I froze in my tracks, chilled by the hostile existence I might sense powering me. A pall of silence fell concerning the space. Speckled, dancing colors from the stained glass home windows, paused of their motion on the partitions. Individuals stepping into the room stood stalk however. I step by step turned to see what had so startled me. I noticed nothing in any respect. The existence remained. I squinted, attempting to pierce the veil stopping me from what ever it was. The image common in my head of an indignant feminine nearing seventy. Her darkish hair confined in a bun on the again of her head was streaked with gray. She wore a print gown reaching completely under the knee. Her black, wool sweater hung open up. Her eyes flashed in anger as she ordered me out of the area.

On my preliminary go to to the Lightner Museum in 1977, I labored my method step by step because of the rooms and reveals. Numbed with a continuing onslaught of uniqueness and magnificence, it took the Tiffany residence to shake me right into a little or no brighter consciousness. “These posts have been manufactured by the gorgeous palms of Louis Comfort Tiffany,” I bear in mind considering.

In the course of the area, a big chandelier hung in my obtain. In a long time earlier, artists instructed me that the mark of a real masterpiece is the compulsion the viewer feels to contact it. This reduce-glass shade was little doubt these kind of a masterpiece and I felt that compulsion. I quietly approached it. Pausing in entrance of it for a few seconds to admire its splendor shut up, it transpired to me that there could be an alarm course of and if I touched it, bells and whistles could presumably go off bringing within the museum’s safety. I proceed to desired to the touch it. Boosting my hand in defiance of the possible outcomes, I prolonged my index finger and actually gently touched a critical Tiffany, minimize-glass Chandelier.

At precisely that second, the hostile presence made by itself acknowledged acceptable driving me.

Thirty a number of years handed with out the necessity of my supplying that have considerably thought-about. In time I went to carry out for Historic Excursions of The us. The enterprise wanted me to overview all of the historic factors of curiosity prematurely of I arrived on board fulltime, so I frequented the Lightner Museum once more. This time I moved extra step by step, possible primarily as a result of in my thirty years in St. Augustine, I skilled realized extra about Otto Lightner and his contemporaries than I understood on my very first go to. A lot of what I noticed this time launched to mind tales I learn and posts I’m going via. I remembered viewing a spot devoted to Musical Machines, on my preliminary pay a go to to.

A single of Otto Lightner’s collections was gear that may have interaction in musical devices. On my very first check out I skipped the live performance (11:00 A.M. and a pair of.00 P.M. every day). This time the stay efficiency was simply beginning as I walked into that place. Within the early 1900’s individuals right now had been rising energized about Machines. They constructed mechanical devices to do issues unimagined within the earlier and this area loudly echoes that pleasure in a group of cleverness and creativity forming an artwork type of its very personal. A single machine even performs a violin. There are lots of organs and avenue pianos which features a hurdy-gurdy. Tools ended up the fad of the day.

An adjoining area on the first floor shows two helpful, blown glass, steam engines the very essence of the age of market blown into artwork. An early “phrase processor” (an vintage typewriter) is proven in that place very best beside seashells and Indian spears. Otto Lightner’s ardour was amassing. His spouse most likely acknowledged, “he simply certainly not throws something away.” His button choice is upstairs with the slash glass and crystal. He gathered reasonably, marble females, elaborate furnishings and unusual dishes. The itemizing is limitless.

Lighter created his {dollars} within the Hobbies Journal group advocating the curiosity of gathering. He traveled the world performing his very personal buying. He was an avid collector of collections and he opened a museum to residence them. A customer will uncover virtually every part there from toasters to Tiffanies, from Steins to Steinways. He even gathered an Egyptian Mummy. That possibly has a ghost associated with it, method too. Lightner’s Museum is pretty a location, however essentially the most extraordinary, historic artifact there’s the creating by itself, a tribute to the creativeness of Henry Morrison Flagler. From his gardened courtyard to his marble fixtured steam residence, The Alcazar Lodge is an architectural assertion about splendor, luxurious and pleasure.

The swimming pool fascinates me even extra than the bathe with the sixteen shower-heads. The pool’s ceiling, 4 tales increased than the h2o when might be opened to the sky. Giant decks wrapped concerning the pool within the higher tales, searching down on swimmers in simply one of many main, indoor swimming swimming pools of its working day, fifty ft broad and only one hundred twenty ft extended. Viewing the place housing the swimming pool haunts the creativity. The house is cavernous. Shops line the perimeters of the pool. The Café Alcazar serves lunch within the deep cease, however the ghosts are nonetheless there. Even when they will not have the ability to be seen, they are often felt echoing via the silence of that huge hall. I marvel if Henry Flagler chafes about his swimming pool at present being become a theater, and if Richard Boone regrets the selection to engineer that rework. The times are gone when children splashed 1 yet one more in that h2o to the echoes of Beethoven from the orchestra earlier talked about, though their dancing mothers and dads in official attire seen in extra of them, a lot down under.

My visits to the Alcazar Lodge usually embrace time within the pool and reflection of the grandeur of those earlier spring evenings. As I wander by way of the establishing, I check out to think about the way it should have been as a resort. On this final pay a go to to, I wandered and mused as forward of however to my shock, I had a jarring reminder of my very first arrival on the Museum.

After going to the gymnasium, Lightner’s consuming space and the slash glass creations, I final however not least reached the Tiffany Place. A few years skilled handed contemplating the truth that my previous tour to see the real museum shows. The a little bit darkened place permitted the colors of Tiffany’s nice creations to be highlighted by the daylight shining by the use of the window. It took my eyes a second to vary and after they did, the to begin with level I noticed was that Tiffany chandelier. I walked nearer for a much better glimpse and felt the equivalent compulsion I felt, the very first time I used to be there. I desired to the touch it. The same views transpired, as previous to – what if there’s an alarm process. This must be reasonably priceless. I did not need to result in a stir or get into points, however nonetheless. I required to the touch it. I elevated my hand, prolonged my index finger and touched a real Tiffany growth. The ghost was however there.

I went again to the Lightner Museum right now to get images completely to {photograph} that Tiffany Chandelier for this quick article. I anticipated to acquire orbs in heaps of the photographs, on condition that lots of people right now in St. Augustine focus on of how haunted that making is. I used to be searching for ahead to discovering out if the ghost was nonetheless there.

Not solely was the ghost not there, the chandelier was not there, presumably. I went to a museum attendant and questioned concerning the chandelier and was knowledgeable to go to the desk downstairs and test with there. The individual I spoke with on the desk had been working on the Lightner Museum for a very long time. After I questioned concerning the chandelier, she answered, “What chandelier?”

I questioned if the exhibit skilled been modified within the remaining few a very long time and was defined to that the Tiffany exhibit skilled not been improved or altered in any method in way over forty a long time. I walked absent shaking my head. Not solely was there no chandelier, there skilled certainly not been a chandelier.

After I received residence I named the person who was with me on my remaining go to and she or he verified that we skilled noticed a chandelier and that I used to be not shedding my mind. The encounter remaining me to some extent disconcerted. I am not employed to proudly owning ghosts play with my senses on this method.