Frank Case was the most popular hotel owner in the nation in the Jazz Age for his care and management of the Hotel Algonquin on West Forty-fourth Street in Manhattan, New York City.
He was born Francis Manning Case, Jr., on 27 November 1871, in Buffalo, New York, where he got his start in the hotel business by working as a night clerk at the Genesee Hotel. He relocated to Jersey City, New Jersey in the 1890s and took over management of the struggling Taylor's Hotel. He married a Buffalo girl, Caroline "Carrie" Eckert in 1897 in a suite at Taylor's. Their daughter, Margaret, was born in 1902. She would grow up to be New Yorker writer Margaret Case Harriman and write books about her father, including "Blessed Are the Debonaire."
In 1902 when the Hotel Algonquin was under construction Case was hired to be the first general manager by owner Albert Foster. The hotel, which was constructed in just nine months, was built by the Puritan Realty Co., giving rise to the fable that the hotel was named the Puritan until Case changed it. Not true.
Case was enamored with the stage, and welcomed actors and actresses to the Algonquin. He was also a member of The Lambs, the oldest professional theatrical organization in the country. He was a council member, and the clubhouse was on the same street as the hotel, bringing scores of famous names in the door, including John Drew, the Barrymores, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks.
In 1908 Carrie died in the hotel, four days after giving birth to their son, Carroll. She was returned to Buffalo and buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery. Eight years later he remarried, to a hotel worker, Bertha Walden, in 1916. She worked side-by-side with him for 30 years until her death in 1946.
In May 1927 Case bought the hotel from the Smith estate, the second owners. The Case family lived in an apartment on the 10th Floor which is today called the Noel Coward Suite. They had a second home on the water of Sag Harbor, Long Island, where they entertained visitors and friends from the Algonquin, including Franklin P. Adams and Robert Benchley.
He insured the hotel would have a reputation long after his death by doing something that seemed simple to him: being a good host. When a group of newspaper writers, critics, publicity men, magazine staffers, and actors started coming in daily in June 1919, he saw how he could take care of them. He moved the group of 30 regulars from the Pergola Room and gave them a large round table--it sat about 16--in the very middle of the dining room. He put a velvet rope around it for them and provided free appetizers. This became the Algonquin Round Table, the most famous literary gathering in the 20th century.
Case faced two business crises in the forty-four years he lived in the hotel. First, was the bar. He removed the bar from the hotel in 1917, before Prohibition even went into practice, because he didn't want his children living around the rowdy scene in the lobby. Alcohol wasn't served for the next sixteen years, until the Blue Bar opened in 1933. The second crisis was when the hotel staff unionized and went on strike in 1939. The staff walked out and he took it as a personal insult.
Case was a genius at marketing and advertising, and the hotel earned a national reputation. He wrote three books that all became bestsellers: "Tales of a Wayward Inn" (1938), "Do Not Disturb" (1940), and a cookbook that included recipes from famous guests, "Feeding the Lions" (1942).
Bertha Case died 21 February 1946 and Frank Case four months later on 7 June. The couple were temporarily kept in a receiving vault at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx. They were relocated to a modest mausoleum in their beloved Sag Harbor in the historic Oakland Cemetery.
He was born Francis Manning Case, Jr., on 27 November 1871, in Buffalo, New York, where he got his start in the hotel business by working as a night clerk at the Genesee Hotel. He relocated to Jersey City, New Jersey in the 1890s and took over management of the struggling Taylor's Hotel. He married a Buffalo girl, Caroline "Carrie" Eckert in 1897 in a suite at Taylor's. Their daughter, Margaret, was born in 1902. She would grow up to be New Yorker writer Margaret Case Harriman and write books about her father, including "Blessed Are the Debonaire."
In 1902 when the Hotel Algonquin was under construction Case was hired to be the first general manager by owner Albert Foster. The hotel, which was constructed in just nine months, was built by the Puritan Realty Co., giving rise to the fable that the hotel was named the Puritan until Case changed it. Not true.
Case was enamored with the stage, and welcomed actors and actresses to the Algonquin. He was also a member of The Lambs, the oldest professional theatrical organization in the country. He was a council member, and the clubhouse was on the same street as the hotel, bringing scores of famous names in the door, including John Drew, the Barrymores, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks.
