Historic Tourism

Frank and Hazel Ridinger’s White Sands Motel and full service gas station was the first established tourist structure to capitalize on the attraction of the Great White Sands in the 1920s.

J. Tanis

 

Frank and Hazel Ridinger’s White Sands Motel and full service gas station was the first established tourist structure to capitalize on the attraction of the Great White Sands in the 1920s. The White Sands Motel compound was a small mercantile store with two Conoco gasoline pumps located by the front entrance, indicative of a drive-in service station, with eight cottage rooms serving as motel accommodations. Unfortunately for the Ridingers’, the establishment of the monument exacerbated competing interests for the tourists visiting the dunes, and by 1950 the White Sands Motel was closed for business.