The Buena Vista threw open its doors on July 4th, 1924 to an admiring crowd of eager spectators. Built on a larger scale than the Tivoli, yet not matching the sweeping grandeur of the Edgewater Gulf, the Buena Vista would generally occupy a middle ground among hotels on Mississippi’s Gulf Coast.
An early post card view of the courtyard
Chicago-born architect turned local building impresario Carl E. Matthes designed the Buena Vista in a style described as “California Mission” with beige stucco walls, soaring arches and a tile roof. The hotel was built in a U shape with a grassy lawn and gardens facing the Gulf of Mexico just across the Old Spanish Trail which would later become Highway 90. Matthes also designed the Tivoli and Biloxi Hotels among other local landmarks. The building was finished on time and within the budget of $400,000. The gracious lobby was expansive without being stuffy and the place soon filled with eager tourists and local people. Business was so good that the hotel was expanded in 1927, the same year that the Edgewater, Tivoli and Biloxi Hotels opened.
The heady days of the Roaring Twenties would end with a resounding thud on Black Tuesday in 1929. Along with the excitement and abandon of the era went most of the Coast’s visitors, who sought good times closer at hand. The Buena Vista would live on, but a succession of troubles led to its purchase by local lawyer James S. Love Jr. in 1938. Love’s “radical” notion of filling the hotel’s rooms with convention guests during the slow season would pay off in spades. The famed “Hurricane Room” was built with a capacity of 1500 and even included huge loading bays at the rear to accommodate the meeting trade. The Miss Hospitality Pageant was held here for years, as were many other meetings and conferences. The hotel’s Marine Room was a popular cocktail and dancing venue and the dining room bustled with patrons. Celebrity visitors from Bob Hope to Tom Mix registered at the Buena Vista. Even Frank Lloyd Wright stayed there once. His thoughts about the hotel went unrecorded, though this may be a blessing, as Wrights acerbity was legendary.
Hurricane Room- ca. 1950s- Mississippi State University Digital Archive CHARM collection
Business was so good that Love turned his thoughts to expansion in the late 1950’s, just as the automobile was changing the way the world traveled. Love brought in the Jackson architectural firm of Biggs, Weir and Chandler to design a daring new addition on the beachfront. The original addition was two stories and had 160 new motel rooms. The 6000 square foot swimming pool with three diving boards was a marvel for its day, but the plans for the place were even bigger. An elaborate dining room was to have been built, topped by a concrete dome, making it the epitome of modern design. The dining room was also to have a stream flowing through it with rock gardens and lush foliage throughout. The pleasure dome never quite made it off the drawing boards, but the new addition was such a great success that additional rooms were built on top of one of the new wings, bringing into being the Buena Vista that many residents remember today. WLOX, owned by the Love family, operated its television and radio stations from just off the Buena Vista’s expansive lobby.
The Marine Room- post card MDAH Cooper Post Card Collection
James Love and his family continued to operate the Buena Vista until Hurricane Camille devastated the area in August, 1969. While the hotel survived the storm, it was soon sold off to a number of owners, the most famous of whom was New Orleans bandleader and musician Pete Fountain, himself a resident of nearby Bay St. Louis. Alas, even Fountain’s charisma couldn’t keep the doors open and the hotel was sold and resold like a plaything. The imminent construction of a loop for Interstate 10 dimmed many prospects for the property as owners considered different uses for the hotel. The old hotel continued in use until the early 1980s, mostly as overflow space from the motel wing. Its wide hallways were strewn with debris and the once gracious lobby sagged into oblivion.
Aerial view of the Buena Vista with 1958 additions- MDAH collection
When gambling was legalized on the Coast in 1992, one of the first licenses was acquired by the owners of the Biloxi Belle Casino. The Buena Vista’s final incarnation saw it morph into a casino most charitably described as being for the low-rolling crowd. Not that the new owners had such plans for the main building, now shuttered and completely marginalized by and subordinate to the riverboat casino at the water’s edge. In early June, 1991, a fire of mysterious origin ravaged the main building and there it sat as a semi-ruin until its eventual demolition in November, 1993. The new casino and hotel planned for the site never rose from the vapors and the property was eventually sold to Steve Wynn who pulled down the tatty remnants of the Biloxi Belle and built his Beau Rivage there. The site of the old Buena Vista is a parking lot today.
Linen post card view of the Buena Vista- 1940s
Categories: Biloxi, Demolition/Abandonment, Gulf Coast, Historic Preservation, Hotels, Lost Mississippi
Preservation in Mississippi 
I was in the Ms Hospitality Pageant there in 1977 representing Itta Bena, MS. It was spectacular. I feel blessed to have been a part of the history of The Buena Vista!
