Mrs. Wilsons True Tales Retold

Chicago was rebuilt. The Palmer House was rebuilt immediately. Reopened in less than two years, it was built bigger—three-times bigger—and more ostentatious, more luxurious than ever: oversized over-decorated suites; a grand restaurant with a thirty-foot ceiling which spangled gilded plaster Beaux Arts garlands, scrolls and festoons, where frescos of Louis Quatorze pastorals chromed the walls, where enormous crystal chandeliers dazzled, where the best-dressed and best-mannered of society were humbly served sumptuous meals by tuxedoed negro staff. The floor of the Palmer House barbershop was tiled with silver dollars. Rudyard Kipling would shortly visit. “They told me to go to the Palmer House,” he said. “A gilded and mirrored rabbit-warren,” he exclaimed “…. and there I found a huge hall of tessellated marble, crammed with people talking about money and spitting about everywhere. Other barbarians charged in and out of this inferno with letters and telegrams in their hands, and yet others shouted at each