The Parco Inn

The panel names the buyer and leaves out his record. Harry Sinclair, whose Consolidated Oil took the town, refinery and fields in 1934, had held the no-bid 1922 lease on Teapot Dome, the Navy's oil reserve near Casper. He was acquitted of conspiracy but convicted of contempt of the Senate, for refusing a question, and of court, for having the jury followed by detectives, and served six and a half months in a Washington jail in 1929. Five years later he owned Wyoming's most elegant company town, and in 1942 it took his name.

What the plaque says

The Parco Inn The Parco Inn was built as the architectural highlight of Wyoming's most elegant company town. Frank Kistler, founder of the Producers and Refiners Oil Company (PARCO), hired the Denver-based architectural firm of Fisher and Fisher to design an innovative company town that was not only functional, but aesthetically pleasing as well. The town was completed in 1925. The motif for Parco's architecture is Spanish Colonial, featuring tile roofs, stucco exteriors and iron balconies. The sixty-room Parco Inn, which opened for business on May 31, 1925, spans an entire town block and features two five story bell towers. Single story wings extend from both sides of the hotel to house shops and other businesses. A long arched vestibule leads to the tiled main lobby, where wrought iron balconies on the second floor overlook the lobby below. Twin stairways lead to the upper floors. Exposed hand-painted cedar beams, featuring stencils designed by Thomas Arrak of Denver, support stained glass skylights. Other notable architectural details include arched colonnades, impost moldings, dentiled string cornices, neo-baroque spiraled columns, a ballroom and a large fireplace. Although guests could dine in the Inn's coffee shop, the Parco Inn was most noted for its famous Fountain Room restaurant. Live trout were stocked in the pool of the Fountain Room and guests could order the freshest fish in Wyoming. Parco fell on hard times during the Great Depression and in 1934 the town site, refinery and oil fields were sold to Harry Sinclair's Consolidated Oil, later named the Sinclair Refining Company. The town's name was changed to Sinclair in 1942. In 1967, the Sinclair Refinery Company sold most of the town site to local residents and the Parco Inn has been under private ownership since that time.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fort Fred Steele State Historic Site — 8.6 mi
  A fort built in 1868 to guard the Union Pacific's North Platte crossing, which became the collecting yard for railroad ties floated down the river.

More markers nearby

• Rawlins — 6.5 mi
• Wyoming State Penitentiary — 6.6 mi
• Rawlins Springs — 6.7 mi
• Rawlins Paint Mines — 6.7 mi