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Volume 065-4 - October 2011 (6 pages)
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Page: of 6
The Golden Age of the
Rector Brothers
by Maria E. Brower
[ JULY OF 1882 ELIJAH JOHN (WHO WENT BY JOHN)
and his brother, Bayliss S. Rector, followed longtime
landlord Jacob Naffziger as the new proprietors at the Union
Hotel on Main Street in Nevada City. The Union was then
a large and grand wooden hotel and the National’s main
rival in the city. The Rector brothers succeeded in building the business of the Union Hotel during the time of the
“blighting influence of the Sawyer Decision” that almost
completely shut down hydraulic mining in California and
caused another period of depression.
Four years into their five-year lease of the Union Hotel.
the Rector brothers also took over the National, so for a time
the two leases overlapped and they operated both hotels.
Up to this time the Rector brothers had more hotel experience than any of the previous owners or managers at the
National Exchange. You might say they were born into the
hotel business, as their father, the Hon. Jesse H. Rector,
was the owner of a hotel in Elk Lick Springs, Pike County,
Missouri, where he had also served as judge and postmaster.
Both Jesse and their mother, the former Cynthia Simpson
Strother, were natives of Fauquier County Virginia, and the
brothers accompanied their parents on their westward migration to Missouri.
Their mother’s family had been early settlers of California
and brought a wagon train to the state in 1850 during
the Gold Rush. One of the elder Rector’s five daughters,
Elizabeth, married Joseph Merritt, who became a California
cattle dealer, while another daughter, Lucinda Jane, married
Jefferson G. James, who became the owner of large tracts
of land in California, amounting to over seventy thousand
acres, and became the president of Fresno Loan and Savings
Bank.
Elijah John Rector and Bayliss Strother Rector.
‘Nevada a County Historical society .
Bulletin
vee 65 NUMBER 4 OCTOBER —
After graduating from college, Bayliss joined his father
as a partner in the family’s hotel, farming and stock business in Missouri. In 1873 Bayliss left for California and settled in Stockton. He first worked for a year at the ranch of
his brother-inlaw, Jefferson James. Then, when his brother
John came to California after working with their father for
a time, the brothers moved to Hollister, California, where
they went into the hotel business, forming the partnership
of Rector Brothers in 1877. They managed the McMahon
House prior to their move to Nevada City in 1882.
On July 1, 1886, the Rector brothers became the proprietors of the National Hotel by leasing the building from
Stanley Eddy, and in 1891 they purchased the property and
hotel building. A publication reported that when the Rector
Brothers took over the lease of the hotel it was in “rather a
dilapidated condition and its patronage small.” It may have
been in need of refurbishing due to normal wear and tear,
but it is difficult to believe it was in dilapidated condition.
Nevertheless, it suffered in comparison to the grandeur and
modernization that the Rector brothers brought to the hotel
in the next several years.
At the time Bayliss and John became the proprietors
of the National they were already well-known and highly
respected businessmen in Nevada City with a great deal
of hotel experience behind them. In addition to running a
first-class house, they were deeply involved in community
service, were members of the local Elks, Odd Fellows and
Knights of Pythias, and were influential in politics. Bayliss
had held positions of county clerk, recorder and assessor
during the time he lived in Hollister.
Perhaps the main reason the Rector brothers made the
move from the Union Hotel to the National was that Broad
street had become the business center of the city and was
more important commercially now than Main Street. The
advantageous location would be more profitable and more
convenient and accessible for local townspeople and travelers alike. Other sources say that the move was made because their lease on the Union Hotel would soon expire;
perhaps the owner did not want to renew the lease now that
the Union had become so popular and prosperous under the
Rectors” management.