Omaha Exploration

At one time, Omaha was home to the most elegant hotel between Chicago and San Francisco. Located in the West Farnam District, the Blackstone Hotel lent its name to the increasingly affluent neighborhood along the streetcar route. The area became known as the Blackstone District, earning a reputation as Omaha’s Gold Coast.

The hotel was built for Bankers Realty Company, which hired Francis W. Fitzpatrick as its architect. As an assistant to Henry Ives Cobb, he helped design the Chicago Federal Building and later designed the St. Regis Apartments in Omaha. The eight-story Blackstone was built in the Second Renaissance Revival style with a steel frame covered in brick and a terracotta cornice.

Located at 302 S. 36th Street, the hotel opened in 1916 as a residential hotel that rented rooms by the year while providing hotel-like services. Unlike similar hotels that were all located downtown, the Blackstone was built in West Omaha to serve the city’s wealthy residents. Its apartments ranged from one to six rooms, none with kitchens, and the streetcar provided easy access to Happy Hollow, Country Club, and Field Club for the “club man.”

The investment company didn’t get the returns it had hoped for, due in part to the number of houses and apartment complexes being built at the same time. By the time the company was looking to sell, its service and furnishings had declined to the point where they used torn bed sheets as tablecloths. That gave Charles Schimmel, the son of a successful Vienna caterer, an opportunity to turn it into one of the best hotels in the country.

Born in Austria in 1873, Charles immigrated to the U.S. at 16 and settled in Chicago, where he built the Custer Hotel in Galesburg, Illinois in 1915. He moved to Omaha in 1920 and bought the Blackstone. Over time, the Schimmel chain expanded to include the Cornhusker Hotel in Lincoln, Hotel-Kings-Way in St. Louis, Lassen Hotel and Schimmel Inn in Wichita, Town House Hotel in Kansas City, Lincoln-Douglas Hotel in Quincy, Illinois, and Indian Hills Inn in Omaha.

Charles and Mary Schimmel turned the Blackstone into a symbol of elegance during the Roaring Twenties, regarded as a premier stop along the Lincoln Highway. The first floor featured a grand marble staircase and palm room, which contributed to its grandeur alongside a dining room, lounge, and soda fountain. The basement offered conveniences such as a barber shop, shoeshine parlor, and hair salon, in addition to a billiards room and servants’ quarters. The upper floors contained suites with four glass sunrooms on each floor, and the grand ballroom with its three rooftop gardens sat at the top.

It also featured award-winning restaurants including The Orleans Room, which received Holiday Magazine’s “Award for Excellence” 16 straight years. Both the Plush Horse Coffee Room and Golden Spur were more casual options. Among its claims to fame, the Reuben sandwich and Butter Brickle ice cream are both said to have been invented at the hotel. The Cottonwood Room, meanwhile, provided guests the opportunity to sip a cocktail beneath a cottonwood tree while taking in views of the river valley via a 54-foot backlit photographic mural.

The Schimmels had six children and envisioned each son running his own hotel someday, training them accordingly. After Charles passed away in 1938, sons Edward and Bernard continued to operate the Blackstone alongside their mother, Mary, who passed away in 1946. The other two sons, Abram Quincy and Walter, managed the Cornhusker Hotel in Lincoln and the Lassen Hotel in Wichita, respectively.

The hotel published its own magazine, The Blackstonian, and kept a small fleet of limousines for the many prominent guests who passed through its doors. Among them were President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, who spent their fifth wedding anniversary there in 1958. Richard Nixon announced his presidential candidacy from the rooftop ballroom in 1967. Other notable guests included Presidents Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.

After a 48-year run, the Schimmel family sold the hotel to Radisson Corporation in 1968. The second generation of Schimmel hoteliers all passed away in the years that followed, with A.Q. in 1970, Edward in 1975, Bernard in 1977, and Walter in 1990.

Radisson attempted to renovate the hotel but never matched its former glory. Occupancy dropped to 55% by the time the company closed it in 1976. The building was declared an Omaha Landmark in 1983, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985, and converted to an office complex called Blackstone Center.

Kiewit Corporation purchased it in 2007 and sold it to Clarity Development Company and Green Slate Development in 2017. Together they undertook the painstaking process of restoring it as a luxury hotel at a cost of $75M. By the time it reopened in 2020, it had to change its name, as a hotel in Chicago had trademarked the Blackstone name.

Today it operates as the Kimpton Cottonwood Hotel, featuring 205 guest rooms, 31 suites, two restaurants, a coffee shop, and a lounge. The restaurants are the reimagined Orleans Room, which offers a casual dining experience, and the upscale Committee Chophouse, which takes its name from “The Committee,” a weekly poker group where the Reuben sandwich was born. A new wing added suites and gathering spaces, along with a resort-style pool and a carriage house that doubles as a poolside bar in summer and a holiday pop-up bar when the pool is closed. While many original features were retained, including the mosaic tile floor, marble staircase, and terracotta columns, other elements had to be recreated using old photographs, including the ballroom and the Cottonwood Room lounge, which once again features its namesake tree and panoramic river valley screen.

The Blackstone Hotel and the neighborhood it named have both had remarkable second acts.

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Sources

• Omaha World-Herald article
• Schimmel Hotels – Wikipedia
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackstone_Hotel_(Omaha,_Nebraska)
• https://omahahistorical.org/items/show/150
• https://postcardhistory.net/2021/08/omahas-blackstone-hotel-a-history-and-mystery/
• Charles Schimmel (1873-1938) – Find a Grave Memorial