PDF Download: Preservation Chicago’s 2005 Chicago 7 Most Endangered Booklet
Not only was it the city’s oldest continually-operating hotel building, Hotel Dana, 666 N. State, was also one of the oldest hotel structures still standing in Chicago. Built in 1891 as the Erie Hotel, the Queen Anne-style flat building remained remarkably intact, the only one of Chicago’s early hotel buildings not to have undergone significant alteration. Furthermore, the five-and-one-half-story Hotel Dana was one of the few grandly-scaled Queen Anne structures left in Chicago, where once there were many.
With redevelopment on all sides, the Hotel Dana occupied a prime River North location. A surface parking lot occupied the site to the north, while a small Victorian house sat to the south. That combination put incredible pressure on the Hotel Dana as a potential candidate for demolition.
Update:Preservation Chicago had advocated for the preservation of the Dana Hotel since 2001. However, despite its Orange rating, city officials expressed absolutely no opposition to the building being demolished. Today, a sleekly modern glass and concrete hotel sits on the site. Its name…The Hotel Dana.