Waldorf-Astoria

           One stormy night many years ago an elderly couple entered the lobby of a small hotel and asked for a room.  The clerk explained that because there were three conventions in town, the hotel was filled.

            The clerk, who lived in the hotel, said, “ But I can’t sent a nice couple like you out in the rain at 1 o’clock in the morning. Would you be willing to sleep in my room?”

            The couple hesitated but the clerk insisted.  The nest morning when the man paid his bill, he told the clerk, ” You’re the kind of manager who should be the boss of the best hotel in the United States. Maybe someday I’ll be build one for you.”  The clerk smiled, amused by the older man’s “little joke.”

            A few years passed.  Then one day the clerk received a letter from the elderly man recalling that stormy night and asking him to come to New York for a visit.  A round-trip ticket was enclosed.  When the clerk arrived, his host took him to the corner of 5^th Avenue and 34^th Street, where a grand new building stood.

            “  That,” explained the elderly man, “ is the hotel I have just built for you to manage.”

            “  You must be joking,” the clerk said.  “  I most assuredly am not,” came the reply. 

            “ Who – who are you? ” stammered the clerk.  The man answered, “ My name is William Waldorf Astor.”

            The hotel was the original Waldorf-Astoria, one of the most magnificent hotels in New York.  The young clerk who became its first manager was George C. Boldt.