Hudson in 1905: Part 5

The following is an excerpt from the booklet Illustrated Hudson, N.Y., published in 1905.

NEW CURTISS HOUSE--Rates $2.00 per day. Frank T. Langlois, proprietor. This is one of the popular price hotels of the city, and one that is enjoying a fine patronage. The house has been established here for many years, but its present proprietor has had it for only the past three years, yet no better demonstration of his progressive ideas could be required other than the fact that he has built the reputation of the house to a point of excellence both in service and modern improvements. The house has accommodation for a large number of guests, and in connection a fine bar is operated, whereat the best of the land can be obtained in the way of fine beverages. In the rear of the hotel is conducted a summer garden and here it is always cool and enjoyable.

Gossips Note: Illustrated Hudson, N.Y. doesn't give an address for New Curtiss House, so I headed over to the History Room at the Hudson Area Library to check the 1905 city directory. There I discovered this address for Curtiss House: "S Front cor Allen." The problem is that the same address--"S Front cor Allen"--was given for another hotel: City Hotel. Which hotel was on which corner?

North corner--48 South Front Street

South corner--52 South Front Street

To answer this, I sought the help of city historian Pat Fenoff, who told me that 52 South Front Street--the south corner--had been City Hotel, but Curtiss House had not been located on the opposite corner. From 1877 to 1883, the address for Curtiss House is listed as 42 South Front Street. Fenoff told me too that the 1871 map of Hudson shows the north corner of South Front and Allen streets as a vacant lot.

42 South Front Street

There's a problem, though, with accepting 42 South Front Street as the location of New Curtiss House. In 1905, according to the Hudson directory, 42 South Front Street was the address of the Franklin Square Hotel. So the question remains: Where was New Curtiss House?