Hot Lake Hotel
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Hot Lake Resort
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Hot Lake Hotel and Sanitarium, circa 1920s; the wooden gabled structure on the right side would later burn down in a 1934 fire.
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| Nearest city | Hot Lake, Oregon, U.S. |
| Coordinates | 45°14′36″N 117°57′24″W / 45.24333°N 117.95667°WCoordinates: 45°14′36″N 117°57′24″W / 45.24333°N 117.95667°W |
| Built | 1864 (first incarnation) 1907 (final construction) |
| Architect | John Virginius Bennes |
| Architectural style |
Colonial Revival Shingle Style |
| Restored | 2003–2010 |
| NRHP reference # | 79002148 |
| Added to NRHP | March 15, 1979 |
Hot Lake Hotel (also known as Hot Lake Resort) is a historic Colonial Revival hotel originally built in 1864 in Hot Lake, Union County, Oregon, United States. The hotel received its namesake from the thermal spring lakes on the property, and operated as a luxury resort and sanitorium during the turn of the century, advertising the medicinal attributes of the mineral water and drawing visitors worldwide. It is also the first known commercial building in the world to utilize geothermal energy as its primary heat source.
After a fire burned down over half of the hotel in 1934, the remaining building was used for various purposes, including a retirement home, asylum, and a nurse's training school during World War II. After that, operations were intermittent under various owners before the building's abandonment in 1991. The hotel and surrounding structures were added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
Today, it is operated as a bed and breakfast, museum, and spa. Prior owners included future governor Walter M. Pierce and former state senator Parish L. Willis.
The hot springs that make up Hot Lake themselves rest at the foot of a large bluff, and were often used by Native Americans before settlement and colonization occurred in the area; the lake was named "Ea-Kesh-Pa" by the Nez Perce. It is thought by historians that Hot Lake was one of the first thermal springs to be visited by European settlers, and the springs themselves were documented by Washington Irving in his recording of Robert Stuart's explorations during the Astor Expedition in 1812. Irving wrote in his record:
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