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Presiding over the Puget Sound region, Mount Rainier has lured adventurers and entrepreneurs to its slopes since the earliest settlers. Visitors rode packhorses or hiked miles to tent "hotels" at Theosophy Ridge, Indian Henry's Hunting Ground, and Ohanapecosh. James Longmire opened Longmire Springs Hotel near bubbling mineral springs. In 1899, Mount Rainier became a national park, and eventually, a motley array of services was consolidated by the Rainier National Park Company, which built National Park Inn and Paradise Inn. Roads, services, and activities expanded, and guests poured in. Winter activities, such as skiing and tobogganing, increased the park's popularity. The 1936 Winter Olympic Ski Trials and training for World War II ski troops were even hosted there. Visitors today might be surprised to know that many inns, rental cabins, bathhouses, and other buildings have come and gone, leaving some areas more pristine now than for much of the park's history.

Mary Ann Conklin, also known as "Madame Damnable," ran Seattle's first hotel, the Felker House, which burned to the ground in the Great Seattle Fire of 1889. The Rainier Hotel was erected quickly following the Great Seattle Fire but razed around 1910. The Denny Hotel, an architectural masterpiece later known as the Washington Hotel, was built in 1890 but torn down in 1907 during the massive regrade that flattened Denny Hill. Upon opening in 1909, the Sorrento Hotel was declared a "credit to Seattle" by the Seattle Times. The Olympic Hotel was the place for Seattle's high society throughout the 1920s. The Hotel Kalmar was a workingman's hotel built in 1881 and was razed for the Seattle tollway. The Lincoln Hotel was destroyed by a tragic fire in 1920, along with its rooftop gardens. The famous and grand Seattle Hotel in Pioneer Square was replaced by a "sinking ship" parking garage, thus sparking preservationists to band together to establish Pioneer Square as a historic district.