A tornado tore through downtown Lorain in 1924, leveling much of Broadway, the city’s main commercial strip. Rebuilding started almost immediately. The Argyle Company of Cleveland bought a lot on the ravaged street within weeks of the storm and began construction on what became known as the Broadway Building, which opened in 1926 with a bowling alley, an upscale restaurant, and office space for the growing lakefront city.
The building anchored downtown Lorain for decades before falling into disuse, and it sat that way until a 2020 restoration turned it into a 56-room boutique hotel with an event center on the fourth floor and rooftop views of Lake Erie and the Black River. It joined Historic Hotels of America in 2022, just shy of a century after the tornado that led to its construction.