I just find it so crazy how there are commercials showing something in all it's glory and then you see it now and you cant imagine people being in those spaces
I'm so very glad that there are folks like you Dan, who go in and film these beautiful places with rich histories. Film them before they are leveled and gone forever. I'm sure you already know, but I'll tell you again anyway, what you and Will and others do is extremely important. Thank you so much.
Wow I stayed there with my grandma and grandpa when I was like 12 for 2 weeks. . So amazing to see it again and so sad the others wont ever see it in its prime like I did . I'm 59 now so that was a while back At 3:00 The swimming pool looks small but it was so big in my memory ,again I was a kid then and I spent hours in that pool as my grandmother and grandfather went to spa treatments and hot baths. They tried to get me to go to a few and I chickened out and went to the pool. At 1: 33 I remember going to that soda fountain getting ice cream, free to me LOL was billed to our room at 4;31 that was a mineral water fountain that was always running , it was so cold I drank it all the time and I remember my grandmother telling me if I kept drinking it I would end up on the pot , but it never seemed to bother me that way LOL. At 6:05 I think that was the registration counter when you came in? I remember there was a long bench where 7 or 8 black men wearing red vests, white gloves and a little cap and they would wait to carry your bags. I remember my grandma traveled heavy it took all the guys to take our stuff to our room and I remember my grandma getting mad a grandpa for tipping them $10 to split among themselves . She wanted to give them $2 said in front of them they will leave work and go get drunk now and they all promised her they would stay, They had figured out how she was and went along with it . It was quite comical how they would talk more ,how shall I say blackish ? not trying to offend anyone but with the yessem and the wees be here fo ya ifins yous needs us talk. she gave them bigger tips then. My grandpa was a kind and humble man(from hungary).and loved to set on there bench and talk with them or hours unless grandma caught him, said he would be mistaken for a (n word) if he sat there. all the old black guys would just laugh and giggle (she was an ole alabama gal) nobody seemed offended and were always nice to her and me and grandpa to . Im sure that would not happen now days, it was a different time. To think of it it was a better time. a lot less hate than now It was August then and it was so hot I had to take a washcloth to open the door to her chevy wagon and start the A/C.and let it run for about a half hour. At 8:02 that room looked so familiar ,washroom on the left when you enter and like a small efficiency apartment with small stove and fridge At 15:02 it shows you going out a door to the pool area, I remember getting out of the pool burning my hands on the shinny metal railing at the pool and running like hell for those doors because my feet were burning on the blazing hot concrete . Did I say it got hot down there? LOL So many other things that happened that I now remember from seeing this Thank You Thank You Thank You Dan , You have brought back so many memories
+Earl V Thanks for sharing your memories! Highly appreciated! It really gives me a better color and visual aspect of the place when it was at its prime time and how people interacted with each other back then.
Great you take pride in having a Racist grandma. 🤔😒 And those were great times for you and evidently not great times for people of color. Alot less hate? Omg...delusional!! You are white of you did not experience the hate and bigotry in those times!! Glad you have good memories with you grandparents but remember that it was not so great for the people like the door men or the many others that could not find work except in the service industry because of their skin!!
ALEXX7843 most of us had racists grandmothers. Just the way it was. Can't change her now. He's just reciting history as he experienced it and I find it interesting.
Out of the many explorations you have conducted Dan, this for me was one of the most depressing. To see such a historic structure purposely destroyed by arson makes me extremely sick. With that being said the exploration of it was excellent. Thanks again Dan for opportunity to see such things.
Fascinating! I love how you add music of the motel's heyday, and intersperse the film with actual footage of when the motel was operational. Sad and fascinating at the same time. More dead motel videos please! 🙏😊
I don't visit Hot Springs often and never entered this hotel, but I was furious when I heard about it's devastation. I didn't know it had been allowed to deteriorate so horribly. All kinds of celebrities stayed at the Majestic and it ended up like that? Thanks for documenting it before it was gone forever, Dan.
This hotel had a lot of history before it was forced to be abandoned years ago. It's a sad reminder of how things can change. Why would somebody try to burn it down is hard to understand.
The EXACT. cause of the fire is unknown, the structure of the original yellow brick building was so unsound even before the fire, that the fire chief did not feel safe sending firefighters in during the fire, or investigators after the fire. It started on the The top floor, and the risk of. the floors giving way was too dangerous. The thought is that the fire was set either by kids who were smoking in the building, or a squater set a fire in one of the rooms to stay warm. There is some suspicion about the owner of the property, because he was reluctant to clean up the rubble until the spring of this year when the city took over the property. He had 'intentions' to renovate the property into apartments for several years, but never did, even after the fire. Something happened to a school building he owned in Oklahoma, I think, that burned down after being in his possesion for a long period, but was never updated, and there was a legal battle to clean up that property as well.
