“tools,” such as Ouija boards, which can, in inexperienced hands, summon unwanted and uncontrollable spirits. I urge you to read and learn from the experts before venturing forth on your own ghosthunting expedition.
As I said, I am not very sensitive. Yes, I have experienced the inexplicable, have been overwhelmed by feelings of negative energy, have seen images that may or may not have been apparitions, but I am no psychic, and I am sure that my imagination had much to do with many of my experiences. But I have sensitive friends, most particularly my sometimes sidekick, Joanne Maio. She doesn’t like to be called psychic, but she is extremely sensitive, so much so that she often is asked to walk through buildings and areas suspected of being haunted and give her impressions.
I have divided the state into five geographical regions: The Keys and the South, West Central, East Central, North, and the Panhandle. Each is unique in its own way. Because Florida is such a long state, over one thousand miles from Key West to Pensacola, I would recommend visiting each area separately, taking time to enjoy all the many interesting places in each region. There are many excellent guides to day trips around the state, and ghosthunting activities can easily be incorporated into these excursions, even on extended weekend mini-vacations. In fact, many readers of my previous books have said that they’ve used the stories as springboards for their children to research and study the history and culture of particular places.
For the avid ghosthunter and paranormal investigator, the Ghostly Resources section in the back of the book provides a listing of online resources, books, and organizations helpful to me in researching the stories. The organizations listed are especially open to assisting others delve into the mysteries of the other side.
I hope you will enjoy Ghosthunting Florida and find it useful and entertaining as you conduct your own explorations of the spirit world. Please feel free to contact me through my publisher if you would like to share your experiences. Don’t forget to check out the other books in this series; even though you might not be able to visit the sites, the books contain some great stories!
Now, buckle up and join Joanne, my intrepid wife, Sue, and me as we begin ghosthunting Florida.
Dave Lapham
Orlando, Florida
The Keys and the South
Arcadia
Arcadia’s Old Opera House & Museum
Delray Beach
The Colony Hotel & Cabaña Club
Key West
Audubon House & Tropical Gardens
Captain Tony’s Saloon
Hard Rock Café
La Concha
Marrero’s Guest Mansion
Miami
Historic Biltmore Hotel of Coral Gables
West Palm Beach
Riddle House
CHAPTER 1
La Concha
KEY WEST
KEY WEST IS ONE OF MY FAVORITE places and is also very haunted, so I decided to make it my first stop on this road trip of haunted Florida. My wife, Sue, and I drove down for our weeklong visit during the off-season, when it was quieter (better for ghosthunting) and also less expensive.
After we’d checked in and gotten settled, we paid a visit to The Original Key West Ghost Tours. Originally founded by my friend, David Sloan, Brant and Karen Voss now own the tour company and maintain a store of ghostly items in the Crowne Plaza Key West—La Concha.
Better known simply as La Concha or the Conch, it is a Key West landmark. Built in 1926 by Carl Aubuchon as the first “first class hotel” in Key West, with elevators, private baths, marble floors, and all the other amenities of any five-star hotel in the country, it was no surprise that it was an immediate success with wealthy high society. During the 1920s the sponge-gathering, cigar-making, and rum-running industries were booming, and tourists by the hundreds flocked to Key West on Henry Flagler’s Overseas Railroad. Key West was the richest city in the United States.
Then came the stock market crash of 1929 followed by the 1935 Labor Day hurricane. Key West, literally cut off from the mainland almost overnight, became the poorest city in America. But the Conch survived, barely, thanks to the beginning of the Second World War, and entertained such celebrities as Ernest Hemingway and Tennessee Williams.
After the war, however, age and competition took their toll on the hotel, and by the 1980s the building was closed and boarded up except for the rooftop bar and a kitchen downstairs to service it. The rooftop and its bar had always been one of the hotel’s attractions. With seven floors, the Conch was the tallest building in Key West, and the views from the roof were magnificent.
In 1986, Atlanta architect Richard Rauh, using old blueprints, photographs, interviews with longtime residents, and samples of wallpaper stripped from the walls, renovated the hotel and restored it to its former glory.
Brant was waiting for us at the Ghost Tours office when we arrived. Since we were already there in the La Concha, he took us on a tour, telling us about the history of the place and about the ghosts. The fifth floor is especially active, and patrons have reported seeing a male ghost there quite often. Because Ernest Hemingway stayed on the fifth floor and mentioned the hotel in his novel To Have and Have Not (Scribner’s, 1937), most people assume the ghost is Ernest Hemingway. But it’s not. It is actually Brent Hoekstra.
On New Year’s Eve 1982, Brent, a Key West resident, went up to the bar shortly after midnight to meet friends who worked there. They planned to celebrate New Year’s Eve down on Duval Street. Brent’s friends were still cleaning up when he arrived. Anxious to join the festivities in the street seven stories below, he volunteered to help.
One of his friends was stacking dirty glasses and dishes on a cart to be taken down to the kitchen. When the cart was full Brent offered to run it down for him. His friend handed him the key to the freight elevator and went back to cleaning up. He forgot to tell Brent how the elevator worked.
With passenger elevators today, you simply push the button, the car comes to your floor, the door opens, and you get on. However, with this particular freight elevator, left over from the 1920s, the door did not stay closed until the car reached your level, unlike present-day elevators. When you unlocked the door, it opened. You then had to press the button to bring the elevator car up. Brent didn’t know that. He unlocked the door and, pulling the cart behind him, backed into the opening—and plummeted onto the car six floors below. He died instantly. When the hotel reopened in 1986, Brent’s ghost was seen hanging around the Hemingway suite on the fifth floor.
Why Brent picked the fifth floor no one knows, but most are certain the spirit there is his. One of his close friends, a security guard at La Concha, often encountered Brent on the fifth floor. Brent’s friend was always a bit uncomfortable, but he was never frightened. In fact, waiting for the elevator on that floor, he often felt a comforting hand on his shoulder,
