Christopher Hemmeter
Christopher Hemmeter (October 8, 1939 – November 27, 2003) was a real estate developer who pioneered the concept of the destination resort in Hawaii and was involved in casino gaming development, primarily in New Orleans and Colorado.
Christopher Hemmeter was born in 1939 in Washington, D.C. and grew up in Los Altos in the San Francisco Bay area. After attending Cornell University and graduating first in his class in 1962 he moved to Hawaii and got a job as a management trainee at the Sheraton Royal Hawaiian.
Hemmeter's development career began in the 1960s when he partnered with Henry Shigekane and Diane Plotts to develop resorts in Hawaii. Projects he was involved with included developing the Westin Kauai, Hyatt Regency Waikiki, Hyatt Waikoloa and the Westin Maui. Hemmeter's signature "...is best known for the extreme - some would say outrageous - lavishness of the Hawaii hotels he built in the 1980's." When the Westin Kauai opened in September, 1987, suites cost up to $1,800 and rooms ran double the island's average at $180 per night. The hotel was set in 560 acres (2.3 km2) and boasted two golf courses and a 2-acre (8,100 m2) reflecting pool, adding to the reported $775 million development cost.
Former Hawaii Governor Ben Cayetano called Hemmeter, "...a man of great vision and energy, More than anyone else, he changed the nature of resort development in Hawai'i. The four- and five-star hotels on the Big Island and Maui are the products of his work." In 1988 he ranked 389th on the Forbes Wealthiest American list.
In September 1987 Hemmeter made a $100 million bid for Hawaiian Airlines which was accepted, but which was withdrawn in December of that year after the October 19th stock market crash.
Hemmeter returned to the mainland in 1991 when he began to develop casino gaming projects. His biggest project was a proposed $1 billion casino in New Orleans. Billed at the time as "the world's largest casino". The original design resembled Monte Carlo's 1861 casino, intending to evoke the New Orleans 1885 Cotton Exposition and Chicago's 1893 World Columbia Exposition. The developers estimated the casino would attract one million additional visitors to the city and would generate annual revenues of as much as $780 million, estimates that were based in part on the proven success of dockside gaming in the Mississippi Gulf Coast area.
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