtures were replaced with white plaster shells. A large solid brass Colonial period chandelier was hung in the middle of the lobby and a smaller version over the mezzanine.

The former rear carriage court between the two wings of the Hotel, which originally contained a large palm tree, was turned into a patio dinning area. Each table had an umbrella and was placed around a circular dance area. Ivy covered a rear fence as it still does. There were colored lights shining on the ivy from the ground.

The rear exit of the lobby opened onto a porch. To one side there was a basement entrance similar to the one on the west side of the Center Building. Above was a porch which opened off the lobby balcony. During the 1993 remodeling, evidence of a door from the back porch into the men's restroom area was revealed. There was probably a hallway that connected with the main bar area hallway.

Further down that side of the building was a door to a bedroom from the outside. This is the same door that opens between the present Reunion Room and Apricot Pit Bar. Originally there were five or six bedrooms in that wing.

The refurbished Hotel opened with a grand party on November 1, 1951. Louis Alberti was one of the bartenders.

Later Louie and Dixie Alberti managed the Hotel with dinner dancing a regular weekly feature. Social events featuring live bands continued until the beginning of the 60s.

(A first person history by Claude Delphia)

My earliest memories of the Hotel go back to the time of Mabel and Charlie Gervasoni when Charlie had a lease on the Hotel from Jack Patterson. My parents were friends of Charlie and Mabel and my brother Ben and I were friends with Gary, their son.

I remember my brother and I going down to the Hotel to visit Gary, probably in about 1945. We went into the lobby to find him. I have a vague memory of the lobby as a big, dark, cavernous area. Years later, when we replaced the lobby carpet, I saw that the lobby pine floors were covered with linoleum.

The lobby wainscoting was stained dark brown and the upper plaster walls were probably still in their original light toast brown plaster which can still be seen in a closet off the lobby. The furniture would have been plain square oak with perhaps stiff, brown, leather seats and backs in the Mission style. The light fixtures, which we still have, were somewhat flimsy and made of tin shaped in a pseudo- Spanish style. They had white bell shaped glass shades with gold rims. You can see four of these shades in use in the main east room of the Museum.

In the 40s, the fireplaces would have still been in their natural dark red brick look. Those bricks, while fashionable then, do not resemble regular red bricks as they are lumpy on one side with a semi glossy, almost cordovan red color. All other bricks used in the Hotels construction, including the exterior facing under the stucco, were traditional red bricks.

Unfortunately I have no other recollections of the interior at that time and so far we do not have any photos of the lobby dated earlier than 1951 after Fred Seely’s remodeling.

After meeting up with Gary in the lobby, the three of us were told to go outside to play. A short time later we found ourselves at the back of the Hotel looking down through the doorless outside entrance to the basement near the back door to the kitchen. I can still see the dim basement floor littered with broken dishes. We proceeded to throw rocks at the dishes until Charlie came out and told us to stop. The rocks hitting the dishes must have made enough sound to reach the lobby in those otherwise quieter days. Patterson only had about 1,500 population at that time.

My next recollection is of Dad taking us to dinner in the Garden Court shortly after Fred Seely finished remodeling the Hotel. As I remember, each wood table had an umbrella in the center. We were served on the same green and white plates that Vee Hooper currently uses for lunch. Water was served in short ruby red glasses faceted in a sort of thumb print. Virginia Delphia Usadel still has one of those glasses. Each table would have its long dark green boat of olives, pickles, celery and carrots, and, I believe, a candle in a low glass holder sat on each table. While I don’t remember the details, I know that there were windows and doors at various locations around the outdoor eating area.

When Dad enclosed the outdoor eating area into what is now the Reunion banquet room, some of those windows and doors were left opening into the new banquet room. In order to maintain the "Garden Room" effect, wood shutters hung next to each window. Other windows were covered over when those exterior walls were stuccoed in pink plaster. When the Cummin's Group removed all the pink plaster, all the window and door openings were revealed. The sealed off stairway to the second floor and the basement stairs below each had a window.

I can still remember Dad’s enthusiasm and admiration for what Fred Seely had done to the Hotel. He showed my brother and I the various changes as if they were a miracle. Perhaps, in his eyes, they were. This was long before it became fashionable to fix up old houses into Bed and Breakfast Inns. It wasn’t even fashionable to remodel old buildings then, let alone a 40-year-old country hotel in a community of only a few thousand people.

