If truth or dare were a competitive sport, Kerry Tucker would be the champ.
When his wife dared him to buy a derelict hotel from 1910, he didn’t hesitate.
Taking up her dare, Tucker now owns the Irricana Hotel, which he bought in 2020 for almost $90,000.
The Calgary resident has a knack for business, backed by over 35 years of experience working for the Canadian Pacific Railway, including five years as an Operations Manager.
Restoring the old hotel is Tucker’s ‘retirement’ project.
He loves history, so buying the Irricana Hotel, about 30 minutes northeast of Calgary, was a no-brainer.
“I’m a heritage kind of guy and when I saw this old building, I figured it would be a good thing to catch for myself and for the community. There aren’t many old buildings left in this province anymore,” Tucker told Global News.
New Life But With History
Tucker is doing more than just restoring an old hotel; he’s breathing new life into the building.
He plans to transform the Irricana Hotel into a cafe with a bar while preserving the building’s history.
Tucker hopes the cafe will help bring tourism to the town of fewer than 2,000 residents.
“The outside is going to look original; the inside is going to be modernized with plumbing and electrical and that sort of thing,” Tucker told CTV News.
Tucker also hopes to add space for 12 small boutiques on the second floor of his cafe, which will bring more new business opportunities to the town.
“It’s amazing that they’re doing something for the town. Bringing back something that’s so cool: an old hotel,” said Irricana resident Tracey Ennis.
But not everyone is as supportive as Tracey.
Some residents are concerned about who is footing the bill.
“There’s a lot of misunderstandings. People think it’s the taxpayer paying for it. I’m paying for it, nobody else, none of the public has to worry,” Tucker explained.
So far, Tucker has spent around $270,000 on the project but plans to spend closer to $550,000.
A Hotel Worth Saving
What makes the Irricana Hotel worth spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on?
The old hotel has something a new commercial building could never replace: history.
The Irricana Hotel was built by the CP Rail to service the line connecting to Drumheller.
When the hotel opened, it was three stories tall with upper floor rooms for accommodation, a bar on the main floor, and stables in the cellar where patrons could park their horses while enjoying a pint.
After a major fire swept through the town’s business district in 1928, the Irricana Hotel never recovered.
The Town of Irricana website states, “As prohibition was taking its toll on hotels in general, the top floor was dismantled, and materials were recycled to assist in rebuilding the town after the big fire.”
The rest is history, literally.
Today, the building’s claim to fame is three old murals on display and painted by Guy Welsh around 1925.
Welsh was born in Nebraska.
For 30 years, he travelled from the Mexican border to Northern Alberta, creating hundreds of paintings portraying the “Old West.”
Three of Welsh’s works can be found on the walls of the Irricana Hotel.
“He was drinking here, and apparently, he painted these pieces — unfortunately, damage has happened to the third piece,” said Tucker.
Welsh’s murals are just a few of the amazing relics of the past that can be found in the Irricana Hotel.
Tucker found an original walk-in cooler in the old barroom that chilled beers using blocks of ice on shelves. Now that’s cool.
There are also original cattle brands burned into the bar, which Tucker believes came from original ranch families in the area.
Additionally, stairs leading up to what would have been the hotel’s third floor are covered in well-preserved carpet from 1910.
From old furniture to an original organ from the hotel’s prime, there’s no shortage of history to be discovered at Irricana Hotel.
A Labour Of Love
The Irricana Hotel is a historic monument, but no doubt the 114-year-old building needs some TLC.
When Tucker first bought the hotel, the stucco outside was crumbling, and the drywall and paint on the second floor were falling.
Thankfully, the bones of the Irricana Hotel are mostly intact.
Since buying it, Tucker has spent most of his time removing garbage and stabilizing the building.
“There was so much garbage in here; I spent a month just removing garbage out of this area. It was packed up to the ceiling. The basement was packed tight and the whole yard was just littered: Cars, boats, everything,” Tucker told CBC News.
Trash isn’t the only obstacle Tucker has faced during his renovations.
Last year, Tucker discovered a bee colony within the hotel’s walls.
According to the beekeepers Tucker recruited to remove the bees, almost 60,000 bees were living in the hotel rent-free!
“We brought in a beekeeper, and he said we couldn’t move them until the spring, so we just left that part of the renovation alone. When it was safe to re-extract them, we moved them to a new colony,” Tucker told the St. Albert Gazette.
The bees entered the building through a small hole on the outside. Tucker likes to think the hole was made by a stray bullet back in the day.
Another challenge Tucker faced was a stop-work order placed on the building by the town due to a lack of proper construction fencing.
A fence has since been erected, but problems remain, including removing a power pole outside the property and a debate about whether he needs to bury power lines serving the hotel.
No Plans To Quit
No matter the obstacle, Tucker has no plans to give up on restoring the Irricana Hotel.
“The only thing that’ll stop me is either my health or there’s so many roadblocks thrown up that it’s not worth investing anymore,” said Tucker.
Although Tucker is eager to finish restoring and renovating the Irricana Hotel, he also wants to listen to the community.
On March 23, Tucker held a public meeting to update the town’s residents on the building’s progress and listen to public input.
“Any suggestions are welcome. Anything from the community would be great,” he said.
Tucker’s retirement project has been met with some criticism from the community.
Some residents doubt the old hotel will attract tourists and see the building as an old eyesore.
However, longtime community residents see the restoration of the Irricana Hotel as a good thing, including Leah Uffelman, who was born near the town in 1936 and now lives in Beiseker.
“I certainly wish them luck and hope people will step up to the plate and give them a hand in any way they can,” said Uffelman.
Historic buildings like the Irricana Hotel are gateways to the past and link old and new generations.
Historical sites and buildings also play a big role in supporting local tourism.
A road-tripper might feel more inclined to visit an old hotel turned cafe/bar than your run-of-the-mill Tim Hortons.
Tucker hopes to open the doors to his cafe by September 2024.
We look forward to visiting!
