Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, July 3, 1993                   TAG: 9307030295
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

HE'LL BE THERE OPENING NIGHT

Roanoker William Kesler, 83, has confirmed first-night reservations. For two.

The widower said he has no notion of who might be sharing the evening with him, but he "hopes between now and then, I'll find someone."

"If not, I'll go alone," he said.

Kesler's letter to Virginia Tech requesting the reservation noted that he had been at the hotel's final evening, and knowing its rebirth "is on my agenda makes for a greater zest for living."

As if he needed more vigor.

Kesler, a career men's clothing salesman, still works a couple of days a week at Thompson's Suits in Salem. And during the school year, he volunteers one morning a week as a math tutor in a second-grade class at Grandin Court Elementary School in Roanoke.

"I enjoy life," he said.

In his letter to Virginia Tech President James McComas requesting the opening-night room at the "new" Hotel Roanoke, Kesler wrote:

"Remember, George Burns is booked at the Palladium on his 100th birthday."

McComas responded to Kesler, and so did Doubletree Hotels Corp. Doubletree will manage the new Hotel Roanoke Conference Center, owned by a corporation representing Virginia Tech and the city of Roanoke.

Doubletree confirmed Kesler's reservation and sent along a gift certificate for a couple of nights at any of the company's current locations, and a box of chocolate chip cookies, a corporation trademark.

"Frankly, I wouldn't tell Doubletree, but I think I can do better than that," he said. He said he makes "pretty good chocolate chip cookies."

He ate the cookies anyway, though.

He also had planned to use the gift certificate for free lodging on a trip out West, but his vacation plans changed and he's now going to Russia.

Kesler said he and his two sons - Jackson Kesler, a professor at Western Kentucky Unviversity, and Peter Kesler, a banker at the Blue Ridge Bank of Floyd - will visit St. Petersburg and Moscow.