Our last post was concerned with a very odd speech given on opening day in relation to Thomas Field, the original idea-man behind the Oriental Hotel. The Oriental Hotel’s opening day went off without a hitch (other than the governor not making it due to train mishaps) but the funding for the latter half of construction was carried out by Adolphus Busch and several other wealthy men from St. Louis. What happened to Thomas Field and where was he on opening day?
There is nothing in the Dallas Morning News that I have come across to indicate there was any kind of scandal either involving a bankruptcy or crime that would cause Thomas Field to run. Nor a messy divorce or whatnot. My search for Thomas Field’s obituary has been fruitless (Thomas Field is an incredibly common name) and no one wanted to speak ill of him at opening day. So, you and I are left to wonder if he simply ran short of funds and pulled in investors, if he left town due to some emergency or opportunity, or, if he really was dead as almost everyone else writes about him at this time in the past tense, exclaiming what a pity it was that he couldn’t see the completion of the building.
Our famous brewing magnate, Adolphus Busch, and his investor group from St. Louis, funded the completion of Thomas Fields’ dream when he disappeared from Dallas. The manager of the property was hand picked by Adolphus Busch, but it does not appear that Adolphus was in town himself for opening day.
While mulling all this over, you can feast your eyes upon this image of the Oriental Hotel, looking up Commerce Street in Dallas. Thanks to the Ephemeral Dallas blog for this image.
