El Garces Hotel

950 Front St., Needles, CA
Phone:

East < GO > West

The El Garces Hotel and Depot opened in 1908 and was considered "the Crown Jewel" of the Fred Harvey chain. The lunchroom had two horseshoe-shaped counters that could serve 140 people. In 1949 El Graces closed as a Harvey House but was used as a Santa Fe Railway offices until 1988.

In 1993 a group was formed as the Friends of El Garces and petitioned the City of Needles to purchase it. They succeeded in 1999 and in the Spring of 2014 it is scheduled to open as a intermodal transportation facility..

The building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2002.

This canon and marker commemorate those who served in WWI in 1917 & 1918.

If you're on Broadway and see this sign, you're one block away from the El Garces, eastbound turn left, westbound turn right.

These train cars are a block west of El Garces at a parking area. There's no signage, but no tracks beyond the train cars. So it is probably a railroad historic display of some sort.

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Vintage Advertising Highlights

Fred Harvey
Hotel - Shops - Restaurants
El Garces, the Fred Harvey Hotel at Needles, California, is named after Padre Francisco Garces, a noted Spanish priest who made several journeys through this region in 1771 and 1774 en route between the California Mission and Southern Arizona.

NOTE: It's nice that the card tells us how the place was named, but a few words about the hotel itself would have been nice. You know, how many rooms, cafe hours, maybe an address, etc.

Photo(s): 2009