Hotel Alcazar: Another Henry Flagler grand hotel — Suzassippi’s Lottabusha County Chronicles

Across the street from the former Ponce de Leon Hotel, developed by East Florida railroad magnate Henry M. Flagler, is another of Flagler’s grand hotels built with the vision of enticing wealthy East Coast elites to the “Ancient City” of St. Augustine. The hotel was completed in 1888, with the original plan to be an entertainment annex for the Ponce de Leon. At some point in the process, architects John Merven Carrere and Thomas Hastings revised the design to be an independent hotel. The front of the building contained the rooms and elegant shops, in the center were the baths (Turkish with dry heat, and Russian with steam bath), a cold plunge pool, massage rooms, and gymnasium. The rear of the building was the casino with the entertainments: the world’s largest-at-that-time indoor swimming pool, bowling alley, archery range, ballroom, and tennis courts and croquet lawn outside.

Hotel Alcazar: Another Henry Flagler grand hotel