Old Faithful Inn (Yellowstone National Park)

Yellowstone is odd and ever-changing on the one hand and full of wildlife, nature and history on the other. It is a place so big and expansive that one can still find solitude with a million other people. There really is no other place like it and our family is completely, passionately obsessed with the place. 

Anemone Geyser

waiting for anemone (2015)

So…when Kenedy and I had the opportunity to stay at the Old Faithful Inn for a reasonable price (when it was too cold to camp and everything else was booked), we jumped and wow are we glad we did!

The Old Faithful Inn was funded by the Northern Pacific Railway partly in competition with Fred Harvey and his buddies at the Santa Fe Railroad. Both railways were looking to complete the first wild, remote luxury accommodation within the National Parks: El Tovar vs. Old Faithful Inn. The El Tovar is a historic, comfy, beautifully designed hotel (with amazing hot chocolate served just right) on the rim of the Grand Canyon. The El Tovar was was finished 1905. The Old Faithful Inn was finished in 1904. So I guess the Northern Pacific won.

In the early days guests arrived, almost to Yellowstone, via rail to Livingston, Montana. From there they to connected to another train which took them 45 miles south to Gardiner. After a quick ride to Mammoth, guests enjoyed one last “civilized” evening of music and dancing at the Mammoth Hotel. Then each guest (about 75 people per tour) climbed aboard their “carriage,” allowed one bag for the $120, six day and 140 mile wagon ride/guided camping trip around the Grand Loop. Off they bounced along dusty roads to the attractions we now know so well: Norris, Emerald Pool, Obsidian Cliff, Old Faithful, Thumb for lunch, boat to the Lake Hotel and the finale at the Grand Canyon and falls.

Old Faithful

At Old Faithful, before the Old Faithful Inn, Yellowstone had a camp and then the Firehole Hotel and then the Fountain Hotel in 1891 which boasted electric lights, steam heat, and hot baths to house 350 guests. Trips were too expensive for most Americans until 1915 when roads provided more equal access to most parks and visitation more than doubled in Yellowstone. In 1914, Yellowstone had 20,250 visitors; in 1915, they had 51,895.

At the turn of the century, Park development regulations were relaxed in order to build the new, modern and privately financed Old Faithful Inn. Stephen Mather, the first and complicated NPS Director wanted golf courses, tennis courts and swimming pools in addition to luxury hotels in the parks.  In the 1940s and 50s people wanted to drain the wetlands around Old Faithful to reduce the number of mosquitoes and during Mission 66, NPS leaders wanted to demolish and replace the Old Faithful Inn with a new, expanded “Firehole Village” located in a less sensitive area - where more buildings, more rooms, more services could be added without encroaching into thermal areas. Also, in Yellowstone (and we love this), thermal features can emerge anywhere, anytime. Currently there is a new spring retaking the road at the entrance ramp from the Old Faithful area to the the Grand Loop Road and many areas along Firehole Lake Road are gooey and melted.

Firehole Lake Drive

The railroad selected Robert Reamer to design and manage construction of the Old Faithful Inn's original building, The Old House, which was very fast (13 months) using mostly local materials. What made untrained, 29 year old Reamer, from Ohio, qualified to lead the design and construction Old Faithful Inn? What made anyone qualified in those days? Connections. No complaints here, though. He was clearly talented and the building still stands as a fascinating “rustic” style architectural re-creation of the forest with lodgepole pines that retain their twisty, burly essence and literal tons of rhyolite rock. Reamer aligned the building (so close to thermal features) so arriving guests (by carriage and eventually car) had a direct view of Old Faithful. George Colpitts, the blacksmith, created the door hardware, fireplace tools, and a massive clock frame that hangs from a 16 foot square 4-sided fireplace. 

fireplace clock

The Bear Pit Lounge, a night club, sat off of the main lobby of the Inn in 1936. And, until 1962, visitors could go clubbing while staying in Yellowstone. Now that area houses a deli with sandwiches and coffee. The Crow’s nest, waaaay ( 0-90 feet high or about 7 stories) above the Inn’s lobby, once allowed guests to access the roof for views of the geyser basin. This is also where musicians, and sometimes a choir, would perform for guests on the first floor. Imagine staying in this rustic inn when a vibrant nightclub occupied one corner of the lobby, where live music wafted from the balcony more than 70 feet above and where bellhops used to call to the guests when a geyser was “a-goin off.”

crow's nest: waaaay up there!

In 1959 a 7.5 magnitude earthquake (the same earthquake that created Earthquake Lake and is included in The Moon By Night) damaged the structure of the crow’s nest. Now it is no longer open to the brave stair-climbers who might want views of the basin or the building from that high. The rest of the Inn stood strong. In 1988 fires burned almost one million acres in Yellowstone, barely missing the Inn. In other words, staying at this place, neighboring and walkable to the massive Upper Geyser Basin, more than 100 years old, the Park Service’s first(ish) iconic, survivor-of-a-lodge is unique, one of a kind and we were lucky to do it. 

the forest inside (by architect Robert Reamer

Our room was in the original building or the Old House which had 140 rooms. Additional wings, conforming to the original build, were built in 1913 (East) adding 100 rooms, and then in 1927 (West) adding 150 rooms with bathrooms! Our room had no shower, no toilet and was not warm enough for us after biking Firehole Lake Drive and walking through the bone-chilling cold wind in Black Sand Basin. It did have a sink and felt like it should be cozy with wood finishes and arts and crafts furniture; but it wasn’t.

sink

We checked in, unloaded, parked the car and grabbed a hot chai from the coffee cart to warm us while we explored the history of the building: the massive fireplace, clock, rocking chairs, crows nest, old-timey photos of the past. Dinner was delicious and just enough shared between the two of us: baked potato soup, salad, salmon and more hot drinks. (Don’t forget to make a reservation.) 

community shower and tub rooms!

Showers in the very nice, mostly clean community shower were hot with decent water pressure. We could hear everything in the rooms adjacent to ours so we opted to brush teeth in the bathroom as well. We curled up under a pile of blankets brought from home for cold camping nights - whatever, this was like camping in a luxury hotel. By morning our room was warm, though, and it seems that our neighbors slept well, too, because we didn’t hear a peep from them. 

remembering

I woke up early and tiptoed down the hall for coffee from the Bear Paw nightclub-turned-deli and thought I might move the frost-covered car to the charger. Unfortunately, when I circled around, one charger was broken and the other was occupied so I re-parked and strolled the icy morning boardwalk, tried to check messages at the visitor’s center (no luck) and headed back up to the room where Kenedy was awake. We packed up and took longer walk around the basin: so steamy and white! The thermal ground and the intense sun warmed us immediately. We reminisced so many trips before: bee hive, Jupiter, castle, grand, geyser hunters, cousins, COVID!

icy hot water

colors