The Royal Hotel was built in 1900 by Joe Delphis and attracted thousands of visitors from near and far to enjoy a luxurious stay in its palatial rooms, some with balconies overlooking the Battle River valley as well as private rooms that hosted week-long hot and rich poker games. The social amenities of the Royal also included a coffee shop, a beer parlour and billiards room in the basement, a private southeast entrance for ladies and escorts, and a hitching rail outside for patrons to tie up their horses before going in for a pint. The original structure survived a horrific downtown fire in 1905, was later enlarged with an elaborate brick façade and white stucco, as well as bold circular windows and nostalgic ‘Old English’ decorations.
From the Ponoka News
Royal Hotel
The Royal Hotel has heritage value for its historic associations as one of the town's three early hotels with the services it provided mirroring the social and economic evolution of the town through the 20th Century. The prominent location of the Royal Hotel, its historic associations and continuing function as hotel and tavern has given it a cherished landmark status in Ponoka as one of the earliest extant buildings in town.
The earliest hotel was Ponoka House, and then, in December 1900, the imposing Royal Hotel, facing Railway Street, opened, followed by the adjacent Leland Hotel which opened in October 1901 on Chipman Avenue.
Almost immediately the two main hotels required expansion. The completion of an addition to the Leyland Hotel, constructed in late summer 1904 was marked by the holding of a dinner by the Ladies Guild of the Church of England. The Royal Hotel, which had already changed hands once, was also having improvements done that summer. In 1905 the Royal Hotel underwent a major transformation from a gable roofed wood siding clad building into a larger structure with an additional storey and a brick veneer cladding with an addition to include a billiard room. The Royal Hotel, and its competitor the Leland, were multi-function public buildings, providing important social meeting space, meals and accommodation, serving a transient migrating population as well the citizens of the town. The Royal Hotel had sample rooms for exhibits from commercial travelers where the town's merchants could select goods that could be ordered and arrive by rail to stock their stores.
From the Ponoka Municipal Heritage Inventory