El Tovar at 76

El Tovar at 76 Carrying on an Elegant Tradition

AT THE GRAND CANYON In the early hours, the sky to the east blushes, a mute signal that the morning spectacular is about to begin.

The night wind sighs its departure, soon to be replaced by the musicians of the morning who herald the oncoming event with initially uninspired sounds, then settle to the task of greeting the day, and their cacophony evolves into a symphony.

And at that precise moment, when all the pines stand at attention and the hills shed their mantle of the night, the first rays of the morning sun slip silently across the vast auditorium and the concerto is started.

Slowly, with subtle pink giving way to crashing orange, the dawn builds to its crescendo, maintains it until the landscape is captured in its song, then retreats into the routine of the day, for the ritual of the long shadows is nearly over.

And when the last shadow from the old Hopi House scurries to its shelter beneath the aged structure, the outline of El Tovar emerges.

In the movies, El Tovar would be a monolith, perhaps, rising far above its earthly moorings to grasp the first rays of the morning sun. A symbol of strength, a testimony to man's ability to make things big.

But in real life, El Tovar shuns such pretentions.

It has been labelled with all the adjectives-magnificent, splendid, spectacular, impressive, elegant, beautiful - and wears them well but is not smothered by such baubles.

Before the day is over, someone will refer to it as "the sentinel of the South Rim," and someone else will declare that it is a "Grand Old Lady." Praise, but common.

But it's hard to find anything new to say.

The Grand Canyon was formed somewhere between 7 and 10 million years ago. Some say it is the handiwork of God. Some say it was created as a home for the spirits of the Hopi religion. Others claim Eastman Kodak built it to boost sales. But the origin of El Tovar isn't so sketchy.

It was put there in 1905, and on the day it was completed, it looked old. And therein lies much of its charm. It doesn't loom above the South Rim or dominate its surroundings. It's not a tribute to someone's ability to spend money. It isn't a monument to gaudiness.

It's simply there. Impressive but unimposing. Distinguished but not distracting. They say it was because of Teddy Roosevelt. They say he leaned pretty heavily on Fred Harvey to build something that didn't clutter up the beauty of the area, so Harvey passed the word on to architect Charles Whittlesey and El Tovar was emplaced, not built.

So it looks today pretty much like it did 76 years ago, and 76 years ago it looked like it had already been there since whenever.

Harvey was recognized for his genius as a hotel and dining entrepreneur, and there's no reason to challenge his reputation. His story sounds like a B-movie script came to America from England with $10 in his pocket, got a job in New York washing dishes for $2 per week and meals, saved enough money to go into business for himself, got wiped out by a shifty partner, started over again and made it. Made it big, too.

He signed on as a clerk in the nation's first railway postal car, sorting Pony Express mail as the train went from St. Joseph, Missouri, to Quincy, Illinois. Eventually, he rose to freight agent, which meant extensive travel, which meant putting up with train food and that experience made him rich.

He found ill-equipped, poorly-operated, crooked restaurants working deals with trainmen who sold meal tickets before their trains stopped, then blew the whistle to order the passengers back on the train before they got their food. The restaurants sold the same food several times and split the profits with the trainmen.

After getting over his repulsion for the practices of the day, Harvey recognized his opportunity. In 1876, the first Harvey House was born when he bought a lunchroom in the Santa Fe Railroad's depot in Topeka, Kansas. It featured clean silverware, fresh table-cloths, napkins, and good food. It was an immediate success.

During the 1880s and 1890s, Harvey Houses opened almost every 100 miles along the Santa Fe, through Kansas, Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. By the turn of the century, Arizona had Harvey Houses at Winslow, Williams, Ash Fork, Seligman, and Kingman, and they bore such names as Castaneda El Ortiz, Alvarado, Fray Marcos, El Navajo, and La Posada. All were, quite simply, elegant. And, as an added attraction, all were staffed by Harvey Girls, "young women 18 to 30 years of age, of good character, attractive and intelligent," who came west with a yearning for adventure and a hope for romance. History records that they found some of each. More than 20,000 of them married the ranchers, cowboys, miners, merchants, lumbermen, and railroad workers who inhabited the Old West, and many of them violated a signed agreement with the Harvey chain that they'd stay on the job unwed for at least a year.

Though El Tovar was to be the crown jewel of the Harvey Houses, Fred Harvey never saw his dream on the South Rim. He died at the age of 66 in 1901. The hotel wasn't opened until January 14, 1905.

So the Santa Fe was the actual builder, integrating President Roosevelt's ecological admonitions and Whittlesey's low-profile design with Harvey's elegance. And the result was a cabin nestled among the pines.

Sort of.

For El Tovar is far too large to nestle among anything. It stretches 325 feet from north to south and 218 feet from east to west. The original structure had 100 rooms and 42 of them had baths in them.

The south end is four stories high and the north end rises three stories.

When built, El Tovar could comfortably house 250 guests and what it text continued on page 12

(Background) El Tovar, built in 1905, was the crown jewel in the necklace of elegant Harvey Houses built along the tracks of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad in the 1880s and 1890s.

(Inset, far left) The dining room at El Tovar, which once hosted potentates, presidents, and leaders of society, is little changed today. It still exudes an atmosphere of relaxed gentility.

(Inset, left) Early-day guests at El Tovar wrote their feelings and reactions concerning the Grand Canyon and the unique hotel in the "Impressions Book," now a curious piece of Americana.

Photos by Kathleen Norris Cook