In 1908 Carrie died in the hotel, four days after giving birth to their son, Carroll. She was returned to Buffalo and buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery. Eight years later he remarried, to a hotel worker, Bertha Walden, in 1916. She worked side-by-side with him for 30 years until her death in 1946.
In May 1927 Case bought the hotel from the Smith estate, the second owners. The Case family lived in an apartment on the 10th Floor which is today called the Noel Coward Suite. They had a second home on the water of Sag Harbor, Long Island, where they entertained visitors and friends from the Algonquin, including Franklin P. Adams and Robert Benchley.
He insured the hotel would have a reputation long after his death by doing something that seemed simple to him: being a good host. When a group of newspaper writers, critics, publicity men, magazine staffers, and actors started coming in daily in June 1919, he saw how he could take care of them. He moved the group of 30 regulars from the Pergola Room and gave them a large round table--it sat about 16--in the very middle of the dining room. He put a velvet rope around it for them and provided free appetizers. This became the Algonquin Round Table, the most famous literary gathering in the 20th century.
Case faced two business crises in the forty-four years he lived in the hotel. First, was the bar. He removed the bar from the hotel in 1917, before Prohibition even went into practice, because he didn't want his children living around the rowdy scene in the lobby. Alcohol wasn't served for the next sixteen years, until the Blue Bar opened in 1933. The second crisis was when the hotel staff unionized and went on strike in 1939. The staff walked out and he took it as a personal insult.
Case was a genius at marketing and advertising, and the hotel earned a national reputation. He wrote three books that all became bestsellers: "Tales of a Wayward Inn" (1938), "Do Not Disturb" (1940), and a cookbook that included recipes from famous guests, "Feeding the Lions" (1942).
Bertha Case died 21 February 1946 and Frank Case four months later on 7 June. The couple were temporarily kept in a receiving vault at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx. They were relocated to a modest mausoleum in their beloved Sag Harbor in the historic Oakland Cemetery.
Frank Case was the most popular hotel owner in the nation in the Jazz Age for his care and management of the Hotel Algonquin on West Forty-fourth Street in Manhattan, New York City.
He was born Francis Manning Case, Jr., on 27 November 1871, in Buffalo, New York, where he got his start in the hotel business by working as a night clerk at the Genesee Hotel. He relocated to Jersey City, New Jersey in the 1890s and took over management of the struggling Taylor's Hotel. He married a Buffalo girl, Caroline "Carrie" Eckert in 1897 in a suite at Taylor's. Their daughter, Margaret, was born in 1902. She would grow up to be New Yorker writer Margaret Case Harriman and write books about her father, including "Blessed Are the Debonaire."
In 1902 when the Hotel Algonquin was under construction Case was hired to be the first general manager by owner Albert Foster. The hotel, which was constructed in just nine months, was built by the Puritan Realty Co., giving rise to the fable that the hotel was named the Puritan until Case changed it. Not true.
Case was enamored with the stage, and welcomed actors and actresses to the Algonquin. He was also a member of The Lambs, the oldest professional theatrical organization in the country. He was a council member, and the clubhouse was on the same street as the hotel, bringing scores of famous names in the door, including John Drew, the Barrymores, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks.
In 1908 Carrie died in the hotel, four days after giving birth to their son, Carroll. She was returned to Buffalo and buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery. Eight years later he remarried, to a hotel worker, Bertha Walden, in 1916. She worked side-by-side with him for 30 years until her death in 1946.
In May 1927 Case bought the hotel from the Smith estate, the second owners. The Case family lived in an apartment on the 10th Floor which is today called the Noel Coward Suite. They had a second home on the water of Sag Harbor, Long Island, where they entertained visitors and friends from the Algonquin, including Franklin P. Adams and Robert Benchley.
He insured the hotel would have a reputation long after his death by doing something that seemed simple to him: being a good host. When a group of newspaper writers, critics, publicity men, magazine staffers, and actors started coming in daily in June 1919, he saw how he could take care of them. He moved the group of 30 regulars from the Pergola Room and gave them a large round table--it sat about 16--in the very middle of the dining room. He put a velvet rope around it for them and provided free appetizers. This became the Algonquin Round Table, the most famous literary gathering in the 20th century.
