Santa Fe Hotel (Basque Hotel)
Introduction
Text-to-speech Audio
In the early 1900s, Fresno was one of several California cities with a thriving Basque community. The Santa Fe Hotel was built in 1913 to serve the Basque community. The building, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, currently houses a restaurant, the Shepherd's Inn, which serves Basque and American cuisine.
Images
Santa Fe Hotel
Two-story, wood frame (yellow) "Fresno Hotel" at Santa Fe Hotel location on 1918 Sanborn map (Vol. 1 p. 30)
Backstory and Context
Text-to-speech Audio
In the late 1800s and early 1900s, a number of Basque immigrants arrived in California, drawn largely by the promise of work as sheepherders. [more on where they came from - basque region, language, etc.]
By the early 1900s, Fresno had the state's fourth-largest Basque population.
The Santa Fe Hotel was built in 1913, making it one of the later hotels to be built in the Basque community. It served numerous purposes: not merely a hotel, it served as a restaurant, a community center, a clinic, and a place for nomadic Basque sheepherders to collect mail and store belongings. It even functioned as a retirement home of sorts for elderly sheepherders.
[when became restaurant? apartments above?]
Sources
Echeverria, Jeronima. Home Away From Home: A History of Basque Boardinghouses. University of Nevada Press, 1999. pgs 120-123
Library of Congress (LOC): https://www.loc.gov/item/sanborn00556_006/