From that 1952 visit, I have a memory of brilliant white plaster pedestals and lots of brass accents against the dark forest green walls. Everything was painted green except the ceiling and the fireplaces which were stark white. The windows were side draped in a dark green polished cotton with white candelabra designs. The design echoed some of the white plaster decorations on the walls. Of special note were the large white plaster shell shaped lights mounted on each pillar and at various locations around the lobby. Little did I know that I would see those same walls and accents as a family business for almost 23 years.

The bar during this period still had a lot of feel of the 40s although there had been significant changes. The round murals painted by Joe Miniachi of Modesto, which had been added to the bar during the 1940s, were now framed in large square pine frames. Pine paneling and built-in red upholstered seats were added to the far end of the bar where the Del Puerto Avenue entrance is now. The bar was created out of three bedroom sized rooms. The walls were decorated with sculptured brass plates and brass wall lights. Some people still remember the brass plated oil cans that were made into lamps by the decorator. There were heavy pine tables with red Naugahyde arm chairs.

In 1954 Dad called my brother and me to tell us he had bought the Hotel. I can still remember the tone of his voice at the pride of what he had done. He purchased the Hotel on September 20, 1954.

Those early years of ownership were what many of us think of as the "Alberti Years." Louie and Dixie Alberti managed the Hotel both for Seely and then Dad. Louie was a Patterson boy and that probably made the business a lively success with the right combination of food and music.

During those years there was dancing to a live band every Saturday night and the Hotel was even more of a local gathering place than it had been during its beginning years. Modesto, a town of maybe 30,000 population probably had only one or two restaurants as fashionable as the Del Puerto Hotel. In any case, people wanted to venture out for dinner in the ‘50s and Patterson and it’s lively Hotel were a short distance away. There are still people in Modesto who remember trekking to Patterson for a good steak and an evening of dancing.

Dad enclosed the patio area in 1955 and made it into a banquet room with seating for over 170 people. It was named the "Garden Room" in honor of its previous life as a patio eating area. The Grand Opening was held on July 28, 1955.

The Alberties left in June of 1957 to establish their own restaurant in Modesto and Doyle and Rosemary Wallace followed as managers. Doyle had been stationed at Crows Landing Navel Auxiliary Landing Field during World War II and married a local girl, Rosemary Borba. Later they left to operate the Aloha Lounge which they purchased. There were several managers after that, with various degrees of success. By 1960, Dad had taken a more active role in the Hotel’s day-to-day management. The dining room was under separate management with Vallera and Charlie Harris cooking lunch and serving dinners and banquets for many years. Rusty Fleming was one of the main bartenders during those years to be followed later by Ed Rodgers and then Paul Clark in the early 1970s.

In the summer of 1959, I moved into the Hotel where I served as night clerk until early 1963. I have many powerful memories of dark cold nights when I was the only one there. During that time, the front door was never locked. We had various schemes for renting rooms at night. I remember numerous occasions when I would hear the front door open below me in the lobby and wonder whether I would have to go down to rent a room. Often people just came in to use the rest room, buy cigarettes or use the pay phone. But often in the middle of the night, I would hear the bell ring, I would have to dress, and go down to rent a room.

At first we didn’t tell people how much the rooms were. Later we put out a sign listing the rates. That prevented the trudge downstairs in the middle of the night only to have the people say they couldn’t afford the rate. They would turn, wearily, to the front door to look for something cheaper or a cold stay in their car. The rates were $6.00 for a single and $8.00 for a double, ridiculously low by today’s standards. We had one extra small room upstairs which rented for $5. It was just big enough for a twin bed and a dresser. Some return guests actually asked for that room, even calling to make reservations for it.

Later we set up a phone where people could stand at the front desk and call and tell me they wanted a room. I learned quickly to ask how many people and then quote them the rate. If they still wanted to stay, they were instructed to come up to the top of stairs where I would open the door, take their money and give them a key. Later we cut a small service window in the door and only that would be opened to rent a room in the middle of the night.

There were nights when the Hotel would be full and we could turn on the "No Vacancy" sign. That was always a moment of relief for the night clerk. I remember several special occasions when we set up the downstairs rooms for guests making a total of 21 rooms rented at one time with perhaps as many as 35 people. Summer and Fall were always the busiest room rental seasons.

