American railroad executive Charles Melville Hays ran the Grand Trunk Railway with a vision of extending its line all the way to British Columbia, building a chain of company-owned luxury hotels in the major cities along the route to draw passengers. When the railway reached Ottawa, Hays commissioned Montreal firm Ross and MacFarlane to design a limestone château blending French Renaissance style with the neo-Gothic lines of the nearby Parliament Buildings. Hays never saw it finished.
Returning from England with furniture for the hotel’s dining room, he booked passage on the RMS Titanic and died when it sank on April 15, 1912, along with the other men in his party; his wife and the sculptor who’d carved a bust of Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier survived. The Château Laurier opened that June instead of its planned April date, and Laurier himself presided over the ceremony, signing the register as the hotel’s first guest. Photographer Yousuf Karsh later ran a portrait studio from its sixth floor for 18 years.
