Hotel de Paris Museum, a Site of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, is owned and operated by The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Colorado.
Mission statement
To collect, preserve, and share history and culture associated with Louis Dupuy's Hotel de Paris, and serve as a catalyst for heritage tourism.
Please consider making a donation at www.hoteldeparismuseum.org.
Showing posts with label The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Colorado. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Colorado. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 28, 2026
The Case for an Original Influencer: Louis Dupuy
Forget ring lights. Forget hashtags. Forget viral videos. Louis Dupuy was building a devoted following decades before anyone dreamed of the internet.
The Evidence
Exhibit A: He Curated a Lifestyle Brand
Louis Dupuy wasn't just running a hotel. He sold an experience. Guests came for elegant French-inspired dining, refined surroundings, and the promise that, for a few hours or a few days, they could leave behind the rough-and-tumble silver mining camp outside and step into a little corner of Europe. Today's influencers call it "creating an aesthetic." Louis simply called it Hotel de Paris.
Exhibit B: Food Content Was His Specialty
Before food bloggers photographed every meal, visitors couldn't stop talking about Dupuy's cooking. His menus featured oysters, fine wines, elaborate dinners, and beautifully presented dishes that became legendary across the nation, and, arguably, the world. No Instagram stories required.
Exhibit C: He Mastered Personal Branding
People didn't travel to meet "the hotel owner." They came to experience Louis Dupuy, the "Oddest Host in America." His personality, reputation, and hospitality became inseparable from the business itself. That's not just marketing—it's his professional brand.
Exhibit D: His Followers Shared His Content
There was no "share" button in the 1880s. Instead, satisfied guests wrote letters, newspaper and magazine articles, and travel accounts praising Hotel de Paris. Word spread from one traveler to another until people sought out Georgetown, Colorado specifically to experience Dupuy's famous establishment. Word-of-mouth was the original algorithm.
Exhibit E: He Understood Exclusivity
The finest table settings. Imported ingredients. Carefully created interiors. An unforgettable atmosphere. Modern influencers call this "aspirational content." Louis called it just an ordinary Tuesday.
The Verdict
Was Louis Dupuy posting selfies? No. Did he have followers? Absolutely. Did he shape opinions, inspire travel, define taste, and convince people that experiencing Hotel de Paris was something they simply had to do? Without question.
So, the next time someone says influencers are a modern invention, remind them that one of the first lifestyle influencers was serving oysters and French cuisine in Colorado nearly 150 years ago. He just measured his engagement in full dining rooms instead of likes.
Wednesday, July 8, 2026
Why Hotel de Paris Museum Doesn't Reopen as a First-Class Luxury Hotel
"Why don't you reopen the hotel—even if it's only a few guest rooms?"
This is one of the most frequent questions we receive at Hotel de Paris Museum...and it's understandable. Staying overnight in Louis Dupuy's legendary inn seems like an extraordinary opportunity to experience the past; however, the mission of Hotel de Paris Museum is to collect, preserve, and share history associated with Louis Dupuy's Hotel de Paris while serving as a catalyst for tourism.
Since 1954, the property has been owned and operated by The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Colorado as a museum dedicated to preserving one of Colorado's most remarkable historic places. Although reopening portions of the building for overnight accommodations may seem appealing, doing so would conflict with the very purpose for which the museum exists.
A Preservation Success Story
As early as 1945, historians with the State of Colorado recognized Hotel de Paris as an irreplaceable historic resource due to its completeness. Unlike many historic hotels that were remodeled beyond recognition or lost altogether, this building survived with an extraordinary degree of integrity. Over the past seven decades, extensive preservation, restoration, and conservation work has focused on safeguarding the building and its artifact collection—not preparing it for modern overnight stays. Reopening guest rooms would place many of these achievements at risk.
Inescapable Wear and Tear
Historic buildings survive because use is carefully managed by the museum's owners and professional staff. Even a small number of lodging guests would dramatically increase foot traffic on original floors and stairs, accelerate wear on historic finishes, require more frequent cleaning, and increase the handling of original doors, windows, locks, and hardware. Every additional use shortens the life of irreplaceable historic materials that cannot simply be replaced once worn out.
