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Historic place

Hotel Alex Johnson

523 6th Street, Rapid City, SD

A railroad executive's Tudor-Revival skyscraper hotel broke ground one day before work started on Mount Rushmore, and its Room 812 still keeps a logbook of guest ghost sightings.

📅 1928–present🏛️ HotelStill hereBuilt 1928
Open on the mapSlide back to 1928
Hotel Alex Johnson, 523 6th Street, Rapid City, SD
Hotel Alex Johnson, Rapid City · Quintin Soloviev, CC BY 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

The story

Built by Alex Carlton Johnson, a vice president of the Chicago & North Western Railroad, construction began August 19, 1927 — one day before groundbreaking on Mount Rushmore — and the eight-story hotel opened July 1, 1928, pairing a Germanic/Tudor exterior with Western and Lakota-inspired interiors. Alfred Hitchcock filmed "North by Northwest" sequences here in 1958-59, reportedly staying with Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint. Room 812's "Lady in White" ghost story is enough of a fixture that the hotel sells a paranormal-investigation package. It operates today in Hilton's Curio Collection.

Everything that was here

Did you know?

It broke ground August 19, 1927 — literally one day before Borglum began Mount Rushmore.
Hitchcock filmed "North by Northwest" here and reportedly stayed with Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint.
Room 812's ghost legend is marketed with an EMF-reader "Ghost Adventure" package.

Connected places

Dinosaur Park

Rapid City, SD
Mount Rushmore

Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox

Bemidji, MN
Mount Rushmore

Crazy Horse Memorial

Crazy Horse, SD
Mount Rushmore

Iron Mountain Road

Keystone, SD
Mount Rushmore

Flintstones Bedrock City

Custer, SD
Mount Rushmore

Chasen's Restaurant

Los Angeles, CA
Alfred Hitchcock

Explore the full web of connections on the map.

Nearby history

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Sourceshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel_Alex_Johnson