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By JAN BOYLSTON Features Editor The grand old building at the intersection of Col leton Avenue and Chesterfield Street has quite a past. It’s future is uncertain. The Willcox Hotel was founded in 1897 from a cat ering service run by an English valet, Frederick Wil lcox, and his Swedish wife. Its registers have included the likes of distinguished personalities such as Sir Winston Churchill, Mrs. John Barrymore, John Jacob Astor and the Vanderbilts. In the late 1950s, the hotel was purchased by John Ewans, a Pennsyyvania oriental rug dealer. The once proud building has been out of operation since Ewans’ purchase and is now on the brink of ruin and decay. During the past 25 years, the fate of the hotel has been debated in the courts. Local officials claim the building is unsafe and should be demolished if reno vations are not made. Eways is currently under court order to produce plans and financial backing for the renovation of the structure. What to do with the Willcox Hotel has been a ques tion for many years. Some say the building is Aiken’s very own white elephant. Others point to its heritage and argue for preservation. Over the years, there’s been talk of the building being renovated into a vet eran’s hospital, condominiums and a shopping mal l/office complex. Members of Beth Fabrick’s third grade class at Aiken Elementary had a few ideas of their own as to what to do with the vacant structure. The students studied the history of the hotel as part of a social studies section on community decay and renewal. Here are some of the suggestions they have for what should be done with the Willcox. We should make a nursing home out of the Willcox Hotel for the old people. Eways should go ahead and o something out of it before it get torn down. A lot of people are getting old or put in the nursing every day and probably the nursing homes are getting full. I hope Eways thinks of something before May 2. —TOMMY VICKS I think Eways should rebuild the Willcox Hotel or maybe sell it. If he rebuilt the Willcox Hotel he wouldn’t have any money to pay with. Ewans paid $56,000 for the house for nothing. I know he isn’t going to do it again. All he is doing is wasting money. Now he has to fix it up, so I would just rebuild it. ERNESTINE GLOVER I think the Willcox Hotel should be remodeled. It should be made into the Willcox Travel Agency. It sounds like a good name to me. BARBARA CLEMENS I think the Willcox Hotel should be torn down. We should build a school. The school should be called Wil lcox Elementary. EARLINE HILDEBRANT I think the Willcox Hotel should be a school for re tarded people and that is my advise about the Willcox Hotel. — PAMELA THOMPSON I think the Willcox Hotel should be remodeled so it could be a school for blind people. They could learn a lot there too. I could go there and see them each day. That’s why I want it made into a school for blind le. STACEY CLARK I think the Willcox Hotel should be remodeled. You could build a school for retarded people, and let re tarded children stay. So then parents can visit them. — LASHON SIMS I think the Willcox Hotel should be remodeled, be cause Eways spent $56,000 dollars for nothing! Eways should get some people to help him remodel the Wil lcox Hotel. Eways should make a new Willcox Hotel. He should add more rooms to the Willcox Hotel and make it safe to go into. — DONNA JACKSON The Willcox Hotel
Newspaper Details
Aiken Standard
Aiken, South Carolina, US
Tue, May 10, 1983
Page 9
Full Page
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