Historical Hotel

Originally built in 1893, Alice Lytle built a hotel as a way to support her five children as well as her mother-in-law. After the death of her first husband Alice was remarried to B.B. Rose. Locals eventually renamed the building to the Rose Hotel, which is now known as the Gidley house. Today, the Gidley house is the oldest intact building in the little town of Lytle. In the future, the Gidley house will be transformed into the Lytle city Museum.

The way the house is faced, the front side of the house is located on Oak Street. The house is located on the upper left side corner of the property. It is a two story white house with a light green tin roof. The overall structure of the house is overwhelming. The first floor of the house has an open decked porch that wraps around to the left side. The second level of the house has a netted in porch. Along the second level there is a walkway with doors leading into the various rooms.

The right side of the house was renovated in the early 20th century to include a kitchen, bedroom sleeping porch, and bathrooms. On the right side of the property, a closed in two car garage sits between the Gidley house and Alice’s personal house. This garage could have been the parking garage for the people staying in the hotel or it could have been used for storage. Sitting a little towards the back right side of this garage is an open sided shed.
The shed seems to have been used as another garage. To the right of this shed is Alice’s personal house. This house is located on the lower right corner of the property. This little one story house is medium in size and extends out onto the back right side of the property towards Main Street. If the big two story house was a hotel, she needed somewhere to live with her family. Like the Gidley house, the front of the little house is facing towards Oak Street. It is also made with the same material that the hotel was made of. On the right side of the house the property ends. There is a road directly next to the house, South Bank Street, with the Lytle Volunteer Fire station across it.

Along the left side of the house is a lower and upper walkway connected by a case of stairs. Just below the staircase is a green wooden two person swing. Behind the staircase is a door leading into a guest room. On the upper level deck, there is nothing but a room and the entrance into the netted porch. The back side of the house is located on Main Street. If you were to walk straight out the back door, you would walk right into the middle of the street. The back side of the house is plain with the exception of windows.

In an artistic view, the property is asymmetrically balanced. While glancing at the property, the main focus goes straight to the Gidley house. The bright white color of the house draws the attention away from the dull colored businesses located around it. Being that the houses are made out of wood, the textures of the houses are rough.