The Hotel Plaza
The Hotel Plaza was built at Fifth and Cooper Street in 1927, and was originally called the Plaza Club Hotel. In 1947 it underwent a complete remodeling. Hotel owner S.N. Petchers of New York explained that the high cost of modernization was “justified in my belief that Camden will continue one of the leading industrial cities in the country and entitled to the kind of top flight hotel service we provide.”
S.N. Petchers undertook another modernization in the summer of 1950.
The hotel featured banquet and meeting rooms, a bar known at different times as the Plaza Hotel Bar and the Lantern Lounge, The Cornerstone dining room, and a coffee shop.
The Hotel Plaza closed in 1985. For almost 30 years it stood empty, with various redevelopment schemes proposed every now and then The old hotel was finally demolished in February of 2014. Like the nearby Parkade Building, which had been taken down a couple of years earlier, the Plaza’s razing was far more a symptom of Camden’s reality than an event marking a new day of progress.
Many thanks to Beatrice Caraballo for information provided concerning the Hotel Plaza.
Plaza Hotel, 2002
Plaza Hotel, 2002.
Plaza Club Hotel Postcard
Postcard — 1935
IN THE HEART OF NEW JERSEY’S COLONIAL AND REVOLUTIONARY LANDMARKS, INTERESTING FOLDER AND ROAD MAP ON REQUEST.
Plaza Club Restaurant and Coffee Shop (Advertisement)
Camden Courier-Post —
PLAZA CLUB
Restaurant and Coffee Shop
UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT
H. ZELLER
5th and Cooper Sts.
Automobile Club of Southern New Jersey (Advertisement)
Camden Courier-Post —
[emblem:] THE AUTOMOBILE CLUB OF SOUTHERN NEW JERSEY, AAA
World’s Largest Motor Federation
“Over a Million Members”
Plaza Hotel, Camden, N. J.
Hotel Cook Is Robbed of His Wallet and $30
Camden Courier-Post —
John D. Fague, a cook at the Plaza Club Hotel, reported to the police yesterday that a wallet containing $30 and his automobile driver’s license was taken from his trousers while he was changing clothes at the hotel.
Fague said that preparatory to leaving Thursday night he put the wallet in a pair of old trousers and put them in a locker. He was two blocks away, he declared, when he discovered he had not taken his wallet. When he returned the wallet was gone.
Farewell Party
Camden Courier-Post —
Mrs. David Hormats, of 1468 Belleview Avenue, who with her family leaves shortly to make her future home in Los Angeles, California was the honor guest at a farewell luncheon and brIdge given on Tuesday at the Plaza Hotel by the following: Mrs. Louis Rosenberg, Mrs. Herman Kaplan, Mrs. Morris Abrams, Mrs. Phillip Rosenfeld, Mrs. Isadore Kahlowsky, Mrs. Herman Rosenberg, Mrs. Stanley Levy and Mrs. Julius Rosenberg.
Alpha Gamma Frat Has Banquet Tonight
Camden Courier-Post —
Beta Rho Chapter of Alpha Gamma Sigma Fraternity will hold its annual banquet tonight in the Plaza Hotel. The speaker will be Herbert R. Ferguson, chairman of the national organization committee. Ferguson will present awards to retiring officers.
Those to receive awards are Perry Conant, Alpha; Edward Harris, Beta; Edward McGarrigan, Sigma; Philemon Rickett Gamma, and Nelson Hodges, Chi.
Plaza Club Hotel Sunday Dinner (Advertisement)
Camden Courier-Post —
SUNDAY DINNER
75c Children Half Price
Exceptionally well-prepared dishes, served in congenial, home-like surroundings . . . under direct supervision of the Hotel Management . . Main Dining Room . . . Bring your family tomorrow.
FRANK W. DAWSON, Steward.
“The Friendly Inn”
PLAZA CLUB HOTEL, FIFTH AND COOPER . . . . CAMDEN
The Plaza in Camden (Advertisement)
Camden Courier-Post —
DOLLARS [?]
MINUTES [?]
