Historic Hotels of America, part of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, has released its 2024 list of “Top 25 Historic Hotels of America Where Women Made History.” Three are in D.C. and one is in Virginia.
The Omni Homestead Resort in Hot Springs, Virginia, which opened in 1776, is named for its place in women’s sports history for its manicured golf courses. The resort has hosted many tournaments since the 1890s, with women making history on the courses.
Glenna Collett-Vare won the USGA Women’s Open on The Cascades course in 1928, the first of several first-place finishes in the U.S. Women’s Amateur tournaments.
The Willard InterContinental in D.C., opened in 1818, is noted for its early and uncommon public spaces designated for women, including a Ladies’ Lounge, when D.C. was dominated by male-only spaces.
D.C.’s Hamilton Hotel, which opened in 1851, is not named for Alexander Hamilton, but instead for his second daughter Eliza Hamilton Holly. The hotel includes The Suffrage Suite, which opened in 2020 to mark the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage and is a combination history exhibit and guest room.
The Mayflower Hotel in D.C., which opened in 1925, made women’s aviation history in 1955, when the world’s first female helicopter pilots from the U.S. and Europe met to form the “Whirly-Girls,” where female pilots could share stories. Amelia Earhart also came to the Mayflower after her 1932 solo flight from Newfoundland to the British Isles, where she received the Special Gold Medal of the National Geographic Society from President Herbert Hoover.
The full list of Historic Hotels Where Women Made History includes some that were once occupied entirely by women as schools or women-only hotels, some that have been operated by women, and some that were once the sites of protests or political organizing by women’s groups.
See the full list of historic hotels.
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