It was stated the fire was intentionally set on I believe it was the 5th floor (office space?) They mentioned "Urban Explorers" as a possible cause on the one interview I noted. Any true "Explorer" would never do any intentional damage to property. They tend to take a special interest in not disturbing things..just document...
Kevin Smith I look forward to Googling this, but my guess is it was difficult to keep running financially so they set fire in hopes of getting insurance money. Or sometimes buildings are cheaper to destroy and rebuild than bring up to code. Spreadsheets rule everything.
This video had such a different feeling to it as most I have watched of yours. There was nothing creepy about it at all. I just felt really sad that such a beautiful building had been left to be demolished. Seeing all of that beautiful work it kinda made me compare it to the Titanic. So so sad
Another very enjoyable vid, so sad to see this magnificent building destroyed. Your choice of music, especially the last song, absolutely perfect. Thank you Dan.
Your channel came in handy. I've been watching for years. But now I'm doing my town history.. and two business owners got sick in hot springs alabama and ones health was never the same so he retires, and 10 years later the other passed out at a cafe. Just saw a newspaper ad for this place and I just wanted a glimpse of what this place is. How fantastic you got it all here
I worked down the street from the majestic, ate lunch at Molly's Cafe, visited the auction houses across the street, and climbed the East Mountain Trails to the back and east side of the Hotel. Lots of memories there! Thanks Clark
Thank you for documenting this for us, I'm assuming it's gone by now and most of us would have never been able to appreciate the old architecture and detail they put into buildings back then had it not for your work. Thank you Dan.
Loved, loved, loved the old portions of the hotel. What a shame. The windows, the woodwork, the whole courtyard with round pools. The shot at 10:40 is what nightmares are made of! Great video, Dan and Will! Keep 'em coming!
What a shame indeed. I’ve stayed at this hotel twice in my life and it was so beautiful. I did not know it had burned down and I am so incredibly sad. Thank you for filming all of this.
Nicely done Dan...am a fairly new subscriber.. am really enjoying your videos !!!! Really like the way this one was put together.... keep filming & we'll keep watching ...have a good one !!!!!
It's so sad to see that this was the finally destiny for this magnificent building. When I was a kid, I would travel to Hot Springs every year for vacation with my parents from Shreveport, LA. My Daddy would rent a suite and we would stay for two weeks. I learned to swim in the pool at the hotel. It was such a grand place back in the day. It's awful that the hotel wasn't preserved. Excellent video. Thank you so much for filming this and sharing it.
Good on you for keeping it real and genuine... We are losing way too many precious, historic places - thank you for doing what you can to keep them alive.
Such a shame, I stayed there a couple of years before it closed. It was a lovely hotel past it's prime. The rooms were smallish and I definitely stayed in the 1920's portion of the hotel. The tubs were builtins from the 20s and were the largest bathtubs I've ever seen in a hotel, only the bathtubs in the Buckstaff bathhouse were bigger. It was also notoriously haunted and had a few unexplained noises and cold spot experiences. the 1960s part of the hotel was closed and abandoned looking, it had kind of a convention center in it. the oldest part of the hotel was mostly the spa area and had gas style fixtures and lots of beadboard wainscots. Great memories and sad that it couldn't be saved. Did you get into any of the abandoned bathhouses?
Wow! U really go out of your way to entertain us This Is Dan Bell! Thank u so much for all of the work that you do. U are my favorite Urban Explorer! Btw...I'm subscribed to your Film It channel too!
When I watch vids of abandoned places, the same thought goes through my mind. Why aren't things salvaged? Banisters, cabinets, counters, tubs, fixtures, doors, windows, tile, paneling, etc., could still be salvaged and re-used or even donated to Habitat for Humanity. It seems like such a waste of materials.
I figured cost would be a factor for the demo company/property owner. Liability issues also keep away volunteers, but HFH uses volunteers, and they could get hurt. So why not volunteers for material retrieval? Just seems like there should be a way to do it.
I find this place sadder than many others, seeing as it survived all the way up to 2006. If it hadn't been for some a**hole firebug, it still might have had a chance. Shame someone hasn’t salvaged all that beautiful woodwork, but then there was quite a bit of water damage. The ironwork on the stair railings would still be fine though…
This makes me really sad. You're about an hour from Little Rock, my home town. It's too bad someone couldn't save some of that wood paneling. Thanks for posting.