COMFORTS [?] [script across the three lines:] Gained
For comfortable living come to Camden’s new Plaza Hotel . . . where you save many precious minutes of traveling each day (five minutes by new subway from the center of Philadelphia) . . . where rates are astonishingly low, single rooms $6 to $12 weekly . . . where you’ve every convenience. Phone us about rooms available.
The PLAZA in Camden, AT 5TH & COOPER STS.
Hotel Plaza, About 1950
Hotel Plaza, about 1950.
Plaza Hotel to Be Further Modernized As Proof of Owner’s Faith in Camden
Camden Courier-Post —
S. N. Petchers Says Progress Justifies Heavy Expenditure
Firm belief that Camden will continue to be one of the leading industrial cities of the nation is responsible for the complete renovation and modernizing of the Plaza hotel, Fifth and Cooper streets, S. N. Petchers, its owner, disclosed today.
Petchers, who acquired the popular hotel in 1943, said that during the last year, installation of a modernistic coffee shop, cocktail lounge and lobby has been completed. In recent months, guest rooms on the second and fifth floors have been completely refurbished, additional baths installed and corridors newly carpeted.
Under the direction of Robert Benzwi, manager of the hotel, other floors are to undergo similar improvements this summer, Petchers said, until the entire hotel has been given a complete overhauling.
Parleys On Improvements
Petchers, who is leaving next week for a vacation in Europe and the Far East, said that Benzwi is consulting with Hal J. Langdon, associate manager, and David Epstein, Camden attorney and counsel for the hotel, in the various improvements being made. Additional rooms on the first floor are to be air-conditioned and made available for banquets and other public functions, Petchers said.
“Since my connection with the Plaza hotel,” Petchers said, “I have come to like the city of Camden and its people very much. I am proud our hotel is giving the kind of service it does to the community.
“We are constantly striving to improve our service so that Camden can continue to be proud of the Plaza. We are constantly striving to keep our operations going for the benefit of the community.
“During the past year we have had the first floor done over completely and today we believe we have one of the finest coffee shops, with a completely modern kitchen and most elaborate cocktail lounge to be found in the entire area.
Justifies Heavy Spending
“All of this has required heavy expenditures but all of it is justified in my belief that Camden will continue one of the leading industrial cities of the country and is entitled to the kind of top flight hotel service we provide.”
In addition to the Plaza hotel here, Petchers also owns the Hotel Irvin in New York, as well as having extensive real estate holdings in New York, Westchester and Long Island, as well as theatre properties in Los Angeles, Calif., and elsewhere on the western coast.
Hotel Plaza Rate Card
Hotel Plaza rate card — 1950s
GUEST PARKING AREA
Hotel Plaza
Phone EMerson 5-4400
5th & COOPER STREETS, CAMDEN, N. J.
OUR RATES
Single Room with Private Bath ........ from $ 5.00
Double Bed (2 persons) Private Bath ..... “ 7.00
Twin Beds with Private Bath ............ “ 10.00
Single Suite (Parlor, Bedroom, Priv. Bath). “ 10.50
Twin Bed Suite (Parlor, Bdrm., Priv. Bath). “ 15.00
Triple Bedroom (3 persons) Private Bath... “ 12.00
BANQUET & MEETING ROOMS
RESTAURANT-COCKTAIL LOUNGE
MOST ROOMS WITH TV & AIR CONDITIONED
FAMILY PLAN (children are free with parents)
COURTEOUS STAFF TO SERVE YOUR NEEDS
FREE PARKING — SIDE OF HOTEL
Emma Sieber Hat Label, Plaza Hotel
Hat label — undated
Emma Sieber
116 N. 5TH ST. CAMDEN, N.J. PLAZA HOTEL
Notes: The Plaza Motor Hotel Envelope
The car in the logo is an early 1960s Cadillac, and the inclusion of a zip code in the address line also dates the envelope.
The Plaza Motor Hotel Envelope
Hotel envelope — 1960s
The PLAZA MOTOR HOTEL
COOPER, FIFTH & MARKET STS. • CAMDEN, N. J. 08102
Plaza Hotel, 2002
Plaza Hotel, 2002.