Protecting the Extraordinary
One of Hotel de Paris Museum's greatest distinctions is its remarkable collection of original furnishings that remain in or near their intended locations. Operating guest rooms would inevitably increase the risk of accidental damage, breakage, and loss while creating significantly greater security challenges. The museum's responsibility is not simply to protect the building, but also the thousands of objects that tell the story of the site and the people who built it, worked it, and occupied it.
Room 9, Restored
Authenticity Matters
The goal of historic preservation has been to present the hotel as it appeared during Louis Dupuy's ownership—not to recreate it as a functioning twenty-first-century hotel. Modern lodging requires bathrooms, fire suppression systems, emergency lighting, accessibility improvements, climate control, expanded electrical service, internet access, expanded security measures, and contemporary furnishings and amenities. Engaging these necessities would largely require substantial alterations that would diminish the building's genuineness. Ironically, protecting historic artifacts might also require removing them from guest rooms altogether, making those spaces less authentic.
Room 9, Modernized
Museums and Hotels Have Different Focuses
Museums and operating hotels exist for fundamentally different purposes. A history museum prioritizes preservation, research, and education. A hotel prioritizes guest comfort, convenience, and customer expectations. When those priorities conflict, historic preservation inevitably comes under pressure to accommodate modern lodging standards.
Preserving a Time Capsule
Louis Dupuy's Hotel de Paris is frequently described as the most unique and complete parcel of early Colorado history—a rare "time capsule" that offers visitors an authentic glimpse into the nineteenth century. Converting preserved guest rooms back into commercial accommodations would fundamentally change their role. Historic rooms would become revenue-producing assets rather than preserved spaces, altering how visitors experience the site and potentially weakening the very qualities that make the property significant. Such a change could also affect the philanthropic support upon which the museum has depended for decades.
Modern Infrastructure Comes at a Cost
Operating a hotel requires far more than beds and linens. Reliable plumbing, expanded electrical capacity, heating and cooling systems, internet service, and modern life-safety systems all require extensive capital, installation, and ongoing maintenance. These upgrades often involve invasive work within historic walls, ceilings, and floors that historic preservation seeks to protect.
Honoring Investment
Millions of dollars in public, private, and philanthropic support have been donated to preserve Louis Dupuy's Hotel de Paris as a museum and cultural resource. Those investments were made with the understanding that the property would remain dedicated to historic preservation, education, and interpretation. Returning portions of the hotel building to commercial lodging would represent a significant departure from that long-standing commitment.
Room 7, Restored
Increased Liability
Unlike museum visitors, overnight guests occupy a building for extended periods without direct supervision. Potential risks include fire, water damage, accidental breakage, vandalism, personal injury claims, unauthorized access to restricted areas, theft, and damage caused by luggage, food, beverages, or pets. A single incident could undo years of careful stewardship.
Room 7, Modernized
Protecting the Experience
Museum visitors experience Hotel de Paris Museum as a protected historic resource. Hotel guests naturally personalize the spaces they occupy by unpacking luggage, moving furnishings, charging electronics, eating meals, and otherwise treating rooms as temporary homes. This changes the visitor's relationship with the historic setting and diminishes its interpretive and educational values.
National Responsibility
Louis Dupuy's Hotel de Paris is important not simply because it was once a high-end hotel, but because it remains one of the nation's most complete examples of a nineteenth-century hotel preserved as a museum. Its management carries responsibilities that extend well beyond local tourism. Preservation and conservation standards consistently emphasize protecting historic buildings and collections when continued commercial use would compromise long-term integrity.
Looking Forward
The good news is Hotel de Paris has already found a sustainable new purpose.Since 1954, it has evolved from a threatened and deteriorated French inn into a nationally significant museum, tool for education, catalyst for heritage tourism, and community gathering place. That transformation represents one of Colorado's great historic preservation accomplishments.
The ultimate measure of success is not whether guests can once again spend the night within the hotel's historic walls. Rather, it is ensuring future generations can pass through the building and experience it much as visitors did during Louis Dupuy's lifetime.
