In 1927, it was called the Bergonian. It opened its doors with a swell of festive music and the click of heels on the dance floor, a glistening jewel of Roaring ’20s elegance, its name a quasi-portmanteau of its hotelier owner, Stephen Berg, and the Oregon newspaper of which he was fond.

Two years later, the stock market crashed and brought the world down with it, ending the party. The Bergonian suffered along with the rest, including Berg, who lost the property to bankruptcy. But the hotel lived on, and through every day of almost a century of history, it checked guests in and out as they visited a city that changed its very identity over and over, from logging/pioneer town to the home of grunge to a tech hub. And though its fortunes rose and fell with the years, it continued to do so uninterrupted, making the building located at 405 Olive Way — now known as the Mayflower Park Hotel — the longest continuously operating hotel in Seattle.

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