Catastrophes and Heroes by Jerry Borrowman

Author:Jerry Borrowman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Shadow Mountain Publishing
Published: 2020-04-16T21:21:05+00:00

The Hotel Ponce de Leon.

The Hotel Ponce de Leon was lavish in its appointments, with every room fitted with electric lights and expensive furniture. Flagler was so pleased with the reception it received that he decided to build a second hotel, the Alcazar, to accommodate guests of more modest means.

When asked why he spent his time and money on a pursuit that could never equal the returns he received in the oil business, Flagler replied that he now desired to bring joy to people. It was an intriguing way to change his public image and to escape the acrimony of the various legal actions against Standard Oil. He remained on the board of the Standard Oil Trust and continued to collect handsome dividends from his ownership, but his focus moved south to his new home on the Florida coast.

Once he was in the hotel business, Flagler saw new opportunities for growth. His two hotels were at full occupancy, with potential guests being turned away. So he purchased the Ormond Beach Hotel, farther south on the Florida coastline, and renovated it to his high standards. But there was a problem—because Florida was relatively impoverished after the Civil War, there had been very little development. The few railroads systems that did exist used different gauges and made for a disorganized and impractical travel solution. Tourists wanting to go to Ormond Beach had to navigate their way on standard-gauge trains to Jacksonville, transfer to a boat on the St. Johns River, and then transfer to a different-gauge railroad for the final leg of the journey. This same problem existed for freight transport. The obvious solution was for Henry Flagler to go into the railroad business.

Flagler decided that such a chaotic system would not do, so he bought the railroads and built a bridge across the St. Johns. This was no easy task. Footings for the bridge had to be driven ninety feet deep to build a solid foundation, something that had never been done before. But this was exactly the sort of venture that inspired Flagler. With enough Standard Oil money available, the job was soon completed. Once the Ormond Beach Hotel was built out and fully occupied, Flagler started a series of railroad extensions down the coastline. So excited was the Florida legislature about all this building activity on the east coast, they started offering land grants to anyone who would build a railroad. As a result, Flagler was able to acquire nearly two million acres of land at almost no out-of-pocket cost. He was now positioned to build more than hotels—he could lay out entire cities to support his resorts.

Perhaps the greatest extension of his Florida empire began when Flagler traveled to the tiny hamlet of Palm Beach and declared it paradise on earth. He decided to make Palm Beach the jewel in his empire. Despite considerable engineering challenges, the rail line was extended to Palm Beach, where he built the magnificent 1,150-room Hotel Royal Poinciana, completed in 1894. Next was The Breakers, a hotel of incomparable style and grace which continues to welcome guests today.

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