Plaza Motor Hotel Breakfast Menu
Hotel menu — about 1964
COVER
PLAZA MOTOR HOTEL
COOPER, FIFTH & MARKET STREETS • CAMDEN, N. J. 08102
PHONE 365-4400 [?]
CORNERSTONE DINING ROOM
LANTERN LOUNGE
COFFEE SHOP
Birthdays, Weddings, Holidays, Banquets, Special Parties
FREE PARKING
“HOSPITALITY PLUS”
A la Carte
JUICES Tomato, Grapefruit, Orange .25 & .45
Cinnamon Buns .35. Pastry .30. Fresh Fruit Cup .45. Cold Cereals .35. Half Grapefruit .40. Hot Cereals .40. Doughnuts .15. Tea or Coffee .20. Muffins .25. Milk or Sanka .25.
Breakfasts
1. ONE EGG (Any Style) Home Fries .80 — TOAST, TEA OR COFFEE
2. FRUIT JUICE. ONE EGG (Any Style) Home Fries 1.25 — Choice of (1) HAM - BACON - SAUSAGE - SCRAPPLE OR PORK ROLL — TOAST, TEA OR COFFEE
3. HOT CAKES WITH BUTTER AND SYRUP .90 — TEA OR COFFEE
4. FRUIT JUICE. HOT CAKES WITH BUTTER AND SYRUP 1.50 — Choice of (1) HAM - BACON - SAUSAGE - SCRAPPLE OR PORK ROLL — TEA OR COFFEE
5. TWO EGGS (Any Style) HOME FRIES 1.00 — TOAST, TEA OR COFFEE
6. FRUIT JUICE. TWO EGGS (Any Style) HOME FRIES 1.50 — Choice of (1) HAM - BACON - SAUSAGE - SCRAPPLE OR PORK ROLL — TEA OR COFFEE
7. FRENCH TOAST WITH BUTTER AND SYRUP 1.10 — TEA OR COFFEE
8. FRUIT JUICE. FRENCH TOAST WITH BUTTER AND SYRUP 1.50 — Choice of (1) HAM - BACON - SAUSAGE - SCRAPPLE OR PORK ROLL — TEA OR COFFEE
9. FRUIT JUICE. CREAMED CHIPPED BEEF ON TOAST 1.60 — HOME FRIES, TEA OR COFFEE
Breakfast Specials
FOR THE HEARTY EATER
A. FRUIT JUICE. GRILLED HAM STEAK — HOME FRIES, TOAST, TEA OR COFFEE — $1.75
B. FRUIT JUICE. CLUB SIRLOIN STEAK — HOME FRIES, TOAST, TEA OR COFFEE — $2.75
Plaza Hotel, 2002
Plaza Hotel, 2002.
In a Faded City, Plans to Build a Hotel Build Hope
New York Times —
By KAREEM FAHIM
CAMDEN, N.J. — The old Plaza Hotel downtown is a tomb, sealed shut for more than 20 years now, its windows shattered and its green marquee worn and stripped of letters.
Trapped inside the hotel are the memories of a once-thriving industrial town, where business people and job seekers and even the occasional entertainer came to visit and dine. Since it closed in 1985, the hotel, battered by the city’s decline, seemed to deliver a warning: Camden was not a place to linger after dark, not a place one stayed. But a group of developers is seeking the planning board’s approval this week for a 140-room Hilton Garden Inn on Camden’s waterfront, what would be the first new hotel built here in about 70 years.
“We want to get in at a time when there are things to be done here,” said Vijnan Chandra, of PRA Development and Management, the Philadelphia-based company that would build the Hilton. “We don’t paint Camden with a broad brush. This signals to the public that the city is open for business.”
For a city struggling to revitalize, a hotel is a signature, a symbol. It suggests there is a critical mass of tourists — in Camden’s case, lured by a new aquarium and a minor-league baseball team — and supporters of the new hotel say that Camden, offering tax breaks and cheap rents, has started to lure businesses again, too, and that there are not enough hotel rooms in Philadelphia, a 10-minute drive over the river, to house the new visitors.
