The Tabard Inn

The Tabard Inn. Rugby's Hidden History. , Look across the field toward the left wood line. That is where Rugby's first hotel, the Tabard Inn stood, facing the Clear Fork River below. It was designed by Boston architect George Fuller and completed in 1880, just in time for the October 5 grand opening day of the colony., Here's a description from an early colonist's memoir: "Rugby's Taband Inn, named for the Southwark hostelry from Chancer's Canterbury Tales, assumed the appearance of an English club, with its excellent dining room, billiard tables in the gentlemen's parlor and tennis and croquet on the lawn. The three-story Tabard, with its mansard roof and dormer windows, was entirely encompassed on two floors by spacious, ornamented verandahs, on which the guests could sit and gaze at the mountains or at a bend in the Clear Fork River far below. Among the attractions were the invigorating mountain air and the healthful waters of the springs and deep wells surrounding the hotel. The inn was advertised in the larger cities of America and England as 'a gem in its sphere, where all the luxuries of a city are combined in a quiet home in these favored mountains. The scenery is among the grandest on the continent…the finest trout and bass fishing in the South within a stone's throw of the hotel, musical concerts every afternoon and evening by regularly employed musicians, boating and bathing, refined society, comprising some of the best known families of this country and England.'", Early Rugby newspapers are full of accounts of activities and happenings at the Tabard. Some of the papers list all guests and where they were from, which includes many cities and states across America and several foreign countries., The hotel and the Rugby colony suffered a major crises in the summer of 1881 when typhoid fever broke out. A contaminated cistern near the Tabard turned out to be the source. Seven young Englishman died and many more residents were sickened. The hotel was closed. The December 10, 1881, Rugbeian announced that: "The Hotel Tabard reopened December 1. It has been thoroughly renovated from cellar to dome and a proper supply of water provided for.", Probably the only period when the Tabard was operated with a profit was during Abner Ross's tenure. Ross had operated much larger hotels, such as the Palmer House in Chicago and the Phillips and Merchants Hotels in Dayton, Ohio, and became known to Rugby residents and visitors for his fine dining room and creative hospitality., Take a look at the drawing and photograph shown here, then imagine the Tabard as it was for a time, with long skirted ladies and well-dressed gentlemen enjoying the grounds and the verandahs, horse drawn buggies coming and going from the entrance and residents and guests relaxing on the verandahs for afternoon tea., On October 16, 1884, at a time when the Rugby colony seemed to finally be flourishing, the Tabard Inn caught fire and burned to the ground. It was described in the Rugby paper as a "great conflagration." Led by Robert Walton, colonists carried many furnishings out of the burning hotel. Some survive today in Historic Rugby's ownership including several pieces of furniture seen on tour at Kingstone Lisle, and the original guest registers that show the wide diversity of travelers who found their way to Rugby's Tabard Inn in its heyday., A second Tabard hotel, of imposing Queen Anne style, was completed in 1887, but Rugby's heyday had passed and it was never a financial success. It too burned to the ground in 1899., The Tabard site is on private property., [Captions:] , This drawing of Rugby's Tabard Inn appeared in Harper's Weekly in 1880 shortly after the opening day of the colony., Here is one of only two Tabard Inn photographs currently known. It was found by Historic Rugby's director in a Hughes family photograph album during a 1980s research trip to England. Surely there are more in the possession of descendants of Rugby's early residents and hotel guests.