Roger Smith Hotel
building in Manhattan, New York City
The Roger Smith Hotel was a family-run hotel established in 1929 and located at 501 Lexington Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City.
History
The hotel was built as part of a chain of Roger Smith Hotels. The Roger Smith Corporation opened the first Roger Smith hotel in Stamford, Connecticut on December 29, 1928 with Frederick Charlton as its first manager. They went on to add seven other hotels to the chain over the next ten years. The Elton Hotel in Waterbury, Connecticut, was a Roger Smith property when John F. Kennedy made an important campaign stop there November 6, 1960, just before his election. The Stamford branch was demolished in 1981. The Roger Smith Corporation bought the Behriont Hotel, located in White Plains, New York, and Hotel Brittany in 1931. The Brewster Hotel and the Hotel Cameron were acquired in 1934. Other hotels were added to the Roger Smith chain in Holyoke, Massachusetts in 1937, New Brunswick, New Jersey and Washington, D.C.
The current Roger Smith Hotel, located on 47th Street and Lexington Avenue in Manhattan, was taken over by the Roger Smith Corporation in 1938. Prior to that it was called the Hotel Winthrop, whose building had been constructed by Hearn & Erich in 1926.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Roger Smith Hotel” is building in Manhattan, New York City. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Roger, Smith and Hotel, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “building in Manhattan, New York City” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Place names and jurisdictional language are key evidence: both can reveal earlier catalogue descriptions and overlooked record series. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q18156930. Authority coordinates are 40.755, -73.973. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1929, 1928, 1960 and 1981.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
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Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Roger Smith Hotel”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Roger Smith Hotel primary sources, Roger Smith Hotel archive and Roger research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
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Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Roger Smith Hotel” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.