Join us in a walking tour of Chadron and visit the people and places from your vantage point on the sidewalks of yesteryear.

The walking tour is approximately 2.5 miles long, beginning and ending at the Blaine Hotel. A printed map of the tour is available at the Chadron/Dawes County Area Chamber of Commerce.

1. Blaine Hotel - 159 Bordeaux Street

You begin this tour from Chadron’s most historic starting point, the Blaine Hotel. It is located at the corner of Second and Bordeaux.

In 1893, the contestants in the “Great Cowboy Race” from Chadron to Chicago gathered their horses here for the start, which was signaled by a gunshot fired from a balcony just above the main entrance. The Blaine was Chadron’s finest hotel, having been opened in 1892 with a grand banquet and ballroom. The facility included a dining room, barber shop, billiard room, an elegant bar, and two bath rooms.

This all-brick structure is divided into bays on the exterior by buttress like pilasters that end at the top in corbelled brick “capitals,” upon which rest wide cornices consisting of repeated corbelled brackets topped with capstone (dripstone) moldings. The windows are topped with keystoned shallow arches

2. Olde Main Street Inn - 115 Main Street

At the far end of the block, the three-story building on the west side of Main Street is the Olde Main Street Inn, a bed-and-breakfast, originally built as the Hotel Chadron in 1890 by the O’Hanlon family.

The O’Hanlon family spared no expense in the building of the hotel. A portion of the gold and green wallpaper covered with gazebos, sailing ships, and flora remains to remind us of the early days of elegance, when Brussels carpeting covered the
staircases and guests enjoyed the luxury of marble washstands in each room.

The hotel took on historical significance when it was the headquarters for General Nelson Miles during the Wounded Knee Massacre in late December 1890. The Hotel Chadron was sold by the O’Hanlon’s in the early 1900’s; it then became the Railroad’s Y.M.C.A., where it was hoped that young men could escape the evils of city life.

In 1969, the building was sold to the present owners. Four generations of family members care for and maintain this business.