Dude, when you were in the elevator motor room, the thing in front of you with the two large balls was a steam engine governor. It must have controlled the original steam engine that would have run the elevator. Basically the whole top of it would spin and lack of centripetal force would make the balls swing outward. The higher they swing, the more they restricted steam. So if you ran a steam engine as fast as you could, the balls would swing to their maximum and you'd be running "balls out". Hence the origin of both the terms "balls out" and "balls to the wall". Thanks for doing the vids dan bell. I love my life and get to live most of my dreams but seeing all these historic buildings is a dream of mine that I cannot fulfil as of yet. Thanks man!
When something like this get torn down, I always hope that they kept something from the original, like the sign or something. Even if they aren't going to rebuild the place, I imagine that something like that could easily be auctioned off.
+Nuclearxpotato I know, right? I hope so, too. Like that beautiful tile water fountain or the big pane glass windows. I see so many things in these old buildings that could be re-purposed, assuming they're in good condition.
So many of those old yellow bricks could have been cleaned up and reused for something, and it would have historical significance considering the building they were part of originally.
Who do you think set this on fire? I lived on Park Avenue in Hot Springs in the 60 and 70. I have so many memories of this. I even had my 10th year Hot Spring High School reunion there. When my father came to visit he stayed there for the baths. As a young girl my neighbor friend would ride our bikes and ride '"the seeing elevator " in the Lana Towers. In the 83' I surprised my husband for our 10th wedding anniversary , blind fold and all, for a stay at the Majestic. So many childhood memories and then as an adult shopping at the boutiques with my mother. So sad to see this destroyed.
If you ever get the chance to in the future, watch Forever Majestic. It goes into the hotels vivid history, the fire, and the efforts to save it. Such a moving piece.
Thank you so much for posting this video. I loved the Majestic Hotel. It was my favorite place to get a massage in Hot Springs. What a shame that no one restored it to its former glory before it burned.
We used to spend our vacations in Hot Springs almost every year and this was the hotel we always stayed in. This is just too terrible. We always stayed int he newer part that had the pool.
What an unfortunate situation, I remember watching a show called Abandoned basically the Hosts would go into Abandoned Buildings with permission and try to salvage anything of any sort of historical value and they actually did the Majestic Hotel, at the time they were unable to buy what they wanted, since a developer owned the building and everything with Huge Historical Significance, like the fountains in the lobby had to remain in the building, I believe it was being developed into High-End Luxury Apartments or Low-End Apartments, I don't quite remember. I remember the Ice Cream Shop on the main floor was going to be completely restored, it's sad to see it like this. Wendy episode was produced the building was still in fairly decent condition, that was only 4 years ago, September 26th 2012. Here is a link, tvblogs.nationalgeographic.com/2012/09/26/refurbished-from-the-majestic/ Unfortunately the show is no longer on.
Beautiful Architecture like this Vanishes and it is just Sad. Forgotten... You know my Dream was to become an Architect. I've had a passion for Architecture since I was a 6 year old. Love Frank Lloyd Wright's work, as well as the Amazing old World buildings. Like the works of H.H. Richardson, Richard Morris Hunt, many of the Classic old world Architects. Beautiful Job, Dan. Thank you for sharing this one. Well done !
As a Roaring Twenties and Depression Era buff, I love some of the music you mixed in the video. It enhanced the atmosphere. What a beautiful and historic place. Truly a shame to lose it. The machinery for the elevators was so cool! And sadly, I know that heartbreaking sound of demolition equipment on an historic site. We lost one of ours ten years ago, and that sound was terrible. It's the sound of history being eaten and obliterated.
As usual, Dan's content is on another level compared to these other "explorer" guys on youtube. He's highly underrated at only 434k subs. As for this video, what really is sad is all the ornate wood work and trim that will be lost. They just don't make them like that anymore.
This is an amazing place, Dan. I loved the music used in the beginning, and well as the old picture and videos, it's perfect! The colors pop out so much in this video. Your lens is great!
There's actually an ad I saw today, about how the majestic might actually be renovated... Not sure if that'll happen though. It should, was once a beautiful place. My dad stayed there when it was still open.
Dan, you do your research well, I love the intro "Yester-year" then directly into scenes of the fire. It really looked like it WAS a beautiful building once upon a day. Shame really
I live where there are a lot of buildings in the 100-150 year old era. It's always a tragedy when these buildings go, (especially when it's a landmark. But, that's why you guys are here. Preservation doesn't just involve the buildings, but the many stories and people involved with them.
Love all of your videos Dan! Looking forward to more dead mall episodes, hopefully soon. Thank you for all the time and editing you put into your great videos!
