Memory Lane: Before Whitehall, Henry Flagler hung his hat at these Palm Beach places

Though he spent most of his time in Palm Beach at his opulent marble-pillared mansion, Henry Flagler — whose 1890s railroad arrival and luxe hotels were game-changers — also stayed overnight elsewhere during his winter visits.

After all, his 55-room manse, Whitehall — a gift to his third wife and now the centerpiece of the Flagler Museum — wasn’t completed until 1902.

So where did Flagler stay in Palm Beach before he and Mary Lily Kenan Flagler moved into the palatial Whitehall after they were married in 1901?

As many locals know, Whitehall wasn’t Flagler’s first Palm Beach residence. Flagler visited Palm Beach before buying that first residence, arriving here after transforming once-sleepy St. Augustine into a destination.

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His first Palm Beach visit came in 1892, when the place was largely a swampy jungle and part of an area called Lake Worth,  named for its focal-point 22-mile-long lake (now part of the Intracoastal Waterway).

Wealthy people, such as Thomas Adams of Tutti Frutti chewing-gum fame, had already built houses here among the pioneers who preceded them and built a community with businesses including small hotels.

On his first visit, Flagler stayed at the home of Frederick and Marsena Nelson Robert, who lived on ocean-to-lake property around what later would be named Seabreeze Avenue. The Roberts had begun winter sojourns to Palm Beach around 1891, traveling from their home base in Saratoga Springs, New York.

In 1893, “President Grover Cleveland’s inauguration was celebrated (in Palm Beach) by the raising of the flag on the dock belonging to Mr. Frederick Robert,” reported the now-gone local Tropical Sun newspaper. “Mrs. Robert sang the Star-Spangled Banner.”

Marsena, an accomplished singer active with The Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea, hosted church and social events at the Robert home (later known as Fleur d’Eau) with poetry readings and singing recitals.

Asked about her first impressions of Palm Beach, she said the “absence of … carriages, wagons and the noise of wheels of any kind” reminded her of Venice, Italy."

Flagler also was smitten with Palm Beach, which he called “a veritable paradise.”

Armed with a plan to make it an unrivaled Florida resort, Flagler went on a property-buying spree in 1893 to build what would become his lakefront Hotel Royal Poinciana, which opened in 1894, and, just east, an oceanfront hotel later renamed The Breakers, which opened in 1901.

His 1893 purchases also included Palm Beach’s then-finest home: Croton Cottage, which he bought for $75,000 from Denver, Colorado businessman Robert McCormick, who’d called his property Lac-a-Mer when his home debuted in 1886.

The Queen Anne shingle-style home featured stained glass windows, a marble entryway, a mahogany staircase and a third-story tower.

As Flagler’s first Palm Beach winter residence, it neighbored his Royal Poinciana and the annual winter social whirl that began after Flagler’s railroad first reached the area in March 1894.

Following a fall at Whitehall in May of 1913, Henry Flagler died at oceanfront Nautilus Cottage at The Breakers on May 20 of that year. In 1913, the McCormick house was moved to The Breakers and became a rental called Sea Gull Cottage. After a 1984 restoration, it was returned to its original vicinity on land donated by Royal Poinciana Chapel. Now boasting an extensive 2010-completed renovation, it’s the town’s oldest house.

It was not the last place Flagler stayed before moving into Whitehall.

While it’s entirely possible Flagler lodged now and again at the lavish six-story Royal Poinciana, he and Mary Lily bunked during Christmastime in 1901 at one of several now-gone three-story rental “cottages” at The Breakers.

Just north of the oceanfront hotel, the Flaglers, then married for four months, stayed “cooped up in one of the small cottages on the seashore,” Flagler wrote in a Dec. 19, 1901 letter to Owen Hill Kenan, Flagler Museum officials noted.

A year later, they celebrated the completion of Whitehall, where the manse’s 120th birthday now backbones a special exhibition at the Flagler Museum.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Henry Flagler hung his hat at these Palm Beach places