Ulysses S. Grant Jr., son of the eighteenth president, begins building a grand hotel in San Diego in his father's honor. When he comes up short, San Diego voters help fund the rest.

The hotel opens on October 15 with a party for 750 guests. Architect Harrison Albright gives it a steel-and-concrete frame, one of the sturdiest buildings of its day.

Charlie Chaplin checks in for a stay that April.

Prohibition arrives, and the hotel quietly keeps the party going downstairs. Later in the decade, the city's first radio station broadcasts from the eleventh floor.

The Crystal Ballroom opens as the Italianate Ballroom, with a black-and-gold travertine floor and a hand-painted ceiling.

Albert Einstein arrives in San Diego by ocean liner in the last days of December, and the hotel counts him among its famous guests.

Fourteen U.S. presidents have stayed here, from Woodrow Wilson onward. Franklin D. Roosevelt even gave a radio address from the hotel's own radio station.

San Diego Comic-Con holds its very first convention here.

The Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation, whose ancestors lived on this land, bought the hotel in 2003. It joined Marriott's Luxury Collection in 2016, and a $13 million refresh in 2017 restored its lobby, ballrooms, and guest rooms.