During the late 1950s, Frank Soares also helped out as night clerk. He often helped watch the lobby daytimes during the years he broadcast his radio show from the room now called "The Library." During that time, I took over weekend night clerk duties when I was home from school in San Francisco. Bartenders also rented rooms until the bar closed at which time the night clerk would take over.

I remember only a couple of times during those years when we closed the lobby for a few hours and did not offer rooms for rent. Locking the lobby was a problem as there was no lock for the front door. Decades went by with that door always unlocked night and day. The later occasions we did lock-up were Thanksgiving or Christmas holidays. But mostly, we left the lobby unlocked with a phone out on the registration counter and we would leave home and run back down to the Hotel to rent a room in the middle of a family dinner when that dreaded call came from the desk phone. At other times, we just held the family event at the Hotel which solved a lot of problems.

In 1974 we held our Carr family reunion at the Hotel. Other family members and close friends used the Hotel for special anniversaries. One of the biggest was the combined 40th anniversaries of Dorothy and Elwyn Delphia and long time family friends, Josephine and Wayland Fink. As with many events at the Hotel, this was a full sit down dinner.

By 1963, Dad’s construction business and farming activities had been curtailed as he looked toward a less hectic lifestyle. Although he occasionally advertised the Hotel for sale, I don’t think he really wanted to let it go. So he closed his big office, which at one time took up both Dr. La Torres office on North 3rd Street and the business next door, and remodeled the lobby of the Hotel to fit the office space he needed for two employees. At various times over the years Dad had considered moving his offices to the Hotel for a staff of some 8 to 10 people. Some of those plans included dividing up the main dining room. Fortunately for the architecture of the room, he never went ahead with any of those ideas. The plan he did use changed the lobby more than at any time in it’s previous 53 years.

The front door was moved over one opening to it’s present location and two office areas were created where the original lobby counter had been. The original library room was divided into his personal office and a files room. The small angle of the main Colony Dining Room was also partitioned off into a storage room.

At this time one of the lobby pillars, which stood in front of the balcony and blocked the view of both fireplaces, was removed and a steel beam was installed to support the rooms above.

The old telephone switchboard which served each room upstairs was eliminated and there has been no general phone service for rooms since 1963. Even before then, phone service was limited to daytime hours. It was bad enough renting rooms in the middle of the night without having to go down to the switchboard and "plug" a phone connection to a room. As it was, we did, on most occasions, let room customers know they had a call waiting at a lobby phone, even during the night if the call was urgent. Other times we took messages and let the person call back.

We had a large number of repeat room guests over the years. Many truckers made the Hotel a regular stop, especially after I-5 opened. Then during the produce season, we had produce brokers who returned from Florida or Texas year after year. Several of them became long term friends of Dad and Virginia. They would stay at the Hotel for months. Part of the time, their wives would join them. They even had their own phones installed so they could call the eastern markets during the early morning hours. This lasted until about 1970 when the fresh tomato and produce business changed and it became easier for them to work from Modesto for the shorter time they were in the area.

By the late 1960s, the guest rooms were becoming seriously outdated with some of the furniture dating to the building of the Hotel. At the same time renting rooms wasn’t profitable enough to upgrade them or restore them. Many rooms had TV’s and all were air-conditioned in summer and had forced air heat in winter.

Off and on, over many years, long time Patterson resident, and beauty shop owner, Hazel DeCarle Cronin, Virginia Delphia’s cousin, lived first in a room downstairs in back of the bar area and then in several different rooms upstairs.

Over the Delphia year’s there were several long-time guest room maids. Perhaps the longest was the well known Ethel Huckaby. Others were Lela Franklin and Onela Hatchett. Each day the maid would find out which rooms had been rented, determine whether they were staying over and then proceed to make-up the rooms. Part of one of the original bathrooms had been converted to a storage room for the stacks of sheets, pillow-cases and towels. A regular hotel-maid’s-cart, with its stacks of towels, soap and cleaning implements, was used as the maid went from room to room. In general, the maid never knew until she got to work whether she was needed for one hour or six. It always depended on how many rooms had been rented the night before.

As with anyone working in a public establishment, you get to know things about local people which will never be told. This is particularly true of hotels and bars and is definitely true of the Del Puerto Hotel. If its walls could talk, as they say, some hot stories could be told.

After the 1963 changes, the Hotel moved into a new stage. The Saturday night dancing had died a natural death even though many have tried it since. Dinners were no longer served at night as there were not enough people to support it, still the case as I write this, although it may change as the town doubles in size over the next decade.

