Longtime Davenport Hotel doorman John Reed dies at 88

SPOKANE, Wash. – John Reed, the dapper doorman who greeted generations of visitors to Spokane’s Davenport Hotel during a 75-year career, has died at age 88.

Family members say Reed died at home, after reluctantly taking the past few weeks off to nurse a foot ulcer.

The Spokesman-Review says Reed started working as a bus boy at the hotel on June 1, 1942. Until recently, he was a fixture at the doors, greeting visitors four days a week, dressed in his black top hat and red three-piece suit.

Reed was just 13 when the hotel hired him. It was World War II, and able-bodied men were in short supply.

He was the last hotel employee who worked directly with Louis Davenport, who opened the hotel in 1913 and died in 1951.

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Information from: The Spokesman-Review, http://www.spokesman.com