Decades of careful restoration, conservation, and stewardship have preserved something exceedingly rare: an authentic nineteenth-century hotel that has become an artifact in its own right. Reopening guest rooms—even on a limited basis—would reverse that philosophy by treating the building as a hotel rather than preserving it as one of Colorado's (and, arguably the nation's) most extraordinary museums.
In the end, the greatest luxury Hotel de Paris Museum offers is not a night's stay. It is the opportunity to step into a place where history itself has been carefully preserved for the public.
Tucked beneath a corner vanity, a small fragment of wallpaper quietly gestures toward a much larger story—one that stretches across oceans and cultures.
Out of sight in Louis Dupuy's Hotel de Paris is a remnant of the property's earliest days. With its delicate pattern inspired by Anglo-Japanese style, what is left of the polychrome wall covering reflects a moment in the 19th century when American and European tastes were profoundly reshaped by an artistic encounter with Japan.
Preserved wallpaper, Room 8
The Opening of Japan—and the Flood of Influence
For over two centuries, Japan maintained a policy of relative isolation from the Western world. That changed in 1853 with the arrival of Commodore Matthew Perry, whose expedition initiated a series of treaties that opened Japanese ports to foreign trade. What followed was not just commerce—but fascination. Japanese goods—woodblock prints, ceramics, textiles, lacquerware—began flowing into Europe and the United States. To Western eyes, these objects felt radically different: asymmetrical compositions, flattened perspectives, natural motifs, and an elegance rooted in restraint. This aesthetic movement became known as Japonisme.
Dinner caster, Restaurant Dining Room
Bristolware vase, Restaurant Dining Room
From Elite Curiosity to Domestic Style
Initially, Japanese art captivated collectors, artists, and designers. Figures like American painter and artist James McNeill Whistler and American artist and designer Louis Comfort Tiffany incorporated Japanese principles into their work. But the appeal did not stay confined to galleries. By the 1870s and 1880s, the Anglo-Japanese style--an offshoot of the broader Aesthetic Movement made popular by Irish author and poet Oscar Wilde--began appearing in middle-class homes (and, in our case, a commercial property). Pattern books, imported goods, and domestic manufacturers translated Japanese design into accessible forms: birds, bamboo, and florals; emphasis on negative space and simplicity; and, flattened, decorative compositions rather than illusionistic depth.
Ceiling fixture (detail), Sample Room 2
Squat globe, Sample Room 2
Harmony Between Nature and Design
Even in the remote Rocky Mountain mining camp of Georgetown, Colordo, these global currents made their mark. The popularity of Japanese-inspired design in 19th century America wasn’t accidental. It answered several cultural desires at once:
1. A reaction against industrial excess
As industrialization accelerated, many Americans sought alternatives to mass-produced clutter. Japanese design—with its clarity and restraint—offered a kind of visual relief.
2. A Taste for the Exotic (the Romanticized “Elsewhere”)
Japan was imagined as refined, mysterious, and timeless. Incorporating its motifs allowed Americans to participate in a global, cosmopolitan identity.
3. Alignment with the Aesthetic Movement
The idea of “art for art’s sake”—that beauty itself had value—found a natural partner in Japanese decorative arts, which elevated everyday objects into works of art.
A Fragment as Evidence of Connection
Our surviving piece of wallpaper in Room 8 is out of sight, so it is easy to miss. And yet, it embodies a remarkable truth: even in a frontier setting like Louis Dupuy's Hotel de Paris, global artistic movements were not distant abstractions—they were lived, chosen, and embedded into daily life. It suggests that the people who passed through these rooms—travelers, workers, artists, dreamers—were not isolated from the wider world. They were participants in it.
Looking Closer
Fragments invite us to look more carefully—not just at what is preserved, but at what lingers in the margins. Beneath furniture, behind walls, in overlooked corners, history waits in partial form. And sometimes, a fragment is enough to tell a global story.
