Читать книгу Ghosthunting Florida - Dave Lapham - Страница 10

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, as if Brent were telling him he was okay and that the elevator was safe.

There are many other stories of sightings on the fifth floor. One hotel patron said he woke from a deep sleep in the middle of the night feeling as if someone were staring at him from a chair across the room. He jumped out of bed to confront the man, and there was a loud crash, as if a table or heavy chair had tipped over. He flicked on the lights; no one else was in the room, and no furniture had been moved.

The rooftop bar of the La Concha provides not only exquisite views of Key West and its breathtaking sunsets, but also a spectacular diving platform for anyone wishing to commit suicide in a gruesome way. Thirteen people have jumped to their deaths over the years from the La Concha rooftop.

On October 7, 1992, Fred Butner, a well-known local attorney, took the plunge onto Duval Street. His former secretary, Susan, supposedly had reported him to the Florida Bar Association for negligent and illegal practices. Knowing his business and his reputation would be destroyed, he decided to take his own life, but he was vindictive. He was going to ruin Susan while he was at it. He wrote several extortion notes that seemed to come from her and that he carried on his person, and he planted an envelope with payoff money in her car. He even carried a tape recorder with him as he entered the hotel, announcing his arrival on the tape and supposedly telling Susan, “I have what you want.” Then, he yelled, “No! No!” and the last sound on the tape recorder was his body hitting the pavement below. A subsequent investigation exonerated Susan.

In 2006, Michael Bachand, a troubled Orlando man, came to Key West and went up to the rooftop for a drink. He ordered a glass of chardonnay and walked outside to a spot overlooking the swimming pool. He drank his wine in a few gulps, set the glass on the wall—and did a half gainer onto the pool deck below, which was also the roof of The Original Key West Ghost Tours store.

Shortly after that, drinking chardonnay at the rooftop bar became a bit of a problem. When someone ordered chardonnay, glasses would often get knocked out of their hands or plastic cups split in half. Down on the pool deck, trays of drinks were often tipped out of servers’ hands, but only female servers. Perhaps Mr. Bachand was distraught over a love affair gone sour.

Even more bizarre after this event were the happenings in the Ghost Tour’s store. The chandeliers began to rattle, and lights in the store would go out one by one, leaving the place in darkness. A violent wind often blew through, scattering T-shirts and books; doors slammed shut and opened again; and a creepy shadow was occasionally seen wandering throughout the store and up into the ceiling. Things also seemed to occur just outside the store. Brant had parked his truck on Fleming Street in front of the store one evening. As he started to get out, the manually operated windows began going up and down and the doors locking and unlocking. He was able to jump out of the truck, but as he did, the battery exploded, setting the truck on fire.

While these happenings were negative and sometimes violent, there was also a female presence in the store that seemed to be trying to protect everyone. Who this presence was, no one knew.

Eddie Ellington had been a tour guide for the Original Tours for several years. He was uniquely qualified—he was a medium. Because of his gift, when he was in the store, he was intimately aware of everything going on and seemed to be able to quiet much of the negative activity.

Unfortunately, Eddie died in 2008. He had no family but had told Brant that he wanted to be cremated and buried someplace in Key West. When he died, Brant made the arrangements for Eddie’s cremation. Afterward, he was given the box of Eddie’s ashes and wondered where Eddie would most want to be buried. Then, a thought came to him: why not the store? Eddie’s life had revolved around it, and the tours and his presence always seemed to reduce the negative energy and activities. So, that’s what Brant did. Eddie now sits on a shelf right behind the counter, keeping watch over everything.

And, truth be told, not much goes on there today. In fact, The Original Key West Ghost Tours store is now a pretty quiet place, but La Concha’s fifth floor still remains active—and who knows when some sad soul will take the plunge from the rooftop.