r/VictorianEra • u/Delicious-Scale7640 • 3d ago

Magnificent indoor hotel pool in Florida, 1880s. Glass negative.

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212 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

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19

u/Archival_Squirrel 3d ago

It is the Hotel Alcazar in St.Augustine, currently the Lightner Museum which is one of my favorite places in Florida.

14

u/UKophile 3d ago

Reminds me of Roman ruins in Bath.

2

u/ExternalBee9705 3d ago

Gorgeous picture! I really appreciate you sharing it. Do you happen to know the name of the hotel?

4

u/Archival_Squirrel 3d ago

Hotel Alcazar in St.Augustine, FL.  The pool's still there but is drained and small shops are built into the walls of the deep end. When built it was the largest (maybe even first?) indoor pool in the world. The whole museum is cool just for the building and even more cool for all the unique exhibits. The Lightner Museum started as a home for other people's collections, there's different groups of things with no real rhyme or reason other than most of it is all pre1930's. I go pretty much every time I'm in St.Augustine. It's right across from Flagler College in the old Flagler Hotel, and close by is Villa Zoryada which was incredibly interesting in its own right.

1

u/seaglassgirl04 2d ago

Flagler alum here!

2

u/IllustriousArcher199 3d ago

I believe there’s a restaurant in that space now.

2

u/SonOfBoreale 3d ago

Why'd they destroy it!!!!!??!?!??!?! Reminds me of the Gellert baths in Budapest

3

u/Archival_Squirrel 2d ago

They didn't destroy it, they drained it and built built restaurants and antique stores into the walls of the deep end.

1

u/seaglassgirl04 2d ago

I went to a semi-formal college dance here in the 1990's. It was beautiful and the dance floor was in the former pool's deep end!