Milwaukee's Pfister Hotel: 125 years of history, hospitality and heart

From his droopy mustache to his morning suit and ascot, Peter Mortensen is as classic as the ornate hotel lobby he surveys.

Mortensen is the chief concierge of The Pfister Hotel, which has been a Milwaukee retreat for presidents, pop stars and everyday travelers since first opening its doors on May 1, 1893.

"When they were building grand hotels, they were building civic institutions," Mortensen said. "They were building places that were points of reference."

Those guests who stroll the lobby today can wander to Mortensen's desk beneath a painting of a young woman listening to a shell, and he will tell them: "Welcome. Your journey has ended. And you have arrived at a place."

The Pfister is celebrating 125 years of history, hospitality and heart.

It opened when Grover Cleveland was in the White House and is still going strong in the age of Donald Trump.

It has survived wars and national economic distress, adapted to changing tastes and somehow remained both current and timeless.

It is the crown jewel of the Marcus Corp., acquired with a group of investors in 1962 by the family patriarch, the late Ben Marcus, who revived it with his son Steve.

Now, it is nurtured by the family's third generation, Greg Marcus, president and CEO of the company.

"Bricks and mortar are one thing," Steve Marcus said. "It's the people in the operation inside that building that really make a difference."

The hotel at 424 E. Wisconsin Ave. is known for its Victorian art collection, sweeping hallways, soaring ceilings and seventh-floor ballroom.

"The hotel has ghosts, you know," Steve Marcus said. "I've never seen one myself. I hear about them every now and then from guests. No one has ever been attacked by those ghosts."

From William McKinley in 1899 to the Bushes and then U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, presidents and other politicos have held court inside the hotel.

Entertainers, too. Greg Marcus whips out his smartphone and shows off a photo of Liza Minnelli belting out a song in the old English Room back in 1968.

He recalled being a kid and getting autographs from visiting ballplayers like pitcher Luis Tiant and catcher Thurman Munson.

And when he was 16 and mad about jazz, he was shocked to see singer Al Jarreau sitting in the lobby. And he was even more amazed when Jarreau embraced his father, Steve. Turns out, Steve Marcus had given the Milwaukee singer one of his first big breaks, a gig in the hotel bar.

"Here is the coolest guy in the world, Al Jarreau, hugging my dad," Greg Marcus said.

And Greg Marcus marveled at how the Rolling Stones once stayed in the hotel for several days while on tour.

"They were actually very quiet," Greg Marcus said. "I think Keith Richards had a refrigerator brought in. I think Mick Jagger had a treadmill brought up to his room."

From weddings to bar and bat mitzvahs, charity galas to political fundraisers, The Pfister has seen it all.

Reputedly, there was even an elephant in the lobby and a leopard in the ballroom during a fundraising dinner for the zoo back in the 1950s.

What keeps it going? Physical upgrades. Attention to detail. And respect for tradition.

Brenda Simonis, who oversees the operation of two bars, the cafe and the in-room dining, said she once received a phone call from a couple who were married in the hotel 50 years earlier and wanted to return on the anniversary.

The husband asked if the staff could re-create a smaller version of the wedding cake. He sent a photo. And the cake was baked.

"The answer is always yes," Simonis said. "Whatever the customer wants, we're going to make their dreams come true."

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The Pfister began with Guido Pfister, a German-born tanner with an array of business interests who purchased the land on which he envisioned the hotel. He died before construction began.

Instead, it fell to his son Charles to turn a dream into reality and build the hotel for more than $1 million, an astounding figure for the age. It was designed in a Romanesque Revival style by Henry C. Koch.

On its opening day, the Milwaukee Journal wrote the hotel was "one of the finest in the country," and would be "a mine of wealth to its owners."

The reality was far different. The financial Panic of 1893 swept across America, plunging the country into an economic depression.

Charles Pfister persevered and eventually the hotel thrived. He was a key backstage player in the Republican Party. Steve Marcus said, "There was a lot of political negotiating and stuff that went on there."

Before his death in 1927, Charles Pfister entrusted the hotel to Ray Smith, who started as a bellhop in 1896 and began managing the place in 1911.

Smith and his heirs ran the hotel for decades. In the late 1950s, a group of New York investors took a controlling interest in the hotel, which was beginning to fray.

In 1962, Ben Marcus, a Polish-Jewish immigrant who built a chain of movie theaters and had a couple of small hotels, led an investment group that purchased The Pfister out of foreclosure.

"We have a concept of business that has worked and will work again," Ben Marcus declared.

Steve Marcus, a lawyer who at the time had no experience in the hotel business, was installed to get the place back into shape.

"We cleaned it up, renovated the lobby," he said.

And the Marcus family transformed the property in the 1960s with an addition of a guestroom tower.

Over the years, they've made changes, kept the facility up to date even as new competitors have moved into Milwaukee, including the Marriott, Kimpton Journeyman, Westin and Iron Horse.

Greg Hanis, hotel industry analyst and president of New Berlin-based Hospitality Marketers International Inc., said The Pfister still holds its own.

"The Pfister has been an iconic hotel that definitely has put Milwaukee on the map for many, many years," he said.

Could The Pfister last another 125 years?

"Why not?" Greg Marcus said. "It will need people to take care of it. You just can't recreate The Pfister."