CHICKASHA — Chet Hitt’s construction crews continue making progress on several projects associated with the California businessman’s multimillion-dollar Town’s End development in Old Town.
Quarter-inch-thick steel framing to support new windows in the front of the Savoy Hotel has been constructed on-site. Clear glass panes will be installed in the frames, and each window can be opened “to allow a cool breeze to blow through,” Hitt said.
A narrative commemorating the history of the building, which was built in 1902, will be engraved in sandstone and installed in an inset area on the east side of the building, Savoy Project Manager Luke Lewis said.
A metal stairway to the hotel’s upstairs will be constructed outside on the east side of the building, Hitt said. “We’re working on those plans,” Lewis told Southwest Ledger last week. At the top of the stairway will be a 4-foot-wide catwalk, he said. One of the upper windows will be removed and the opening will be enlarged, framed and boxed in for a door.
Hitt said his plans for the upstairs are to feature different themes year-round, such as a “haunted house” at Halloween and Santa and the Grinch during the Christmas holiday.
A hole will be cut in the back wall of the Savoy for installation of a meat smoker, and that project is scheduled for “around September 15,” Lewis said.
The Savoy’s upstairs floor is solid, and the roof is in good shape, Hitt said. During renovation of the nearby Chickasha Hotel, Pat Brooks had the roof of the then-abandoned Savoy Hotel treated, too, Lewis said. “It’s covered with some kind of heavy industrial spray foam” to prevent leaks.
Asbestos-laced particle board material was removed from the ground-floor ceiling and will be replaced with copper tin tiles. The interior, bare brick walls will be coated with a clear sealant.
New water lines to the kitchen, the bar and the restrooms have been installed beneath the flooring.
Most of the original flooring in the Savoy was replaced with 4x8 plywood sheets; permanent hardwood flooring will be overlain later. “That will be installed last because we don’t want to scratch it,” Hitt explained.
He said he found a 20-foot-long bar for the Savoy, and the dining area and bar will accommodate 80 to 100 patrons, he estimated.
The exterior doors will be “reskinned” or replaced entirely, and the handles will feature Hitt’s signature “Town’s End” logo.
Renovation of the Savoy is “not moving as fast as I’d like,” Hitt said, but his target date for opening the remodeled “Savoy 1902 BBQ and Deli” is still New Year’s Day.
Restoration of the 121-year-old building will cost “between $500,000 and $700,000,” the self-described “dreamer” and 1982 Anadarko high school graduate estimated.
Restoration resumes on Mill Building; corrals planned
Across the street, work is starting on the upstairs floors in the Mill Building, where Hitt said he intends to establish his local office. On the upstairs walls he plans to paint scenes of the iconic leg lamp statue, the Savoy Hotel, the Rock Island Railroad Depot, and the nearby grain elevator.
The vacant Mill Building was Hitt’s first acquisition after he informed the City Council of his plans to invest as much as $5 million on several development projects in Old Town Chickasha. In five days Hitt and some of his employees “gutted and remodeled” the ground floor of the building.
During his presentation to the City Council on Dec. 5, Hitt said his Town’s End Company would establish the TE Coffee House in the Mill Building, which had been vacant for years.
The coffeehouse will feature “our special blend of roasted coffees, along with its own private label of coffee beans” for public sale. Other retail items will include clothing, soaps and miscellaneous items bearing the Town’s End and TE Coffee House brand, he said.
In a lot adjacent to the Mill Building, postholes were dug, and poles were set July 27 in preparation for construction of six corrals to hold Hitt’s team of “big, black Percheron draft horses.” Each corral will be 18x20 feet in size, Lewis said. The Percheron is a breed of horse that originated in the Huisne River Valley in western France.
Hitt said his horses weigh 1,800 to 2,100 pounds each and are expected to arrive in Chickasha Thursday.
Plans for bridge, hotel discussed
In a related matter, Hitt said he has held discussions about development of a new hotel and a bridge linking the fairgrounds with downtown Chickasha. “Activity breeds activity,” he said.
Hitt said he has met with Hopper Smith, interim executive director of the state Commerce Department; Lt. Gov. Matt Pinnell; and Dr. Kayla Hale, the new president of Chickasha’s University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma.
The hotel Hitt proposed for construction in the Old Town area would be “based on economics,” he said. “Maybe start with 75 rooms, or 50.”
“I would like to see the college benefit” from the proposed hotel project, he said. A partnership between USAO and the hotel could develop into a culinary arts district and a hotel/hospitality management degree program, he believes. Hitt said officials at the Canadian Valley Technology Center campus in Chickasha previously “reached out to me and offered to help” with development of a hospitality employee training course at the Career Tech school.
Perhaps the project could attract a national chain “to use the hotel as a culinary and hotel management training center,” he added.
Hitt’s plan is to “put this together as a community event,” he said. “I’m just the facilitator. I will not be financing the project,” he told the Ledger.
As for the bridge Hitt envisions between the fairgrounds and Old Town, he met one afternoon last week with Andy Maher, executive director of the Grady County Fairgrounds.
The fairgrounds received a facelift in 2000. Since then, the fairgrounds have evolved into a multipurpose event center and a tourism destination point.
The facility hosts myriad events, including rodeos, performance horse shows, dog shows, concerts, roping events, barrel racing, cutting horse and team penning events, livestock shows, numerous local and statewide educational events, sports activities, and the largest antique car swap meet in the nation. The fairgrounds will host a national alpaca show in 2025, Maher said.
“We focus on family and corporate events as well as livestock shows,” he said.
A “Memorial of Christ’s Death” was held at the fairgrounds April 4, and Continental Resources Training was held in the event center April 6. The Junior Social Workers of Chickasha conducted their annual Spaghetti Day fundraiser in the North Building at the fairgrounds last September.
Corporate retreats, oil and gas safety meetings, and wedding receptions are held at the fairgrounds.
Many of the events span multiple days.
During conversations with various city leaders “I was told they’ve been talking about that bridge for 15 years,” Hitt said in April. The proposed hotel and bridge “are not my projects,” he said. “They are community projects.”
The hotel, pedestrian bridge, and perhaps a miniature train in the new downtown park, “would help attract tourism to Chickasha,” he contends.