National Register Listing

Mobley Hotel

a.k.a. The First Hilton Hotel

4th St. and Conrad Hilton Ave., Cisco, TX

A.J. Olsen Construction built the Mobley Hotel in 1916 for Henry Mobley. Conrad Hilton purchased the hotel in 1919, during the time it catered to the participants of the Ranger oil field boom in west-central Texas. The building is significant for being the first Hilton Hotel. It was the birthplace of not only one of the world's leading hotel chains but also of the modern hospitality industry itself.

Henry Mobley of Cisco built his hotel on property purchased from A.J. Olsen, who had purchased it from the Texas Central Railroad Company in 1914. The Mobley Hotel opened its doors in 1916. Most of its guests came from the railway station across the road. The major feature of the hotel was its cafe which catered to railway passengers who had short stopovers in Cisco. When the oil boom began in the Ranger field, Cisco attracted a large population of oil field workers, itinerant salesmen, businessmen, gamblers, and other professionals who usually flocked when sudden riches were amassed. Mobley taking advantage of this sudden demand for beds transformed his 40-room hotel into a 120-room establishment by renting his rooms for eight-hour periods that coincided with the shifts in the oil fields.

In 1919 a young banker from New Mexico, Conrad Nicholson Hilton, arrived in Cisco in order to purchase a bank for $75,000. When the deal fell through, the 32-year-old Hilton went to the Mobley Hotel to get a room for the night. He discovered that the hotel was renting its rooms three times over. After inspecting the books, Hilton offered to buy the hotel for $40,000 cash. Mobley accepted, for despite his hotel's success, he too was taken with oil fever and wanted to try his luck in the oil fields.

Hilton's first partner and the hotel manager was L.M. Drown, a banker from San Diego. According to Hilton, the Mobley Hotel was the "ideal hotel to practice on." He regarded it as his "first love; a great lady." "She taught us the way to promotion and pay, plus a lot about running hotels." Two principles that are basic to all Hilton hotels were first tried in the Mobley: maximum reduction of wasted space and "esprit de corps" among the employees. He was the first to put a novelty shop in the lobby thus initiating the boutiques' trend in hotels as an added service for guests and as a new source of revenue and space usage. Hilton realized the need for hotels that catered to middle and upper-middle-class patrons by providing maximum services and comforts at a minimum cost. Hilton even coined and copyrighted a word to express his philosophy-- which meant minimum cost and maximum comfort.

Hilton conceived of a systematic approach to hotel planning based on the economic use of space (columns in the hotel lobbies became showcases for high fashion designers, jewelers, and craftsmen), sophisticated planning, innovative management, and a deep understanding that an atmosphere of comfort, luxury, and taste could be provided at an economical cost. These ideas became a basic blueprint that revolutionized the planning and architecture of hotels the world over from the siting of the entrance, lobby, front desk, and restaurant, to all parts of the hotel that catered unobtrusively to the comfort of the guests. He polished these concepts at the Mobley and then expressed them with total success when he personally designed the first Hilton Hotel in Dallas in 1924.

Hilton sold the Mobley Hotel in 1929. During the Depression, it fell into disrepair. In 1956 after several changes in owners, it was purchased by Mrs. Prissy Springer, who transformed it into a senior citizen home. Some rooms were turned into apartments, mechanical heating and cooling were added, corridors were ramped, and some of the larger rooms were subdivided so that the original 40 rooms became 46 rooms. In May 1970 Harold Martindale, a gold prospector from Alaska, bought the Mobley for $5,000 to turn it into apartments. That same year, the Cisco Historical Society gave the hotel a historical marker. Martindale sold the building on December 15, 1977, to G.H. Glanville who, acting on behalf of Eric Hilton, transferred the deed that same day to the University of Houston Foundation. In February 1979 the University of Houston Foundation, the Conrad N, Hilton College of Hotel and Restaurant Management, and the Hilton family designated the Mobley Hotel in Cisco, Texas as a memorial museum to house a collection of memorabilia that belonged to the late Conrad Hilton, who died on January 3, 1979, at age 91.

Hilton's genius in hotel administration and design, together with his philosophy of honesty and hospitality became the seed of modern hotel and restaurant management practices in the world today. Today there are 250 Hilton Hotels, employing 25,000 people in the United States and 23,500 in the rest of the world. In 1977 the gross revenue of the Hilton Corporation was $376 million; net profit after taxes was $40 million. C.N. Hilton is regarded as the father of the hospitality industry today. He had deservedly earned the title by which he has known the world over; "the world's finest innkeeper."

Local significance of the building:
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1981.