History

Milwaukee in the 1920s was one of the great industrial cities of America — a center of beer brewing, heavy machinery, tanning, and Great Lakes shipping whose diverse economy had produced a large and prosperous middle and upper class by the decade of American prosperity that preceded the Depression. The Wisconsin Avenue corridor, running west from the Milwaukee River through the commercial heart of the city, was the address of the best hotels, department stores, and office buildings in the region. The Schroeder Hotel was commissioned to provide Milwaukee with a first-class hotel capable of competing with the grand hotel buildings then being constructed in Chicago, Detroit, and other Midwestern cities: a building of 25 stories with ballrooms large enough for the political conventions and corporate banquets that the city’s size and economic weight should have attracted.

The hotel opened in 1928 and immediately established itself as the premier address for visiting dignitaries, convention delegates, and the business executives who moved between Milwaukee and the national corporate network. Its ballrooms hosted the political events, union conventions, and civic gatherings of Milwaukee’s active democratic culture. The hotel’s name was changed over the decades through a series of ownership transitions: from Schroeder to Marc Plaza (in the mid-twentieth century) to the Hilton Milwaukee City Center (in the 1980s), when the Hilton flag brought the building back to full-service operation after a period of decline. The renovation program that accompanied the Hilton rebranding preserved significant original fabric in the lobby and public rooms while updating the guest floors to contemporary standards.