LikeLike
In the early 1950s I was living in Jackson Mississippi, I had just been discharged from the Air Force, me and my lady friend would work very hard for week or two saving our money up so that we could go to Biloxi for weekend and of course there was only one place that we love to stay at, and of course that was the old Buena Vista hotel, back in those days as the old-timers will remember liquor and gambling were illegal you couldn’t do that they put you in jail, of course, everybody was gambling, drinking, partying had a wonderful time in what was called back then the Marine room, and other place that we love to go to back at that time was the friendship House, great food, great entertainment, those were happy fun days.
LikeLike
As a kid we lived here my mother and father ran the restaurant, i was 4maybe 5. Lots of small memories from here. The shag carpet was diffrent colors on every floor in1979 and there was small window on elevator that you could see on to each floor as you passed and that was only way i could remember what floor we lived on.
LikeLike
I ate a lot of burgers and fries at this restaurant that your parents ran. Before. I did my airshift on W LOX radio in the hotel.
LikeLike
I want those chairs from the Hurricane Room!
LikeLike
I worked at the Buena Vista for several months in 1968, as a desk clerk and night auditor at both the old hotel and the motel across the street. The hotel was in decline, but still a grand old place wth loyal guests.
LikeLike
HI Mr. White- My mother, Phyllis Adams (English Lady) was a desk clerk/switchboard operator and Night Auditor as well there and was one of the last employees to work the night they closed the hotel for good. I loved that hotel !
LikeLike
My future husband took me to the Buena Vista when I was visiting from England in May 1969. I remember sutting in the Marine Room and listening to someone playing the grand piano. Wasn’t it renamed Camille Room after the hurricane? Camille hit 7 weeks after I returned to the U.K.
LikeLike
Thanks to all for the interesting stories! These places really did touch a lot of lives in different ways. I suppose that may be part of why I find the histories of hotels so endlessly fascinating. A hotel should be a good window through which one sees a place and a time- not just a box in which to lay one’s head.
LikeLike
From the first time I can remember my family stayed at the Buena Vista until I was 17 in 1968. My Dad owned the newspaper in Baldwyn and then in Booneville, and we went to coast for the Mississippi Press Convention every year. I LOVED the old hotel (not to mention the fact I could get the bars and buy beer by the time I was about 12).
LikeLike
Does anyone remember Danny Holly who was an entertainer at the Old hotel?
LikeLike
I haven’t heard of him. Can you tell us anything about him and his show?
LikeLike
I worked at WLOX AM and TV in 1968, I loved Biloxi. The vapors Gus Stevens and all the great clubs along the beach. Miss it often. Was stationed at Keesler AFB and worked part time at LOX. I think I’ll visit 45 years later!
I probably won’t recognize the town. Camille hit in 69 when I was in Vietnam
LikeLike
I also worked at wlox radio in 1967 and 68. Does yhe name Bob Bradley ring a bell? That’s me. I was stationed at Keesler also. Discarged in December of 68. I worked weekends and fill in on weekdays at the Mighty 1490. I worked at the tv station on base.
LikeLike
I spent my first honeymoon here in June of 1964. Lots of drunken guests and shrimp shells strewn all over floor are my primary memories. Luckily second honeymoon was much happier!
LikeLike
I was stationed at Keesler in 1954 and there was a group of airmen who would come to the Marine Room at the hotel on friday and saturday nights and party. I remember the pier with the shed at the end.
LikeLike
I have the big round globes out of the ball room
LikeLike
My dad and I help tear the historical hotel down. I have a few cool things from there.
LikeLike
My great great uncle George Sturm ran the Buena Vista in the 60’s and early 70’s. i loved going to that grand place for a couple of weeks in the summer.
LikeLike
My husband and I spent our honeymoon there back in March of 1967. We will be celebrating our 50th anniversary this March and are planning on coming to Biloxi to celebrate
LikeLike
I stayed at the Buena Vista when I was eight years old in 1942 with my mother and dad and siblings.It was a great time.I enjoyed it very much. lots of guys station at Kessler Field.My sister also enjoyed it, she was eighteen at the time.
LikeLike
I grew up going to the Buena Vista with my mom and dad. (Mid 1950’s – Into 1970’s) To me it was a magical place. Over the years I explored every room in the hotel, and the motel. I remember tbe beautiful blue/green shag carpet in the hotel lobby. It was like a 2nd home. I was sad to see it become run down, then become the empty shell of the once beautiful hotel. I am so glad I have the wonderful memories of the Beauna Vista.
