The White House Hotel

Evergreen’s History as a Winter Resort

The White House Hotel is a wood-frame two-story building located in Evergreen, Alabama, and remains one of the last remnants of Evergreen’s past as a winter retreat. The expansion of the southern railroad transformed Evergreen into a popular winter resort for Northerners between 1890 and 1920. Like other regional hubs such as Thomasville, Georgia, Evergreen capitalized on its moderate weather, mineral springs, and the purported health benefits of its pine forests.

One of the first tourist hotels in the city was the Evergreen Hotel, located on the corner of Rural and West Front Streets. On November 7, 1895, every business and house located on the east side of the railroad was destroyed by fire. Five days later, all the houses and businesses on the west side burned down as well, including the Evergreen Hotel. It was rebuilt on the same site, described as a “one-story building with a wide spacious gallery extending across the front with a fancy balustrade…”

The White House Hotel

The White House Hotel on Desplous Street was built in 1908 and owned by James Feagin Jones, the district attorney for Conecuh County. He was born on April 12, 1853, near Brooklyn, Alabama, and lived in Evergreen for 25 years before he died in 1917.

The White House formally opened to the public on March 21, 1908. It was described as a “home-like place for the traveling public” featuring all the modern conveniences of the time. According to a 1909 advertisement, it was comprised of “12 rooms beside kitchen/dining facilities, screened, and within 100 yards of the central depot, reasonable terms.” Another advertisement in 1914 had rates at $1 per day and $18 per month. The hotel also offered home-cooked meals for 25 cents.

Decline

While the town supported four hotels and various boarding houses at its peak in 1910, the industry shifted in the 1920s. As travelers began favoring the warmer, newly accessible climates of southern Florida and the “mineral water” craze declined, Evergreen’s hospitality sector shrank. By 1927, all but two of the hotels, one of them only half as large as originally, seemed to have vanished from the town plan.

The old Evergreen Hotel burned down in 1956, suffering a similar fate as its predecessor. The former Sewell Hotel stood on the corner of East Front and Mill Streets until the late 2000s, when it was demolished. The White House Hotel is the only original hotel building that remains in the downtown district. Since then, it has served as a boarding house and a private residence. In 1994, it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a contributing structure of the New Evergreen Commercial Historic District.

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