There’s another vacant lot in Wickliffe, Kentucky. This afternoon my capricious brain decided to update a post from November 2022 with some interior photographs I’d been sent after the initial story published. Of course, simply updating will never do, so I decided to spend a few minutes trying to track down some of the names associated with the former hotel – only to find, via the ever-helpful Google streetview – that the former Mrs. Folsey’s Hotel is gone.
Circa 1978 photograph of the former hotel, now demolished.
The late 19th century former Folsey’s Hotel in Wickliffe, Kentucky. Photograph 2015.
A vacant lot is all that is left. Google Streetview, October 2023.
In the spring of 2020, Chris Black of Paducah, Kentucky, went through the former hotel. Chris is not only a major force in preservation in Kentucky, but he knows a thing or two about rescuing and rehabbing historic buildings – so when he sent me the photos, I dared dream that the old hotel might be saved.
Railing on the second story landing. Photograph April 2020, courtesy of Chris Black.
Water had been at work on the building, but intact details beckoned and whispered stories. Transoms above doors, a substantial and yet still finely-executed staircase leading to the upper story…buildings much further gone than this hotel have been saved and repurposed.
The staircase to the second story hotel rooms, April 2020. Photograph courtesy Chris Black.
I wanted to find out some information about Mrs. Folsey – if that was indeed her name. My brief search turned up no one with that surname in Wickliffe from the early 20th century. Apparently the hotel was known as the “Elwood Hotel” in 1905.
Section of the 1905 Sanborn Fire Insurance map of Wickliffe, Kentucky.
The two-story brick hotel was well-situated on a major thoroughfare and near the railroad. In 1925, it was known as “Hotel Kennedy” and there was a bakery next door. (I still don’t know where Folsey comes into the picture – my information in that area comes from the survey form completed in 1978.)
Second story of the former hotel. Photograph April 2020, courtesy Chris Black.
I saw the hotel and photographed it (from the exterior only) in the spring of 2015. It was still standing in the spring of 2020, and while I can’t recall if I checked Google Streetview prior to writing my post last year – now there is only a desolate lot where the hotel once stood.
really sad. doesn’t look in that bad of shape.