Des Moines · Downtown
Hotel Fort Des Moines
Proudfoot, Bird & Rawson's 1919 hotel, where Woodrow Wilson, Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev all stayed.
- Built
- 1919Built 1918–19 as a hotel; the nomination says the architects' plans and newspaper accounts date construction to 1918–1919, and the hotel opened in 1919.
- Style
- Tall-building design on the classical-column principle (base, plain shaft, decorated capital)
- Architect
- Proudfoot, Bird & Rawson
- Type
- Grand hotel
- Area
- Downtown
- Credentials
- Listed on the National Register of Historic Places
The story
Des Moines businessmen including Frederick C. Hubbell and Clyde Herring promoted the hotel, which the Proudfoot, Bird & Rawson firm designed and which opened in 1919, the same year as the Savery. Its guest rooms sit in a nine-story H-shaped tower above a two-story base of public rooms. Twelve U.S. presidents, among them Woodrow Wilson, Harry S. Truman and John F. Kennedy, stayed here, as did Charles Lindbergh and Nikita Khrushchev. The hotel closed to guests on November 13, 2015 for renovation after its sale to Hawkeye Hotels and reopened in Hilton’s Curio Collection.
Good to know
- Address: 1000 Walnut Street, Des Moines, IA 50309
Sources (2)
Last verified October 2026. Details change; confirm with the inn before you book.