However, then, as now, the Hotel was a popular location for parties and banquets. It is especially suited to weddings and anniversaries. Some of the 50th wedding anniversary couples’ original wedding receptions were held in the Hotel.

One of the memorable banquets was the luncheon for then former Vice President, Richard M. Nixon who was on a campaign tour through the area on August 30, 1962. He was running for Governor of California but was defeated. In 1968, he was elected President of the United States.

During the 1960s, a private club was formed to provide local dancing. It was called the "Night Outer’s." Basically these were a private extension of the once popular Saturday night events, although perhaps more formal. These were very successful events of more than 100 people, with reservations required well in advance, and lasted about 10 years.

Starting about 1967, Dad and his wife, Virginia, managed the Hotel on a full time basis. While Hank Wong was often brought in to cook for large banquets, Dad did much of the cooking himself. Virginia managed the waitresses and saw that everything ran smoothly. I was in charge of the front desk doing whatever else was required on a moments notice, such as carrying buckets of ice to replenish the bars. For a short time I would leave the desk and help dish up food for banquets. It was "all hands to the kitchen" at least for a half hour, or so, while as many as 200 plates were dished up and sent out. Later, after the food was served and if there was little activity in the lobby, I would start running the dishes through the dishwasher until the lobby bell rang in the kitchen and I would race out to the front desk to rent a room or deal with some other request. For big parties there would be as many as three bartenders in two bars, a cocktail waitress and three to five waitresses.

If it was a major party, Dad, Virginia, and I would be up until 2 or 3 a.m. after the bar closed. The whole place had to be checked out, to make sure no cigarettes were lying around. The money from several cash registers had to be counted, all doors locked, and several dozen sets of lights turned off.

The Christmas party season was always a busy time with as many as 10 major parties booked well in advance.

The Hotel kitchen, not frequently seen by customers, changed little over the Delphia years. Perhaps the least changed, even now, is the pantry scullery. This is the room where supplies are kept and a large sink is used for washing cooking pans.

As far as I know, the big cooking ranges have always been located where they are now. Besides the single chimney which serves the three fireplaces, and at one time served the coal burning furnace, the only other chimney in the building is located on the outside wall next to the stoves. Now it only serves as a vent for the water heater. An early photograph shows smoke coming from this chimney. Perhaps the original stoves were wood or coal fired.

By 1976 the ovens and ranges were pretty old and some no longer worked although they were left in place. Even then there was some wonderful food cooked there. I can still remember a huge restaurant-sized pan (the rectangular pan needed 4 burners) of ham hocks and lima beans Dad cooked just for friends and family. He said it tasted better in large batches.

During the 1960s and early '70s the Hotel needed continuous maintenance and minor refurbishing. The Colony Room dining area needed new window treatments as the yellow draw-drapes installed by Fred Seely were getting old. At that point, the last of the Hotel's original, no longer functional, steam radiators were removed from below the dining room windows. Then wood stained shutters and gold velvet side drapes were installed on the windows.

The bar was also updated when the decades old backbar with mirrors and 1940s modernistic style mahogany was replaced with stained pine boards and glass shelves for glassware. At that time a large number of farming and ranching equipment, such as horse collars, were used to decorate the new, simpler wall. A huge sail fish, on loan, was mounted on the back wall for many years. The old Spanish-style chandelier found in a junk yard, now located in The Library, was hung over the bar. The rest of the bar remained unchanged. The bar was not carpeted in those days.

Around 1970 Dad decided it was time the Hotel had a proper sign. The big red neon sign, with the single word "Hotel," was fine, but there was no sign giving the name of the place. The old neon sign installed in the 40s or 50's was past repair. Many times we had people come in and ask if this was the Del Puerto Hotel. He added a sign just in front of the upper porch railing. This sign was removed by some owner in the '80s, possibly the Cummins Group. For most of its life, the Hotel has relied on relatively small signage such as the present sign on the pole in front.

During those years I helped Dad with many repairs, mostly plumbing, which continues to be a major problem. After Seely’s addition of some 15 bathrooms upstairs, most of the plumbing was in good shape, but by the '70s, severe problems were developing. Water heaters in particular did not last long. Guest room faucet repairs were almost a weekly problem. The water and sewer pipes, then as now, were very complicated. Some of the still functional sewer pipes appear to date to the original construction. Following the pipes in the basement has always been difficult. Very few of the rooms upstairs lined up with rooms downstairs, so we had to draw plans to identify where a water or sewer pipe led to.