Wallpaper labled "0 352 A.W.P.M.A." (American Wall Paper Manufacturers Association)
Awaiting Your Inspection
With the help of Bo Sullivan of Arcalus Period Design and Wayne Mason of Mason & Wolf, we located our wallpaper pattern in the archive of the Benson Ford Research Center at Henry Ford of Dearborn, Michigan. See the full-size reproduction for yourself, now on display in Room 8. Printing by Grizzly Creek Gallery, 512 6th Street, Georgetown, Colorado.
The West Courtyard at Louis Dupuy’s Hotel de Paris
was used for butchering meat, and storing cords of firewood and a pile of coal.
Enclosed by stone walls built by Chinese
laborers in the late 19th century, the West Courtyard at Hotel de Paris Museum is shielded from
the hustle-and-bustle of the modern world. This creates a calm area, a kind of palate cleanser, where visitors can
sit and absorb history they learned on one of our self-guided tours.
The West Courtyard
provides a reset—something grounding after moving through
interior spaces. Visitors can chat with companions, scroll through photos, or just sit in silence.
Hotel de Paris Museum is a member of the American Alliance
of Museums (AAM), which advocates for museums to function as “community anchors” that
provide spaces for rest, reflection, and emotional processing. Therefore, Hotel de Paris Museum has upgraded
and reopened its West Courtyard as a quiet zone to help reduce sensory
overload, and to facilitate and support visitor well-being and inclusion in a calm space.
Our West Courtyard enhances the visitor experience by
providing a physical and psychological break from the museum’s dense Victorian interiors
to a serene, open-air environment that allows self-reflection and healing. For
those seeking rest and reflection, it offers a “secret garden” atmosphere that
contrasts with the detailed indoor tour.
After 1901, the courtyard transitioned from work to relaxation. Photographs show members of the Burkholder Family enjoying the sun-drenched, private space.
In addition, our West Courtyard seating encourages visitors
to slow down and connect more deeply with Louis Dupuy’s story of reinvention
and second-chances. According to AAM, 4 out of 5 museum-goers
are looking for a place to sit, relax, and decompress; therefore, our courtyard delivers
exactly that in a setting that feels intentional and restorative.Framed by historic architecture and
thoughtfully furnished, the space invites visitors to pause while touring,
reflect on what they’ve experienced, or simply take a breath.
Initially a commercial tenant, restaurateur and hotelier Louis
Dupuy sought to elevate and convert Delmonico Bakery, which occupied the Powers
Building on Alpine Street (now 6th Street), into a first-class
French restaurant.This transformation would
require a setting deserving his reputation as best cook in the Colorado Territory
and his interest in selling French flair in one of the West’s most famous and
bustling silver mining camps.
As a tenant, Dupuy’s ability to adapt the building was limited or not allowed; therefore, he purchased the Powers
Building with intent to expand and remodel the restaurant dining room and add a
large commercial kitchen.
A $200-$300 reward (approximately $4,332-$6,498 USD in 2020)Dupuy earned for his heroism in saving lives in a mining accident some
years before would have been used to take over the bakery, establish Hotel de
Paris, and move overseas family members Sophie and Jean-Antoine Gally to Colorado
for staffing Dupuy’s venture.
Joshua Monti
By January 1877, a combination of items (perhaps left by bakery operators and added to by Dupuy) resulted in the following list of movable
personal property included in the document “Chat. (Chattel) Mort. (Mortgage)/Louis
Dupuy/To/Joshua Monti” from Book 42, Page 202 and Book 37, Page 405:
·15
beds and bedding clothes ·10
silver dinner casters ·Cream,
sugar, and butter stands ·54 pans
and cooking utensils ·10 dozen
glasses ·10
dozen plates ·10
dozen cups and saucers ·10
dozen dishes ·20
carpets ·12
cases of different wines ·A small
house and laundry ·8 chandeliers ·All other
furniture, appliances and utensils used in carrying on the hotel business
Probably in conversation among merchants along Alpine
Street (a popular pastime even today), Dupuy and Joshua Monti (a Swiss
immigrant who ran a neighboring bakery and grocery store) discussed a business
agreement and entered a financial arrangement.
