Established in 1859 by William and Mary Menger on Alamo Plaza, the Menger Hotel is the oldest continuously operating hotel west of the Mississippi and has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1975. The hotel began as a two-story, fifty-room property built to house guests of Menger's adjoining brewery, and grew through a series of additions, including the 1881 acquisition by Major J.H. Kampmann, who added new wings and the hotel's famed cherry-wood bar, modeled after the taproom of London's House of Lords Club.
That bar, now known as the Menger Bar, is where Theodore Roosevelt recruited his Rough Riders, and it remains a centerpiece of the hotel's Victorian-era lobby, filled with museum-quality artifacts and Renaissance-revival detailing from a 1909 renovation. Just off the lobby, the Spanish courtyard garden offers palm trees, blooming azaleas, and a three-tiered fountain, alongside a heated pool described as the largest in San Antonio.
For weddings and private events, the hotel's Grand Ballroom and Minuet Room anchor a set of eleven event spaces, from the crystal-chandeliered Grand Ballroom with its adjacent poolside terrace to the Minuet Room's Victorian fireplace, dance floor, and French doors opening onto the courtyard. Catering and bar service are handled in-house. Positioned directly on Alamo Plaza, steps from the River Walk, the Menger Hotel blends more than 160 years of San Antonio history with its downtown setting.