The structure of the Hotel still holds a fascination for me. While I am a moderate draftsman, I still haven’t been able to plot all the angles and twists of the Hotel floor plan accurately, all due to T.W. Patterson’s idea for laying Del Puerto Avenue out from a circle with the Hotel’s wings paralleling the streets and converging in the many angled lobby.

Dad tried to improve the air circulation of the building. The lobby, at one point, rises to the upstairs hallways. This left the lobby cold during the winter and the upstairs hall always too hot. He added a return air fan over the Colony Room and vented the attic. As part of his effort, I crawled through every part of the three foot high attic and every section underneath the Hotel that was not basement.

We both learned a lot about the building's construction. For example, we found dangerous shafts in several locations that were open from the basement to the attic some 22 feet above. Apparently the architect couldn't see how to incorporate these spaces into his floor plans. We also found a number of skylights in various locations on the second floor that had been plastered over.

At the time of his death, Dad and Virginia were spending nights at the Hotel and overseeing every detail of its operation. Dad was still supervising construction projects during the day time and even running some of the heavy equipment himself after his brother Elwyn was killed in July of 1970. Dad and Virginia rarely got home during those years.

Very few people can have a real understanding of how demanding the hotel, restaurant and bar business combination can be unless they have actually done it. In fact restaurant people can’t understand how difficult it can be unless they have added the hotel room rentals to their list of activities. That makes it a 24-hours-a-day job for months and years on end with only rare days off.

Dad and Virginia held a grand 20th Anniversary party of hotel ownership just 5 days before he was killed in 1974.

The Hotel was added to the California inventory of historical sites in 1976.

After Dad’s death, Virginia, with my occasional help, kept the Hotel going until it was sold on July 20, 1976. Before selling it, we made a few repairs and re-carpeted the lobby to make it more attractive to buyers.

Ironically one of the buyers was Rosemary Borba Wallace Russell, who, along with her husband, Doyle, had managed the Hotel back in the 1950s. Her daughter Jane and son-in-law Wayne Dickman were the other buyers.

The Russell-Dickman ownership began with an attempt to revive the earlier dinner-dancing scheme but this style of entertainment was, and apparently is, no longer popular on a regular basis. Rosemary Russell was previously married to Doyle Wallace who was a long time Hotel bartender and manager. Hazel Saylor (former Yosemite Avenue Cote de Oro restaurant owner) of Modesto bought the Hotel in 1977 and did extensive redecoration and completely modernized the kitchen facilities including the installation of a modern ceramic tile floor and a stainless steel walk-in refrigerator.

A March 10, 1978 Modesto Bee article featured the Hotel after Hazel Saylor’s remodel. A night time picture shows the Hotel with both the old neon sign and the Delphia sign still above the front porch. Photos show the dining room windows with ornate drapes, chandeliers and ornate wallpaper.

Saylor was the first one to change the overall appearance of the lobby and dining rooms since the 1951 remodeling. Many walls in the lobby area were papered and the overall color scheme was changed to white. The lobby chandeliers were changed at that time.

Saylor removed the office partitions that Delphia installed and moved the Hotel desk to the opposite side of the lobby and installed the present glass showcase where the original check-in counter was located.

In June 1979 the Hotel was purchased by Chet and Judy Cummins (Modesto Early Dawn Cattle Co. restaurant principles and contractor), along with Betty Reader, William Michael and Merle Goatley. Again major remodeling took place including stripping the Garden Room walls to expose the original brick of the building and raising the Garden Room floor to match the rest of the building. The first major exterior changes were made to the front and sides of the building when bar and dining room porches were added. The big neon sign, "Hotel", which had hung on the front of the building near the top for many decades, was removed and hung in the banquet room above the rear sliding doors.

The Cummins group remodeled the bar beyond any resemblance to its previous look. They removed walls and added beams to support upstairs rooms in order to expand the bar area south into what were previously bedrooms or storage areas. Lots of rough sawn wood was added, including decorative ceiling beams, along with mirrors and other contemporary restaurant effects. The stained glass windows were added in the bar at this time.

