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| (Courtesy the Museum of the City of New York) |
Click to listen to:Guy Lombardo's Orchestra playing at the Roosevelt Hotel while you read!
When my parents moved from St. Louis to New York, they first stayed for two weeks at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City. This grand hotel stood (and still stands) at 45 East 45th Street and Madison Avenue. The hotel, named for President Roosevelt, originally opened in 1924.
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| (Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York) |
The hotel was right next to Grand Central Station and at the time had an underground passage accessing the train station. I can imagine Gary and Pauline arriving on the train and entering the lobby of this elegant hotel for the first time.
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| (Courtesy of the Roosevelt Hotel) |
This was a convenient place for them to stay; it was situated only half a mile from where Gary worked in the RCA building at Rockefeller Center- so he had just a short walk to work. Many New York attractions were within easy walking distance; shopping on Fifth Avenue, Radio City Music Hall, the Broadway Theater District, Times Square, and Central Park were all within a mile of the hotel. Pauline could explore NYC to her heart's content during her first few weeks in the city.
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| (Courtesy of the Roosevelt Hotel) |
The Roosevelt Grill provided elegant music, dancing, and dining. Guy Lombardo's orchestra performed at the Grill. Music was piped into the hotel rooms live through the hotel's radio broadcasting system.
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| (Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York) |
A note of interest: the playing of "Auld Lang Syne" on New Years Eve is credited to Guy Lombardo who chose this song to perform on a radio broadcast from the Roosevelt Hotel shortly before midnight on New Year's Eve 1929. He then continued the tradition every year afterward for many years to come.
Lawrence Welk also began his career in the Roosevelt Grill in the summers when Lombardo moved his show out to Long Island. My parents were avid fans of the Lawrence Welk show when it came to television!
Pauline and Gary had an exciting start to their life in New York!
