Area less than one acre NRHP Reference # 93000336 Opened 1917 | Built 1917 (1917) Designated CP August 6, 2014 Added to NRHP 26 April 1993 | |
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Location 5 Creek St., Ketchikan, Alaska Part of Creek Street Historic District (#14000454) Similar Revillagigedo Island, Potlatch Totem Park, Totem Heritage Center, Tongass National Forest, Saxman Native Village | ||
The Star is a historic commercial building at 5 Creek Street in Ketchikan, Alaska, United States. It is the only one of a once-numerous collection of brothels that famously lined Creek Street to retain its historical integrity, and was one of the largest in the city. The Star's origins (like those of other brothels on Creek Street) lay in a 1903 city ordinance banning brothels from the city center, after which those businesses began building up what is now Creek Street on stilts over the north bank of Ketchikan Creek. The Star was probably built as a modest gable-roofed structure not long after the ordinance was passed, and was enlarged in 1910 and again in 1917 to achieve its present size. Its name devrives from a star placed in the center of the wooden floor of the dance hall on the first floor. It is documented to have been in operation between 1917 and 1954 (when the city shut down all brothels), with only a few brief closures. The building was damaged by fire in 1971, and restored in 1991.
The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1993.