Overall, they decorated the place to appeal to a younger crowd. They did however, decorate the walls with some 30 copies of historical photos. A May 21, 1984 Modesto Bee article stated that the Hotel had been painted a warm beige.

In 1981 Hazel Saylor regained ownership of the Hotel after the Cummins group ran into difficulties.

A Modesto Bee article of April 28, 1982 reported that Hazel Saylor had filed a Chapter 11 business reorganization petition. She was quoted as saying, "There are assets to more than cover all the debts, but I needed time, just a few days, to work it out. It got beyond my control." Debts were listed at $427,023. The Hotel was appraised at $350,000 according to court papers. Saylor owned the Hotel free and clear at that time. She said she made payments on the Hotel until 1979 when she sold the Del Puerto Hotel to the Chet Cummins group. The sale to Cummins Group was apparently never completed. She regained possession in April 1981, two months after the property had been abandoned. She operated it until it was sold to Vee Hooper.

In 1984 Vee Williams Hooper, an heir to the local telephone company, bought and operated the Hotel for two uneventful years. This was the last peaceful period until 1993 when she took over management herself.

Hooper sold the Hotel in early 1986 to Xong Liet Lu of San Jose. He ran the Hotel until mid 1989 featuring a French and oriental menu. Despite its recent history little is known about the operation during that period other than rumors and questions of sanitation. The Hotel was actually closed by the County Sanitation inspectors on November 11, 1988 but was later reopened after changes were made.

From July 17, 1989 until August of '90, Robert DeFrates leased the Hotel. After DeFrates left in August of '90, (he was officially ordered out by the bankruptcy court on October 23, 1990) the building remained closed for business until it reopened in June '92.

The story of the two years of legal proceedings would take up this whole issue but a brief version is included here to show how the Hotel was affected physically during this period.

When Vee Hooper sold in '86 to Xong Liet Lu, she took back a large mortgage. When DeFrates left in August of '90, and after the building was closed up, she proceeded to foreclose on the property as no payments were being made.

Xong Liet Lu then filed for bankruptcy to forestall Hooper's foreclosure efforts. His filing revealed some six additional mortgages totaling around $800,000 against the property. There were also various tax liens.

In February of '91, a roofing company began a complete re-roofing of the Hotel. By the fourth week of February of 1991 the old roofing was being stripped off. But an anonymous tip led City inspectors to stop the work on the basis that there might be asbestos in the old roofing being removed.

Although the roof was draped with plastic to protect if from rain, a few days after the "stop work order," 2.01 inches of rain fell on February 28th and March 1st. Rain water soaked almost the entire inside of the Hotel from top to bottom. Those who saw it after the rain reported that plaster from ceilings was falling all over the upstairs and the wallpaper downstairs was hanging in strips. Carpeting throughout the building was soaked. The solid oak floors under the carpeting in the Colony Dining room were seriously damaged. March of that year was unusually wet and further damage was done before the roof was replaced.

According to one exaggerated report, "the place was almost totally destroyed inside." The most damage was done to the guest rooms upstairs. Later repairs destroyed almost all the original character of the plaster in these rooms. But virtually none of the lobby's wood paneling and other architectural features were affected. Even the balcony's oak floor remains undamaged.

Ironically, by mid March, it was determined that there never was any asbestos in the roofing being removed. Whether the damage would have occurred anyway is not clear as the new roof would probably not have been put on in time to avoid the unusually heavy rains.

In May of '91, the owner, whoever that might be, was ordered to cleanup the place.

Foreclosues and auctions

By the fall of '91 a second mortgage holder, Rock Springs Property Co. of the San Jose area foreclosed on the property through bankruptcy court proceedings which eliminated all except Vee Hooper's 1st mortgage.

On September 24, 1991, the Patterson Irrigator reported that the Hotel was to be auctioned on the Stanislaus Count Court House steps on orders of Rock Springs Property Co. which held the second mortgage. Michael Faber and attorney for Rock Springs said that the Hotel would be remodeled by a company which had the money to do the job. Sheila Barnes, Joseph Huynh and Duc Nguyen, three Bay Area investors, were already investing money in the hope a new owner would honor Huynh’s three-year lease.

The Patterson Irrigator on Nov. 12, 1991 reported that Rock Springs had bid a minimum of $166,026 to secure the Hotel.

