Jacob Etzel Hotel at Fraunces Tavern

Jacob Etzel Hotel at 101 Broad Street "Washington's Headquarters" in the 1880s. Black and white photograph with some colorization. Source: Fraunces Tavern Museum.

Jacob Etzel leased the building, where he operated the old tavern from 1881 to about 1890, offering to board by the week. This picture shows Jacob Etzel to the left of the lamp, standing with the people who were boarding at the time. His wife and child are in one of the first-floor windows. The Etzel family lived in the boarding house alongside its tenants, serving communal meals in the Long Room. Etzel advertised “the best selected Stock of Imported Wines, Liquors and Segars” on small business cards for the tavern.

The J. Grimes Steam & Gas Fitting seen on the left, was a store leased at 54 Pearl Street. On the corner of the building there is a sign of Peter Doelger's Lager Bier. He leased the 101 Broad Street, probably the bar, from Jacob Etzel in 1882 (Real Estate Record, October 7). The address of Jacob Etzel as a registered voter in the City Record Official Journal (October 29, 1884) was 101 Broad Street.

The original building began to be constructed by Etienne de Lancey as a family residence, in 1719. In 1762 it was purchased by Samuel Fraunces that opened the Queen’s Head Tavern, in the place.

Today, the address of the old Fraunces Tavern is 54 Pearl Street. It was renovated in 1890 and restored in 1906-1907 in an attempt to bring the building's design back to how it was in Washington times.