A dozen hotels once stood in Cambridge Springs, serving tourists who came daily by train to indulge in the town's mineral springs, widely known for their supposedly healing qualities. One old mineral springs advertisement read .. "The water from these fountains are chemically pure, being entirely free from organic matter. It cures Dyspepsia and all Stomach, Liver, Kidney and Bladder diseases ... and is invaluable for Insomnia, Indigestion, Torpid Liver and loss of appetite." From another advertisement an English doctor was quoted .. "I find a remarkable apathy among American physicians who do not take the trouble to inform themselves as to the powers of these springs."
Cambridge Springs got its name from the local mineral springs which were a popular health craze near the end of the 19th century.
The Riverside Inn and its adjacent spring house were erected in the 1880s as this mineral water craze spread, but as the fad faded away in the first decades of the 20th century so did the concept of Cambridge Springs as a resort town. Most of the other hotels were sold off or demolished. As the decades passed, the Riverside Inn transformed along with its ownership, but unlike the others, it continued to operate. By 1985, the Riverside was one of the few remaining relics of Cambridge Spring's resort town past. That same year, Michael and Marie Halliday purchased the Riverside Inn and began the arduous process of room-to-room restoration. They reconstructed the Riverside Inn once again into a cornerstone of the community, returning it to its glory as a popular tourist destination which was a hub for weddings and parties, meals and drinks, music and the Riverside Inn Dinner Theatre plus reunions among old friends.
The Riverside Inn also featured a dinner theatre and the Inn was listed on the National Register of Historic Places December 13, 1978. The inn was a three-story structure with 74 guest rooms and set on 7.5 acres along the banks of French Creek.
In the summer of 1990, a young man by the name of Jeremy Ball began working at the Riverside Inn which was a rite of passage among Cambridge Springs youth. Like many newly hired teenagers, he started out washing dishes.
When I first started, I was mostly dish room, but then Mrs. Halliday always felt bad that my glasses would fog up in there and after a couple of months I had been promoted to busboy.
Jeremy Ball
From there, Jeremy was again promoted to help run the Canterbury Feast at the Inn and oversee the buffet line .. essentially becoming royalty among high school employees at the inn. He, then, moved onto serving tables when he turned eighteen. These experiences at the Riverside Inn led Jeremy to pursue a degree in Hotel, Restaurant & Institutional Management at Penn State University. While doing so, he traveled back home every other weekend to continue working at the Riverside Inn. After graduating in 1997, he managed the American Ale House & Grill in State College, PA for nearly five years before an implusive summer trip to Philadelphia led to his relocation. He spent the next decade managing numerous high-end restaurants throughout Philly before deciding to move back home in 2014.
Jeremy was ready to move back to the country and be closer to family. He was initially nervous trying to find something that would be challenging in this market. Then, Marie Halliday found out he had returned home and soon called him and said .. "we need to talk". Halliday offered Jeremy the position of General Manager and after so many years, Jeremy was back to where it all began, the place that had instilled in him a passion for the hospitality business. Over the next several years, the Riverside continued to flourish under Jeremy's leadership.
Having the opportunity to run the hotel that I started working at as a kid, the trust and faith the Hallidays put in me and being trusted with such a monumental operation of a 130-year-old hotel was the most amazing opportunity I had ever experienced.
Jeremy Ball
The Water Tower still stands near the Riverside Inn site.
Riverside Brewery
and
that history
was
The Riverside Inn's recognizable facade which left an indelible impression on countless people for over 130 years.
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