Gerald Hotel
Fairfield, Maine
NR Reference Number: 12000894
Listed: 03/25/2013

 Location:

151-157 Main Street, Fairfield, ME

Summary:

The Gerald Hotel is a small town hotel which was built with a degree of extravagance and detail more common to larger hotels in major urban centers. The .59 acre property is located on Main Street in the Somerset County town of Fairfield. The brick and terracotta hotel building was built by Amos F. Gerald in 1899-1900 to designs by Lewiston architect William R. Miller. An attached building at the rear was used as a furniture showroom for the Lawry Brothers, one of two commercial establishments that had store fronts on the first floor of the hotel. Although much of the exterior architectural detailing is no longer extant, the Gerald Hotel meets Criterion B, at the state-wide level of significance for its association with its builder Amos F. Gerald (1841-1913), a businessman whose life's work influenced commercial, industrial, recreational , and transportation development across Maine in the late-19th and early- 20th centuries. The Gerald Hotel also meets Criterion A at the local level of significance as home to one of the longest lasting commercial establishments, Lawry Brothers furniture (and successors), in downtown Fairfield and as the town's premier hotel and community function facility for more than three decades. The areas of significance, under Criterion A are commerce, and entertainment and recreation while entertainment and recreation, industry, and transportation are the areas of significance associated with Amos F. Gerald under Criterion B. The period of significance commences in 1900 when the building was completed, and ends in 1962, fifty years before the present.

 

Link to full file: Gerald Hotel