Case faced two business crises in the forty-four years he lived in the hotel. First, was the bar. He removed the bar from the hotel in 1917, before Prohibition even went into practice, because he didn't want his children living around the rowdy scene in the lobby. Alcohol wasn't served for the next sixteen years, until the Blue Bar opened in 1933. The second crisis was when the hotel staff unionized and went on strike in 1939. The staff walked out and he took it as a personal insult.
Case was a genius at marketing and advertising, and the hotel earned a national reputation. He wrote three books that all became bestsellers: "Tales of a Wayward Inn" (1938), "Do Not Disturb" (1940), and a cookbook that included recipes from famous guests, "Feeding the Lions" (1942).
Bertha Case died 21 February 1946 and Frank Case four months later on 7 June. The couple were temporarily kept in a receiving vault at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx. They were relocated to a modest mausoleum in their beloved Sag Harbor in the historic Oakland Cemetery.
He was born Francis Manning Case, Jr., on 27 November 1871, in Buffalo, New York, where he got his start in the hotel business by working as a night clerk at the Genesee Hotel. He relocated to Jersey City, New Jersey in the 1890s and took over management of the struggling Taylor's Hotel. He married a Buffalo girl, Caroline "Carrie" Eckert in 1897 in a suite at Taylor's. Their daughter, Margaret, was born in 1902. She would grow up to be New Yorker writer Margaret Case Harriman and write books about her father, including "Blessed Are the Debonaire."
In 1902 when the Hotel Algonquin was under construction Case was hired to be the first general manager by owner Albert Foster. The hotel, which was constructed in just nine months, was built by the Puritan Realty Co., giving rise to the fable that the hotel was named the Puritan until Case changed it. Not true.
Case was enamored with the stage, and welcomed actors and actresses to the Algonquin. He was also a member of The Lambs, the oldest professional theatrical organization in the country. He was a council member, and the clubhouse was on the same street as the hotel, bringing scores of famous names in the door, including John Drew, the Barrymores, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks.
In 1908 Carrie died in the hotel, four days after giving birth to their son, Carroll. She was returned to Buffalo and buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery. Eight years later he remarried, to a hotel worker, Bertha Walden, in 1916. She worked side-by-side with him for 30 years until her death in 1946.
In May 1927 Case bought the hotel from the Smith estate, the second owners. The Case family lived in an apartment on the 10th Floor which is today called the Noel Coward Suite. They had a second home on the water of Sag Harbor, Long Island, where they entertained visitors and friends from the Algonquin, including Franklin P. Adams and Robert Benchley.
He insured the hotel would have a reputation long after his death by doing something that seemed simple to him: being a good host. When a group of newspaper writers, critics, publicity men, magazine staffers, and actors started coming in daily in June 1919, he saw how he could take care of them. He moved the group of 30 regulars from the Pergola Room and gave them a large round table--it sat about 16--in the very middle of the dining room. He put a velvet rope around it for them and provided free appetizers. This became the Algonquin Round Table, the most famous literary gathering in the 20th century.
Case faced two business crises in the forty-four years he lived in the hotel. First, was the bar. He removed the bar from the hotel in 1917, before Prohibition even went into practice, because he didn't want his children living around the rowdy scene in the lobby. Alcohol wasn't served for the next sixteen years, until the Blue Bar opened in 1933. The second crisis was when the hotel staff unionized and went on strike in 1939. The staff walked out and he took it as a personal insult.
Case was a genius at marketing and advertising, and the hotel earned a national reputation. He wrote three books that all became bestsellers: "Tales of a Wayward Inn" (1938), "Do Not Disturb" (1940), and a cookbook that included recipes from famous guests, "Feeding the Lions" (1942).
Bertha Case died 21 February 1946 and Frank Case four months later on 7 June. The couple were temporarily kept in a receiving vault at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx. They were relocated to a modest mausoleum in their beloved Sag Harbor in the historic Oakland Cemetery.
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