The Barnes group fixed all the plaster upstairs and repainted much of the downstairs. In October of '91, the Planning Commission gave permission for various repairs, exterior painting and a new sign. This groups biggest contribution was the complete recarpeting of both the upstairs and downstairs. Those touring the building at this time were able to see that the stories of destruction were highly exaggerated. Claude Delphia toured the building with Vee Hooper and it was clear that the structure was intact and only needed cosmetic work and basic repairs. The removal of the detailing in the upstairs guest rooms was a major loss.

During this two year period of uncertainty, there were many locals who said the Hotel should be torn down and the property used for a badly needed downtown parking lot. Others who wanted to save the building at any cost, proposed that it be taken over by the City and used for city offices. But the majority of people who had many fond memories of this building wanted it to continue as it was originally intended.

The biggest danger to the Hotel during this period was the fact that a good part of the time, there was no one actually watching out for its safety. There was no one in charge legally and on many occasions doors were left unlocked and it is only by chance that it was not vandalized. Many of us worried endlessly that it would be destroyed by fire for one reason or another. There is a near certainty, that if the legal wrangles had gone on, the historic building as we know it, would have been lost.

Vee Williams Hooper finally repossessed the Hotel on May 28, 1992 in a County Court House steps auction. Several of these had been scheduled over the preceding two years only to be postponed or canceled at the last minute. Hooper spent countless hours and attorney's fees dealing with the bankruptcy courts in San Jose. But the final result was that she was able to regain full ownership.

On June 18, 1992, Ron Swift referred to the Hotel as the 'Old gal’ in his Fast Talk column in the Patterson Irrigator. This signaled an affection that many felt for the Hotel that grew as the Hotel suffered, neared disaster and the was saved.

Hooper leased the Hotel to Bob and Myrna DeFraties until January 4, 1993 when she took over management herself.

On retaking personal possession, Vee Hooper closed the Hotel for a little over two months and began extensive upgrading and redecoration including a complete rebuilding of the men's restrooms and the addition of a handicap restroom.

The handicap ramp was added to the bar side of the building.

The former Garden Room underwent major changes with the installation of windows and the front doors rescued from the Patterson High School which was torn down in 1975. A large section of the chandelier installed by Hazel Saylor was moved to the renamed "Reunion Room." A band of burgundy colored canvas was hung around the top of the room.

The room off the front lobby, now named "The Library," was redecorated with wallpaper and drapes.

The "Colony Room," the original dining room, underwent complete redecoration with the addition of new wallpaper, shutters and drapery treatment.

Furnishings and decorative items were added to the lobby and mezzanine and all brass items were polished and reinstalled. There was also extensive work on plumbing and electrical problems.

Perhaps the most expensive reopening costs went into the kitchen. Stoves, refrigerators and other expensive equipment had to be purchased. While the Seely dinnerware was still intact, there were many other items needed to make a working restaurant. All kitchen utensils had to be purchased.

The bar also needed considerable work. The sinks had to be removed and the floor rebuilt. The bar was also recarpeted. Some of the bar furniture goes back to the 1950s.

The lobby now contains some of its 1950s furniture. Of particular note are two deacons benches and several white plaster pedestals. A mirror at the head of the stairs on the balcony is also from that era.

The large white table in the lobby is perhaps one of the original pieces of Hotel furniture. Some dressers from the original bedrooms have been preserved although most were damaged by the rain storm when the roof covering was being replaced.

During this 1993 remodeling something unusual happened without any planning. As the work started, people who love the Hotel stopped by to see the work in progress, and started offering to help. This help was gratefully accepted.

In the two months of remodeling, more than 40 volunteers became involved in the restoration work. Most of it was in the form of painting and cleanup. These volunteers just wanted to see the building preserved and were willing to give of their own time to make it happen.

A grand reopening celebration was held on March 17th . The March 25, 1993 Patterson Irrigator estimated that 700 people attended, touring the kitchen, upstairs and new baths. For many of those attending, this was the culmination of dreams that the Hotel would again have a chance to survive. Many people gathered that day to visit a very dear old friend who had been near death. People came from near and far to celebrate its rebirth and share fond memories of the important part it has played in so many of our lives.

The Hotel had gone to the lowest point possible short of destruction or being remodeled beyond recognition like so many similar historic buildings.

For all of us who care about the Hotel, we can only hope that future Del Puerto Hotel owners will appreciate and understand what it means to the community, and treat it with the respect it deserves. Its future looks assured, but for its long term viability, it need's our continued support and protection.