I have looked for a print of the hotel for a while. I would like to purchase one if I can locate a source.
LikeLike
https://polldaddy.com/js/rating/rating.jsTaking a trip down memory lane. I was in 1st grade when we moved to Biloxi in 1970. Right after Hurricane Camille. My father worked for Pete Fountain who had just bought the property. It was a side job. He was stationed their in the Air Force at Kessler Air Force base.
LikeLike
I worked for Chef Robert James at the Buena Vista in the early 70’s. I was studying to be a Chef at Jefferson Davis Jr. College. The Hotel, Motel, and Restaurant program was taught by Thomas Noland. I remember George Sturm and Jimmy Love. I remember endlessly chopping vegetables for the Creole Sauce. I worked with a Cook named Phyllis who worked as a welder at ingalls. Prior to B V I worked as a waiter at Gus Stevens Supper Club. I was young and eager to learn the food business. It was not Bobby Flay or Emeral Live. It was hard work. I remember when the Edgewater Hotel was taken down to make way for Edgewater Mall.
LikeLike
My father Jerry Willis worked for Jimmy Love managing the Buena Vista motel restaurant in the mid-1960s. We lived on property in the cottages (Cottage 5 and later the large combined one in front Cottages 1/2. Wonderful memories of the Asian gift shop in the hotel (my sister and I had matching Mandarin-collared pajamas from there), swimming in the pool, walking across the HWY 90 overpass to have breakfast with my daddy in the restaurant and tossing pennies into the stream that flowed through the restaurant.
LikeLike
My dad (Jerry Lane) and his orchestra played for many events and parties at the Buena Vista. Sometimes we got to go along to the Coast – always a treat for us.
LikeLike
https://polldaddy.com/js/rating/rating.jsMi\y wife and I lived 4-5 blocks east of the Buena Vista when Hurricane Camille hit in August 1969. I was in avionics tech school at Keesler AFB when hurricane Camille showed up. Our son had been born there 6 months earlier. The Buena Vista had a deep well that was our only source of good water for several weeks after Camille. I carried many buckets of water home to maintain our “reservoir” in our bathtub, The Buena Vista was also set up as a a distribution point for emergency supplies for hurricane victims. I was never in a position to experience the grandeur of the Buena Vista but I was sure glad it was there at the time.
LikeLike
As a child on vacation there in the 50’s and early 60’s, I loved the pool with its island of tropical greenery. My parents had honeymooned at the old Hotel and by the time I was age 3 we were summer vacation “regulars”-the large rooms in the Hotel had plenty of room for furniture for a young family of 3, then 4, then 5 -who needed not just beds, but comfortable overstuffed chairs with ottomans, and big closets and bathrooms for the adults, but often a full baby crib too-with enough floor space left over for the kids and even a visiting cousin to spread out toys and play. I especially remember the occasional rainy days when one of my cousins and I would “sneak” to the very fancy Mezzanine Ladies Room-of all places (!) It was never occupied during the day, and the Powder Room’s four golden edged mirrored walls covered in rectangular mirrors became our personal ballet theater/studio/concert hall-the mirrors giving us the illusion as we danced that there were hundreds of “us” dancing in a spectacular corps de ballet or chorus line. I’ll never forget it-just so sorry not to be able to take a granddaughter there to do the same thing!
LikeLike
My future husband took me to the Buena Vista when I was visiting from England in May 1969. I remember sutting in the Marine Room and listening to someone playing the grand piano. Wasn’t it renamed Camille Room after the hurricane? Camille hit 7 weeks after I returned to the U.K.
LikeLike
I was at the hotel on that fateful night of August 17th when Hurricane Camille hit along with Bert Case and Bob Bullock of WJTV news. It was quite a night and thanks to the sturdy construction of the building we all survived.
Bert had checked in earlier and was in Ole Miss suite and I somehow later was able to retrieve the key and give it to him.
It is a memory that will live with me forever.
LikeLike
My husband and I spent our honeymoon at the Buena Vista Hotel on July 4th 1965.
We wanted to go back there for a visit this year for our 57th Anniversary but we didn’t know that it is no longer there. It was a great Biloxi hotel right by the Ocean. Great memories.
LikeLike
I was stationed at Kessler AFB in Biloxi and spent many a night dancing at the roof nite club to a great orchestra that broadcast live in the evening. So if we did not make it to the hotel we could listen on the radio. The hotel was friendly and warm and my parents would stay there when visiting me.
This was the very early fifties.
LikeLike