There’s complimentary high-speed WiFi plus the now-expected flat-screen television, hair dryer, coffee maker, and iron with ironing board. The guest rooms are quiet and tastefully appointed (and not over-the-top gilded like the lobby, which has 5,000 square feet of gold leaf). I’m not a golfer, but I’ve heard the 18-hole Pete Dye Course is quite the challenge. If I’d had time, I would have loved to take a canter on one of the horses in the stables. I was far more interested in the mundane, especially the spa (still offering baths in that famous mineral water) and the two swimming pools - one indoors and one outside. I peeked in to see some of the 1,000 slot machines and 37 live-dealer game tables, but I couldn’t see the high-limit gaming area and VIP lounges. I’m not a gambler, but even I was impressed with the 51,000-square-foot Vegas-style gaming facility. Now - after years of vigorous lobbying - the hotel has the only land-based casino in the state.

When “looking the other way” stopped in the 1940s, and the Indiana State Police shut down the casinos, the hotel lost its cachet. The 1920s, tumultuous times, solidified the gambling reputation of French Lick (at one time there were said to be more than 50 gambling halls). Seven rail lines brought guests from all over the United States. That’s when Indianapolis politician Thomas Taggart bought the hotel and enlarged it. The exterior of yellow “French Lick Brick” was added in 1901. I had been reading about the hotel for years, and couldn’t wait to check it out. An additional 56 guestrooms and a new sports bar are under construction near the hotel’s event center and casino. Today, hundreds of millions of dollars of restoration and remodeling later, the French Lick Springs Hotel is a thriving enterprise once again, with 443 rooms, a casino, 165,000 square feet of event space, and all the amenities a visitor could want from a bowling alley to three golf courses. The hotel, a AAA four diamond property along with its sister property one mile to the north, the West Baden Springs Hotel, is part of French Lick Resort which is owned by the Cook Group. They enlisted the help of the billionaire Cook family of Bloomington, Indiana, who bought the property in 2005. It started as a spa hotel in 1845, went through several owners, burned down, was rebuilt and remodeled a couple of times, and, beginning a few decades ago, went into a slow decline.Īlong came Indiana Landmarks, an Indianapolis-based nonprofit with a particular interest in historic buildings. The French Lick Springs Hotel, 8670 West State Road 56, French Lick, Indiana, is an unlikely success story in the 21st Century.

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