Click to enlarge.

Travelers Kafe, 1929.

The Soledad Hotel of the 1930s-40s-50s started life in about 1925 as the Travelers Hotel and Kafe (Perkins, The Signal, 8-20-1964) at 829-831-833 Spruce Street (southwest corner of 9th and Spruce, now called Main). Original owners Elmer and Annie Eaton added a second story in 1928. They sold it in 1930 to Charles E. Sitzman, then-superintendent of the Pico Oil Field, and a partner, who rebranded it as the Soledad Hotel and Coffee Shop. Exactly when they sold it, we don't know, but it changed hands many times throughout the 1930s and 1940s. In the spring of 1964 it was razed, and the one-story building that would eventually become the Way Station coffee shop took its place.