“A hotel can start to leverage quite a bit,” said William H. Hudnut III, a senior resident fellow at the Urban Land Institute, an education and research group in Washington, D.C. “It brings people, and it brings rooftops — restaurants, bars and eateries. One hotel won’t do the trick, but it’s certainly a positive piece in the jigsaw.”
In the years since the Plaza closed, the business that thrived here was the drug trade, and the superlatives thrown at Camden usually concerned its status as one of the nation’s poorest or most dangerous cities. Thousands of residents have left the city, leaving behind neighborhoods of boarded-up row houses and empty lots. For those people who have remained, there are few comforts: no supermarkets or movie theaters, and, for a generation, no hotel rooms.
Camden was a different place in the 1930s and 1940s, when employers like Campbell Soup, RCA Victor and New York Shipbuilding Corporation made the city, positioned strategically on the Delaware River, a center of industry. Several hotels operated here over the years, including the Walt Whitman Hotel, where Red Skelton is said to have requested a room on the second floor, so he could lower his dog, rather than walk it, according to Paul W. Schopp, a local historian.
The hotels were not just way stations for businessmen and itinerant salespeople, Mr. Schopp said; the region was considered a “mecca for the jazz supper clubs,” and entertainers would stop in Camden as well.
The Plaza was a business hotel, where professionals who worked on Cooper Street would gather for lunch. The Walt Whitman was the scene of the city’s fancier soirees, where M. Allan Vogelson, a retired judge, saw several friends get married.
“Our high school fraternity had its annual sweetheart ball there,” recalled Judge Vogelson, who grew up in Camden. “The Walt Whitman brings back wonderful memories. It was a different time for Camden.”
By the time the Rev. Michael Doyle arrived in Camden in the late 1960s, middle-class residents had begun fleeing the city, an exodus that accelerated after race riots in 1971. He found that the city’s shoreline — its great treasure — was “gobbled up by crude industry,” Father Doyle said.
“I remember walking through abandoned factories and sumac trees to get to that river,” he said.
Efforts to revive Camden have focused on that waterfront, and in the last two decades, large swaths of the riverfront property under the Benjamin Franklin Bridge have been transformed, with new office buildings, an aquarium, a concert hall and upscale apartments. About nine months ago, a developer was found for the hotel, according to Thomas P. Corcoran, the president of Cooper’s Ferry Development Association, the master developer of the waterfront.
The five-story hotel, with an indoor pool, would cater to several different kinds of travelers, Mr. Corcoran said, including business people and visitors to Campbell Soup, Cooper University Hospital and Rutgers University’s satellite campus here. The developers also hope to lure families visiting the waterfront’s entertainment attractions, as well as visitors to a new convention center in Philadelphia, where hotel rooms can cost far more than the Hilton’s planned rate of $125 per night. Mr. Corcoran said that rock stars playing the concert hall, the Susquehanna Bank Center, usually stay at the Four Seasons in Philadelphia, but their road crews could stay at the proposed Hilton.
Several hurdles remain, he said, including gaining approval from the local planning board and obtaining large bank loans in a weakening economy.
Talk of the new hotel could revive the debate about the revitalization process here. Community activists have complained that Camden’s beleaguered neighborhoods have garnered far less attention from developers than the waterfront, and they worry that the riverfront is becoming an enclave — an annex to Philadelphia — rather than part of Camden.
But Mr. Corcoran said that the waterfront plan was designed to be an extension of Camden’s downtown, and not a “gated community.” Projects like the hotel, he added, also promised to bring the city badly needed tax revenues.
Father Doyle is among those working to restore Camden’s neighborhoods, and last month an organization affiliated with his church, Sacred Heart, broke ground on a new community theater. That new building gained far less attention than the plans for the new hotel, but Father Doyle and several people involved in the project say that it is no less important, and will be the first theater for live performances to be built in the city in decades. None of that diminished the pastor’s enthusiasm for the new Hilton. “It’s a long time since I walked through that sumac,” he said. “I want to go in that hotel, hold a glass of wine and look across that river.”
Hotel Plaza, 1950s
Hotel Plaza neighborhood, 1950s.
Hotel Plaza Demolition
Hotel Plaza demolition, February 8, 2014.