James Monroe ‘Doc’ Day

Jesse Lincoln Driskill, builder of the Driskill Hotel, was born in Tennessee in 1824. He moved to Texas at the age of twenty-five and eventually entered the cattle business in 1957. Earning the rank of colonel during the Civil War, Driskill made and lost a fortune selling cattle to the Confederate army. In 1869, Driskill, his wife, Nancy Elizabeth Jane Day, and their four daughters and two sons moved to Austin, situated in the heart of Texas. In the early 1880s, after Austin had become the capital of Texas, Driskill became a wealthy cattle baron and respected civic leader.

In 1884, he drew up plans for a luxury hotel worthy of the capital of the largest state in the Union. He bought the lot at the corner of Brazos and Pecan Streets for $7,500 and commenced building his dream hotel. When construction was completed in 1886 at a total cost of $400,000, the Austin Daily Statesman proclaimed the Driskill to be "one of the finest hotels in the whole county." Only two weeks after the grand opening, the inaugural ball for newly elected Texas governor Sul Ross was held at the Driskill. In later years, the Driskill hosted the inaugural balls of other governors as well, such as John Connally and Ann Richards. 

Despite the hotel's auspicious beginning, the next few years did not bode well for the Driskill. In May 1887, the general manager and half the staff were lured away by Galveston's Beach Hotel, causing the hotel to shut down temporarily. The hotel reopened under new management in October 1887, but a severe drought killed off most of the colonel's cattle, forcing him to sell the Driskill Hotel in 1888 to his brother-in-law James Monroe ‘Doc’ Day [little brother of William Henry Day]. Colonel Driskill died of a stroke in May 1890. His portrait now hangs in the lobby. 

The Driskill Hotel went through a series of owners in the next few years. In 1893, Day traded the Driskill to an actor named Maurice B. Curtis for a California ranch and a vineyard plus $14,000. The next year, it was sold at auction for $75,000 to the British holders of its mortgage. In 1895, another cattle baron named Major George W. Littlefield purchased the Driskill for $106,000 in cash. 

-Alan Brown, Haunted Places in the American South

Only months old, the Driskill shortly experienced the first of its numerous shutdowns. By late October 1887, the hotel had reopened. By the next December, James Monroe ‘Doc’ Day was the proprietor. In between (May 16, 1888) the new Capitol had been dedicated, the mule-drawn street cars had overflowed with passengers, and the Driskill lobby had been thronged with out-of-town dignitaries in town to view the red-granite marvel which now dominated the little city.

For a while the hotel flourished. Its telegraph office was a natural port of call for commercial men and people with good or tragic news to exchange. Its cigar and newsstand was also well patronized. It became something of a honeymoon hotel. The Driskill was also becoming the place to make a splash with social events. Small wonder then that the local journal would proclaim that “it is impossible to get a better meal in the South than the Driskill is now serving,” or that it would also claim that the Driskill was “the only fashionable place one can go after the theater.”

While proprietor Doc Day, as he was known locally, seemed to be succeeding, the hotel sold again in December 1893. The price was $306,000. The sale revealed that Day had gone to England for a good portion of his investment in the Driskill. M. B. Curtis had agreed to assume two notes executed by Day back in 1888 for 6,000 pounds and 20,000 pounds sterling. Within one year the hotel sold under the hammer for $75,000.

Joe B. Frantz, The Driskill Hotel

J. M. Day, of Austin, Texas, is a Missourian by birth, but at the early age of ten years emigrated to Texas with his father, who went at once into stock ranching, and adhered closely thereto during the remainder of his life; thus thoroughly and practically educating his son in the business of live stock raising. As soon as Mr. Day had attained the years of manhood he engaged in live stock driving on his own account, having a few years previously went as assistant driver with a herd to Kansas City, also one or more trips to Tipton, Missouri, where the herds were shipped to St. Louis. This was among the first shipments of Texan cattle brought to the St. Louis market, and was as early as 1857. But before the trade was fairly opened the civil war began, and further efforts to drive northward was abandoned. At the close of the war Mr. Day turned his attention to his old occupation, and was a drover of 1866, but one of the fortunate few who had sagacity sufficient to enable them to see that a route west of all settlement in Western Kansas was practicable, and so it proved in his case. In Iowa he found cash purchasers for his cattle, at figures that afforded a fine profit.

The opening of a cattle market at Abilene induced him to put several herds upon the trail for Western Kansas. From the year 1868 to 1871, inclusive, Mr. Day annually drove from three to seven thousand head of cattle, and his herds were generally of good quality, well selected beeves. He was recognized as one of the most substantial, straightforward, honorable drovers that engaged in the Western cattle trade. Seeing so many engaged in driving, Mr. Day decided to abandon it, and devote his time and capital to buying and selling in Kansas—a kind of local trader or speculator,—and for two years has handled fully ten thousand head each year, never failing to make a reasonable profit on each transaction. Whilst he has been looking after the cattle in Western Kansas for a few months annually, he has devoted the balance of his time in establishing and opening up a large wheat farm and thoroughbred stock ranch in Denton county, Northern Texas, which enterprise he expects to make his permanent business, and there expects to make his home.

Mr. Day is one of those quiet, affable gentlemen, that makes good impressions and warm friends wherever he goes. Texas has few better, truer men than he; kind hearted and honorable, straightforward in all his business transactions, he has much good will and hearty cheer for every one.

Joseph Geiting McCoy, Historic Sketches of the Cattle Trade of the West and Southwest, 1874