There’s a scene in the 1956 movie Giant when Jett Rink, played by James Dean, tells the characters played by Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor that he’s struck oil. And not only that, he insinuates, it’s payback time.
Rink is a hard-drinkin’, fierce-brawlin’, tough-talkin’, uncultured Texas oil well driller who strikes it rich. But everybody in Texas knew that Dean was really playing Glenn McCarthy, a Houston wildcatter who struck it rich—cover of Time magazine rich.
The fictional Rink spent millions of dollars building the Emperador, the biggest hotel in Texas. The real-life McCarthy did the same. But McCarthy called his the Shamrock Hotel.
The Shamrock, nicknamed the Houston Riviera, was the grandest hotel in Texas when it was built in 1947 and the largest outside of New York or Los Angeles.
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It was 20 stories tall, counting the two-story emerald Shamrock sign on top, and it towered over southwest Houston. The hotel cost $21 million to build in the 1940s—or about $300 million in today’s money. It had the biggest hotel pool on the planet—so large that people water-skied in it. There were 1,100 rooms, all air-conditioned and each with a TV and radio, which was remarkably high-tech luxury back then.
McCarthy planned a grand opening for St. Patrick’s Day 1949 for his monolithic hotel. He wanted Hollywood stars but was told that the only way Hollywood would come was if there was a movie opening to attend. But no big studio would launch a film in Texas in those days.
So McCarthy decided to fund his own film—The Green Promise, starring Walter Brennan and a young Natalie Wood. In so doing, he had the premiere and hotel grand opening at the same time. Brilliant.
And Hollywood came. Howard Hughes gave McCarthy a good deal on one of his planes so he could fly stars to Houston. McCarthy also chartered a party train that brought in hundreds of celebrities for the opening.
The evening was regarded as the most prestigious event in Houston’s social history. And it likely remains so. Everyone who was anyone was there. Ginger Rogers was there. So was Errol Flynn. It was partially broadcast live on national radio by NBC and hosted by actress, singer and World War II pinup girl Dorothy Lamour—until the hotel crowd got out of hand.
Many loved the Shamrock for its sheer size and art deco style: the Emerald Room, where Frank Sinatra sang; the Cork Club that overlooked Houston; and the hotel’s grand devotion to its Irish theme.
But not everyone was impressed. Renowned architect Frank Lloyd Wright called the Shamrock’s 63 shades of Irish green an “architectural venereal disease.”
The Shamrock was sold to Conrad Hilton in 1955 and was known as the Shamrock Hilton until it was demolished in 1987. Today, the Texas A&M Health Science Center sits on the site.
I think McCarthy would like that. He was, after all, an Aggie.
