infant metropolis, turning 32 square blocks of civilization to ashes. Young Davenport salvaged what he could from the rubble, bought a tent, and opened "Davenport's Waffle Foundry." Davenport's restaurant is one of the possible places where the first Crab Louis (reportedly named after Louis Davenport) was created and served. Spokane rebuilt quickly after the big fire. Washington became a state that winter and Spokane dropped the Falls from its name. With timber, mining, agriculture and the railroad pouring money and people into the region, the city of Spokane was in the middle of it all and poised to become one of the great cities of the West. Davenport recognized his opportunity and leased a brick building on the North-east corner of Sprague Avenue and Post Street the next year. He expanded his culinary offerings to nearly 100 items. Within a few years, Davenport's Restaurant was described by a critic as "the finest thing of the kind in the country." Business was so good, Davenport expanded into an adjoining building within a decade. He hired up-and-coming architect, Kirtland Cutter, to make the two buildings appear as one in 1904. Cutter offered a Mission Revival style theme. The white stucco walls and green tile roofs stood in marked contrast to every other building downtown. This remodel added the finest ballroom in the West on the second floor, the Hall of the Doges. Construction of the hotel The Davenport Hotel was neither Louis Davenport's idea nor was it built with his money. Instead, Cutter and his firm, Cutter & Malmgren and Davenport were chosen by a group of leading Spokane businessmen, who thought the growing city required a large, grand hotel in which to board and entertain their guests. Leveraging Davenport's already strong reputation, the Davenport Hotel Company was formed in 1912 and preparation of the site began that year. The hotel tower went up in eight months in 1913, using horse carts, steam jacks and hand tools. Not a single worker was seriously injured or killed — a rarity for the time. In the design, Cutter was instructed to make sure "no more money than necessary was squandered on exterior ornament", which resulted in a building with a relatively simple exterior with strategically placed ornamentation but an extremely extravagant interior. Built lavishly in the Renaissance Revival and Spanish Revival style, the 406-room Davenport Hotel cost two million dollars to complete and included