The Monti Block contained a bakery and grocery
Dupuy sought to mortgage assets (chattel) of his hotel for $700 (approximately $17,328 USD in 2020) plus 1/4 interest ($17.50) to raise money towards purchasing
the Powers Building for $1,250 (approximately $30,943 USD in 2020). If Dupuy failed to pay the loan off, his restaurant
and hotel furnishings could easily be used by Monti in his myriad business
ventures, and Monti would gain from the elimination of Dupuy’s competition (like Dupuy, Monti sold food, wine,
liquors, and cigars); however, the mortgage stipulated Dupuy's possessions would be confiscated and sold if the loan and interest were not paid back in six months (June 29, 1877).
An important factor in Dupuy’s desire to own the Powers
Building and expand his restaurant was the imminent arrival of the Colorado
Central Railroad to Georgetown on August 1, 1877.The welcoming crowd numbered an estimated
8,000 people, which to a restaurateur translates into many potential customers
and countless gourmet meals and bottles of imported wines.
Dupuy experienced highs and lows in 1878.About this time, he proposed marriage to Eda Bryant; Dupuy’s proposal was refused.We may never know if Dupuy was
trying to impress Eda with his entrepreneurship or simply trying to distract himself
from a broken heart, but after successfully raising $1,250 Louis Dupuy
purchased the Powers Building on the West ½ of Lot 3 in Block 20 from Edward R.
Powers.
Gentlemen, I love these mountains and I
love America, but you will pardon me if I bring into this community a
remembrance of my youth and my country.To have the human name preserved has ever been, not only the desire, but
one of the illusions of my race, and will doubtless always be.
Mausoleums are built and tablets hewn for
the purpose of binding memory, the fact of a life.
In the very earliest of Hindu mythology
the milk of the sea was mystically churned to make the amrita, which gave
immortality; and all the literature since, bears trace of similar fancies.This desire to be remembered, that our dust
shall retain the tender regard of those whom we leave behind, that the spot
where it shall lie will be remembered with a kind of soothing reverence, that
our children will visit it in the midst of their sorrows, and our kindred, in
after times, will find that a local inspiration hovers round it, has been one
of the most potent forces in the history of men.It created literature, architecture, and the
art of war; it built pyramids, started the crusades, discovered, penetrated and
peopled America.
And so, my friends, this house will be my
tomb…and if, in after years, someone comes and calls for Louis Dupuy, show them
this little souvenir of Alençon which I built in America, and they will
understand.
In 1975, portions of Dupuy’s speech were repeated by journalist
Charles Kuralt during a CBS Television episode of “On the Road.”
Hotel de Paris Museum’s affiliation with the National Trust for Historic Preservation is helping build a preservation movement.As a site of the National Trust, I recently participated in a cross-divisional meeting of the Trust’s senior staff.HdPM has a seat at the table when it comes to discussions about how to integrate the Trust’s historic sites into the overall work of the Trust.
Hotel de Paris Museum is involved in a project known as “Innovation Lab,” which is working to re-imagine historic sites by probing deeper into the topic of sites integration into the Trust and its efforts to make the organization ten times more effective.The work Hotel de Paris Museum and the National Trust are engaged in is, in the words of Executive Vice President and Chief Preservation Officer David J. Brown, “… thoughtful, forward looking, serious in tone, yet reflective of our values of collaboration and innovation with the goal of making a difference.”
Over the last couple of years, HdPM has worked to unfreeze history and embrace its dynamism.Instead of being stagnate, we are accentuating multiple points of view to tell a wider range of stories that reflect the diversity of American history.We believe this layered approach creates a larger audience for the museum and broadens our base of support.
The removal of physical barriers, development of secondary stories, distribution of information beyond our “period of significance,” and participation of our visitors in the tour experience have all begun to change the traditional house museum model found at HdPM just a few years ago.Our tours are more vibrant and engage the senses beyond sight, to include sound, touch, and sentiment.
Hotel de Paris Museum is an ideal stage for the Innovation Lab.Our small size allows us to be nimble and move forward with strategic ideas.This shift in preservation thoughts and practices, and implementation of “active engagement” has been well-received by the public and is increasing HdPM’s on-site visitation, on-line visitation, museum shop sales, and donations.
