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A Chronological Look at Harvey's Lake
The Lakeside Inn at Warden Place, built in 1914 during the Lake's tourism heyday. A row boat rental facility is shown in the foreground, and the steamboat landing is just visible on the shore at left.
Chapter 3: The Early Hotels
For more than a hundred years Harvey's
Lake thrived as a recreational attraction for visitors from the Wyoming
Valley and beyond. No less than 10 public hotels welcomed guests beginning
in 1855. Many of the historic structures are
now gone--lost primarily to fires and the transition of the Lake
from public playground to private residential community.
Lake House/Rhoads Hotel
The first public hotel, the Lake House, was built at Sunset in 1855. It could accommodate 100 guests and was later expanded. At first, the hotel was served by daily stage coaches from the Valley during the summer. The poor travel conditions prevented the Lake House from being successful until the 1870s, when a retired county sheriff (and bar keeper) purchased the hotel. Renamed the Rhoads Hotel, the facility flourished as increasing trade visited the lake for fishing and boating, spurred by completion of a rail line to the lake in 1887. The Rhoads Hotel burned in January 1908.
Lake Grove House
In 1881 another hotel, but on a lesser scale, the Lake Grove House, was also built at Sunset by Jacob Rice. The Rice family were pioneers in the Dallas-Trucksville area. Among other attractions, the hotel had a reputation for good Bass dinners.
Hotel Oneonta
Ten years later the Lake Grove House was demolished to build the Hotel Oneonta, the Lake's most magnificent building. The hotel was opened in April 1898 at Sunset. The hotel had 70 rooms on three floors with a fourth floor for storage. It had its own electric power plant and was conveniently located below Oneonta Hill where at the hilltop a newly constructed trolley line from the Valley had a station.
The first-class Hotel Oneonta (an Indian name for "place of rest") had elaborate furnishings and decorations and drew patrons from as far as Philadelphia. It's lakefront landing was the major stop for the Lake's steamboat traffic, which carried trolley and hotel passengers around the Lake or to the Picnic Grounds. Major Valley events were held at the Oneonta including a visit by former President Teddy Roosevelt in late August 1912.
In early February 1919 the inadequately insured hotel was totally destroyed by fire. The cause of the fire was not determined, but the mortgage was seriously in arrears at the time.
The Lakeside Inn
The Lakeside Inn was opened in 1914 at the Warden Place landing and operated by Martha Schworm, a popular Lake hostess until her death in 1921. The inn changed ownership several times over the years until it too burnt down in 1978.
Lake Grove House
Hotel Oneonta
Rhoads Hotel