Many Glacier Hotel: Glacier National Park

After Congress created Glacier National Park in 1910, the Great Northern Railway constructed a complex network of hotels, chalets, roads, trails, and tent camps in the region. The railroad modeled this system after luxury resorts in Europe, and Many Glacier Hotel served as one of its crown jewels.

Constructed at the edge of what is now Swiftcurrent Lake, Many Glacier Hotel provided the Great Northern Railway’s second grand hotel at Glacier National Park. It served as the center of the Great Northern’s network of chalets and tent camps alongside the 1910 Glacier Park Hotel. From the grand hotels, tourists could access chalets and tent camps in Glacier’s backcountry. Visitors accessed these locations on horseback, but automobiles later drew tourists away from them. The Great Northern brought an unprecedented level of development into Glacier, and it spent approximately $1.5 million on hotels, chalets, campsites, trails, and roads by 1917. Many Glacier Hotel cost $400,000. 

Designed by Great Northern architect Thomas D. McMahon, the hotel comprises three separate buildings connected by covered walkways. The central portion opened in 1915, but the railroad did not complete the hotels’ north and south ends until 1917. Its rough stone siding and foundations resemble the rustic architecture that was becoming increasingly common in national parks. The architect further emphasized this feature in the lobby, which included a grand fireplace and tall wooden support pillars. This imitated the “forest” lobby at Glacier Park Hotel, which uses massive Douglas fir trees as pillars and includes an open fire pit. Many Glacier briefly featured an indoor pool, but the Great Northern removed it due to sanitary issues. 

The railroad also intended Many Glacier to match the Great Northern’s other buildings in the park, which imitate Swiss chalets. The hotel’s three sections look like individual Swiss chalets from a distance. Wooden pieces called moldings adorn their windows and balconies, and these pieces feature cutout patterns inspired by the Swiss chalet style. This created a unified sense of place in the region and emulated Glacier’s status as the “Switzerland of North America.” Early advertisements capitalized on this idea during World War I, encouraging guests to “see America first” instead of spending their vacation money to visit foreign locales. The Great Northern hired numerous artists to paint Glacier National Park, and their work hung in train depots and ticket offices. The railroad displayed a variety of paintings from the See America First in Many Glacier Hotel, but only a few remain today. 

While Glacier National Park quickly became a popular tourist attraction, the Great Northern’s vast building network became increasingly expensive to maintain. Initially, the railroad kept its resort system to draw train passengers into the park, but it made numerous attempts to sell the hotels as more visitors began to arrive by car. In 1957, the Great Northern hired the Knutson Hotel Company to prepare Glacier’s hotels for sale, and Glacier Park Inc. purchased them in 1960. In 2001, the National Park Service funded a $42 million restoration project that replaced the lodge’s roof and siding, restored original architectural features like balconies, and reinstalled an original circular staircase that the Knutson Hotel Company removed from the hotel lobby in 1957. Xanterra Parks and Resorts currently manages Many Glacier Hotel.

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