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Local History

Hotels

Rickman Hotel

The Rickman House is one of the most impressive and imposing landmarks on the north end of downtown Kalamazoo. The elegant architecture speaks to the building’s century-old history as one of Kalamazoo’s finest hotels.

American House Hotel

At one time, the American House Hotel footprint comprised an entire block of Kalamazoo’s primary commercial artery. Strategically located across the street from the Grand Rapids and Indiana Railroad station…

Burdick Hotel

The origins of hospitality on the present site of the Radisson Plaza Hotel date to August 1850 when construction of an imposing four-story brick structure began. Built by Frank Dennison and initially known simply as Dennison’s brick block, the new...

Columbia Hotel

In 1870 the Grand Rapids and Indiana Railroad began service through Kalamazoo with a passenger station on the southeast corner of Pitcher Street and East Main, today’s East Michigan Avenue. The presence of this station, and the countless...

Holt Hotel

Situated along the south side of the 300 block of E. Michigan Avenue, stuck between the Columbia Hotel, the New Arlington Hotel and the Henderson-Ames Building is the three-story Holt Hotel.

International Building

Anchoring the northeast corner of S. Burdick and South Street since its construction in 1869, the International Building first began as a hotel/boarding house. 1873 Kalamazoo County Map, Local History…

Kalamazoo House

“Earliest of Kalamazoo enterprises to experience a business boom were its hotels–institutions which became the rallying places for the community and the scenes of many festive occasions in the first years of the city’s history."