Hotel New Hampshire

In its 227 years the Hanover Inn has brought forth an eccentric cast of characters and incidents worthy of a John Irving novel. Here's a sampling:

1780 Captain Ebenezer Brewster, Dartmouth's first steward, converts his home on the corner of East Wheelock and Main into a tavern.

1813 Amos Brewster, Ebenezer's son, replaces the house with the Dartmouth Hotel.

1887 A fire ravages the hotel, "God finally visited his wrath upon this architectural conglomeration by burning it down," comments one Hanover resident. A Dartmouth professor who lived at the hotel for two years (the 85-cent-a-day room rate included meals) says, "One would almost conclude that it was planned, furnished to drive its guests to homes of their own."

1888 Owning the land underneath the hotel, the College rebuilds with a new name, the Wheelock Hotel (above).

1902 The Wheelock Hotel is remodeled and renamed the Hanover Inn.

1924 The board of trustees votes to build a fireproof wing of the Inn. It contains 48 twin-bedded rooms, each with a private bath.

1943 Because so many men are at war, many summer resorts are "Adamless Edens," According to the HotelGazette of New YorkCity. It carries an ad for the Inn that touts the 2,400 naval trainees on campus who are invited to join guests for dances, picnics, tennis and canoeing.

1946 About 20 college women who hold summer jobs at the Inn vie for the title of "Miss Hanover Inn."

1951 Dartmouth trustees establish an all-alumni board of overseers to supervise management of the Inn.

1967 Billboards on routes 89 and 91 advertising the Inn cause major controversy in the Upper Valley. Two weeks after the billboards go up, they're gone.

The Inn's bicentennial celebration includes a cotillion and a Winter Games Weekend.

1987 More than 150 reporters jam into the Inn's Hayward Lounge to hear presidential contender Gary Hart claim that he didn't have sex with 29-year-old Miami model Donna Rice.

1988 Pastry chef Chris Lasell wins first prize in Yankee magazine's apple-pie bake. "Lard is good," Lasell says of his secret ingredient.

2006 Carl Pratt leaves Canyon Ranch Spa in Lennox, Massachusetts, to become general manager of the inn. He plans major renovations.

"This large, modern hotel now features professional service, attractive rooms, excellent dining and subterranean walkways to the art museum and theater," writes Frommers.com. "Yet the inn somehow manages to maintain an old-world graciousness, informed by that mildly starchy neo-Georgian demeanor trendy in the 19405."

in its 227 years the Hanover inn has brought forth an eccentric cast of characters and incidents worthy of a John Irving novei. Here's a sampling: §