Ellsworth Statler

Ellsworth Statler

(October 25, 1863 - April 16, 1928)

Ellsworth Statler was born in poverty, but his innate business sense enabled him to acquire great success in the hotel industry. From the time he became a bell boy at the age of 13, he had a consuming curiosity about every aspect of the hotel business. He questioned various department heads from housekeeper to engineer and bookkeeper to learn all that he could. And his curious enthusiasm led to greater responsibilities. From the beginning, he had innovative ideas that improved profitability. He convinced the hotel owner where he worked to add the first railroad ticket counter to ever function in an American hotel.

His first hotel was a temporary structure he built for the 1901 Pan American Exposition held in Buffalo, New York. The exposition itself was a commercial failure, but Statler earned a small profit on his venture. He used the money to build another temporary hotel for the successful 1904 St. Louis Exhibition. That profit enabled Statler in 1908 to construct his first permanent hotel in Buffalo.

Innovation and attention to guest conveniences insured Statler's success, revolutionized the hotel industry in 1908, and continued to provide standards for hospitality leadership. In the Buffalo Statler, each guest room featured a private bathroom, a closet, running ice water, telephones and electric light switches by the door. Other guest room innovations included a lamp over each bed and a writing desk with hotel stationery. The vertical corridor for pipes and other utilities is now common place in most high rise construction, but at that time, it enabled Statler to offer the rooms at competitive rates. By 1927, Statler had hotels in Cleveland, Detroit, St. Louis, and in New York City where he built the largest hotel of its day, the 2002-room Pennsylvania Hotel.

Ellsworth Statler had a unique philosophy, saying that "Life is service. The one who progresses is the one who gives his fellow human beings a little more, a little better service." He was the first to give hotel men and women a six-day week, paid vacations, and free health service. He devised a profit sharing plan that matched a free stock share with each one purchased by employees.

Statler died unexpectedly in 1928, but his widow, Alice Statler continued the expansion of his hotel company and avoided financial difficulties during the Depression. Statler's Will created the Statler Foundation as an instrument for the perpetuation of his ideals. Those ideals not only fueled the success of Statler Hotels, but also continues to fund research for the benefit of the hotel industry in the United States, and support the education of future generations of individuals who would enter the hospitality profession.

John Willy, editor and publisher of the trade publication Hotel Monthly, wrote of Ellsworth Statler in 1912:

"Mr. Statler's genius is both creative and adaptive and is combined with a shrewdness in selecting utilitarian features. He also combines the traits of the dreamer with those of the man in action."

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