The West Baden Springs hotel is pretty much my favorite hotel in the entire state of Indiana. Built in 1902, its 6-story atrium was an architectural marvel of the time. (Honestly, it still is, if you ask me.) In the early 20th century up until the day the stock market crashed in '29, anyone who was ANYONE came here to "take the waters" and party like there was no tomorrow.
The history of the place, in a nutshell, is that the founder had been a business partner with the French Lick resort, but had a falling-out, and went a mile down the road and built his own (wooden) hotel for people to come and "take the waters". That burned down, and he decided he wanted to build the grandest dome anyone had ever seen (at least, in North America). Many architects told him he was nuts, but not the bridge architect!
So, the place thrived, and people came by the trainload from all over the place. Famous performers performed, there was So Much Dancing! They didn't want to lose any floor space, so they had a suspended band platform at the top of the dome. (The performers had to climb up there, every night!)
When the stock market crashed, almost overnight, everyone checked out and vanished.
Eventually, it was sold to the Jesuits for a dollar.
The Jesuits turned it into a college, and, being Jesuits, thought that it was Too Fancy. They covered up the fancy paint jobs, and tried to chip up the million and a half or so pieces of the atrium mosaic floor, but found it was too big a task and decided to just leave it and cover it up with carpets, instead.
At some point, the Jesuits sold it to some other independent college, which continued until around the 1980s, and then the whole place just sat derelict for years.
But then... along came Bill Cook, your Friendly Neighborhood Billionaire and Historic Preservation Enthusiast, who poured something like $600 million into its restoration, and, well, West Baden is BACK, baby!
Ludibriumventis