MEANWHILE, following the big to-do at the downtown Sheraton, the announcement came that Seattle’s first Sheraton franchise, known in recent years as the University Plaza, will be sold, closed, and turned into apartments.

The ol’ motor inn, on the NE 45th Street exit off I-5, was a familiar sight for commuters and tourists since it opened in 1966 (just a few years after the freeway itself). Even before I lived in town, I remembered spotting it out the car window every time the family went through Seattle on the way to Tacoma.

Then one year the big sign stopped saying SHERATON and started saying SHERWOOD. I didn’t have to be told what happened: The place had obviously been sold; the new owners had obviously lost, or chose not to renew, the Sheraton franchise; and they had chosen a new name that required them to change only three letters on the big sign.

When I finally got to look inside the place in ’76, it turned out they’d spent the money they saved from the sign on a “Sherwood” interior. They’d added fake Olde English interior walls and lights for a pseudo-Robin Hood effect. That loving seventies tackiness remained with all the subsequent owners, as it became a Nendel’s Inn, a Quality Inn, and finally the University Plaza.

But that prefab quaintness couldn’t hide the hotel’s business problems. As a freeway motel, it was relatively small and inconspicuous, even when it had a franchise operation behind it. As a dining/drinking/meeting spot for locals, it was inconveniently located and not particularly inviting-looking from the outside.

But I’ll miss it just the same.