Without taking a formal poll of our visitors, most of us at Hotel de Paris Museum would agree the public's favorite object on exhibit would be the salesman’s bed (a folding bed that when stowed looks like a desk).However, there is another object that also receives regular inquiries from around the United States and even Europe.The surprising thing is that the other object is not on display and has no direct association with Hotel de Paris.
Then why are people calling and writing us about it, you wonder?
They are contacting us because they have found a Hotel de Paris bawdy house or brothel token. However, Hotel de Paris was neither a bawdy house nor a brothel, but, in fact, the finest hotel in town.Brothels existed in Georgetown, but they were on the far side of Clear Creek Valley from the hotel (about four blocks distant).There, a person would have been able to find the pistol-toting madame Martha “Mattie” Silks running a fancy parlor house on Brownell Street.
Mattie Silks
The Hotel de Paris tokens are popular, and examples have spread across the country and around the world.According to people who have contacted us, many fobs have been found in trash dumps, recycling centers, dresser drawers, or jewelry boxes.
The Hotel de Paris version is known as a “fantasy token” and seems to have been offered as a keepsake souvenir or for collectors of bawdy house and brothel tokens.Presently, the value of one of these tokens is less than $20.
Tokens are often about the size and shape of a silver dollar.
Unlike many tokens that are the shape and size of a silver dollar, the Hotel de Paris token was executed in the form of a key fob.It is cast or struck metal, weighty, oblong, squared off at one end, and rounded at the other.Ornamental motifs include banners, ribbons, four-petal flowers, and what may be a compass. All lettering is capitalized.
Hotel de Paris fantasy tokens (front and back)
The fobs are high-quality, which adds to the perception they are authentic and original to the hotel. In addition, there is a wide range of variation in the color (from bright brass to black) and clarity of script (well-defined to indistinct). The front of the fob reads “FROM HOTEL DE PARIS,” “LOUIS DUPUY,” “GOOD FOR 24 HOURS,” and “GEORGETOWN, COLO.”The back of the fob reads “WINE, WOMEN AND SONG,” “FIRST CLASS,” “ONE HIGH CLASS LAY,” and “MADAME SOPHIE’S MOTTO SATISFACTION GUARANTEED.”
Also on the front, barely decipherable are the words “COLO. MINTING CO. 1894” (this may or may not be the manufacturer). The date would have been during Louis' lifetime, further ruling out the likelihood that the claims were true.Like the use of real names, the phrase “first class” (most likely lifted directly from a familiar advertisement placed by Louis Dupuy) adds to the perception the token is real.
Print advertisement placed by Louis Dupuy
In contrast, authentic Hotel de Paris key fobs were not promotional in nature, but plain and practical.Fobs original to the site read simply “HOTEL DE PARIS,” followed by a room number (1-14), “IF CARRIED AWAY RETURN UNSEALED BY MAIL POSTAGE 3 CENTS,” and “GEORGETOWN, COLO.” They had plain backs and were stamped from sheet metal.
Sophie Gally, Room 3
Louis Dupuy, Room 14
Sophie Gally’s and Louis Dupuy’s fobs have survived and are part of the museum’s collection of over 5,000 authentic artifacts original to the site.For a time, brass reproductions of Louis’ fob were produced by The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Colorado and sold at This Little Souvenir Museum Shop, located in Hotel de Paris Museum.
We have yet to be contacted by anyone who has found or acquired one of Louis’ original key fobs.However, we’ll keep our fingers crossed that if a key was “carried away” it will find its way back to Georgetown. Please consider making a tax deductible contribution at hoteldeparismuseum.org.
With all of the potential exposure photographers could offer us on their websites, blogs, and social media sites, the staff and advisors of Hotel de Paris Museum made the difficult decision to not allow photography, filming, or recording by non-commercial visitors.
Loss of a revenue stream (the sale of officially sanctioned images) was not a factor for us.The policy protects the museum’s intellectual property, light-sensitive artifacts, tour aesthetics, and security.In addition, it helps prevent the stalking of visitors, volunteers, and staff.
