The Christmas parties have begun, and one of the favorite establishments for holiday celebrations in early Jacksonville was the Franco-American Hotel. You may be familiar with Madame Jeanne DeRoboam Holt’s grand brick U.S. Hotel which she opened in 1880, but over 20 years earlier she had established the Franco-American Hotel.
It was located at the southwest corner of Oregon and Main streets in Jacksonville where the Jacksonville Inn cottages are now. The Franco-American became a famous regional hostelry and the leading hotel and stage stop in Jacksonville, noted for its “table d’hôte,” and holiday balls “worthy of the patronage of epicures and connoisseurs.”
It burned to the ground in 1886.