Nobody Asked Me, But… No. 167: Hotel History: Casa Monica Hotel, St. Augustine, Florida*

Stanley Turkel | September 26, 2016

By Stanley Turkel, CMHS The Casa Monica, one of the oldest hotels in the United States, was built by Franklin W. Smith, an idealistic reformer who made his fortune as a Boston hardware merchant. He was an early abolitionist, author and architectural enthusiast who proposed transforming Washington, D.C. into a "capital of beauty and cultural knowledge." He was a major founder of the YMCA and a supporter of the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln. Henry M. Flagler sold Smith the land on which to build the Casa Monica Hotel in 1887. The Casa Monica is an impressive five-story structure with 100-foot towers on each end topped with ti...