Information Sheet

 

 

R         Connor Hotel (Joplin, Mo.).

136                  Collection, 1908-1978.

                                    Two folders, photocopies.

 

 

 

This collection includes an illustrated promotional booklet, photographs, and newspa­per clip­pings concerning the Connor Hotel in Joplin, Jasper County, Missouri.  The lavish building was begun by Thomas Connor in 1906.  It opened in 1908 and closed in 1969.  The building col­lapsed while being readied for demolition in 1978.

 

Thomas Connor arrived in Joplin in 1871.  He was an Irish immigrant who had lived in Ohio, Montana, and Texas before moving to Missouri.  He operated a hack service and sa­loon in Joplin, and in less than six years he had become president of the Miner’s Bank of Jop­lin.  He was in­stru­mental in bringing the first smelter to the area, and he was a principal owner of the Joplin Water Works.  He was a well-known public benefactor and an ardent Democrat.  He was selected as a delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1892, and as a State Senator from Jasper County in 1906.

 

In 1906 Connor began construction of the landmark hotel which bore his name, but he did not live to see it completed.  After his death in 1907 his heirs continued construction as he had planned it.  The hotel opened in 1908 under management of the Dean brothers, man­agers of Kan­sas City's Baltimore Hotel.  The Connor Hotel incorporated the finest building stone, ornate mar­ble, bronze, and mahogany in its construction, and was said to have cost three-quarters of a million dollars.  The management touted it as “the finest hotel west of New York.”  Joplin’s so­cial life re­volved around the Connor in the days when the city was the heart of the mining boom in the Tri-State Mining District.

 

The Connor’s business declined rapidly as the area’s mines played out, and it was further di­minished by competition from motels.  The hotel finally closed in 1969, and despite several at­tempts it never re-opened.  In a final spectacular episode the building collapsed in 1978 while be­ing readied for dynamiting, killing several workmen who were trapped inside.

 

This collection includes photocopies of a fifty-four page illustrated booklet published by the hotel’s management in 1908; several clippings which detail the history and ultimate end of the building, 1960-1978; and five interior views of the hotel.

 

 

 

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