The Spring House Gazebo is a historic

gazebo A gazebo is a pavilion structure, sometimes octagonal or turret-shaped, often built in a park, garden or spacious public area. Some are used on occasions as bandstands. Etymology The etymology given by Oxford Dictionaries is "Mid 18th c ...

of Eden Park within

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. Designed by architect Cornelius M. Foster and completed in , it is the oldest enduring park structure in the Cincinnati municipal park system. As an icon of the entire park system, it appears in the logo of the Cincinnati Park Board. The gazebo was constructed in the Moorish style, with brightly painted arches and ball finials. The gazebo took its name from the old

spring house A spring house, or springhouse, is a small building, usually of a single room, constructed over a spring. While the original purpose of a springhouse was to keep the spring water clean by excluding fallen leaves, animals, etc., the enclosing stru ...

it replaced. Said to have therapeutic qualities, locals hauled away the spring water by the bucketful until the spring was found to be contaminated. The well was sealed off in 1912. The Spring House Gazebo stands near the center of the park next to Mirror Lake, a large

reflecting pool A reflecting pool, also called a reflection pool, is a water feature found in gardens, parks, and memorial sites. It usually consists of a shallow pool of water, undisturbed by fountain jets, for a reflective surface. Design Reflecting pools are ...

and former city reservoir with a walkway around its perimeter. The seasonal fountain in Mirror Lake shoots water in the air and can be seen from miles away from the hilltop park.

Remus incident

In 1925, popular Cincinnati attorney and bootlegger George Remus was indicted for thousands of violations of the

Volstead Act The National Prohibition Act, known informally as the Volstead Act, was an act of the 66th United States Congress, designed to carry out the intent of the 18th Amendment (ratified January 1919), which established the prohibition of alcoholic d ...

, convicted by a jury that made its decision in under two hours, and given a two-year federal prison sentence. He spent two years in Atlanta Federal Penitentiary for bootlegging.Haunted Cincinnati and Southwest Ohio
by Jeff Morris, Michael A. Morris; Arcadia Publishing, 2009 While he was in prison, Remus befriended another inmate and told him his wife whom he adored, Imogene, had control over his money. The inmate was an undercover prohibition agent

Franklin Dodge Franklin L. Dodge, Jr. (July 29, 1891 – November 26, 1968) was a Bureau of Investigation agent in the early 1920s who had an affair with Imogene Remus, the wife of millionaire bootlegger George Remus. Franklin L. Dodge, Jr. was born in L ...

. Dodge resigned his job and started an affair with Imogene. The pair liquidated Remus' assets and hid as much of the money as possible, in addition to attempting to deport Remus, and even hiring a hit man to murder Remus for $15,000. In addition, Remus's huge Fleischmann distillery was sold by Imogene, who gave her imprisoned husband only $100 of the multimillion-dollar empire he created. Imogene then filed for divorce from Remus in late 1927. On the way to court, on October 6, 1927, for the finalization of the divorce, Remus had his driver chase the cab carrying Imogene and her daughter through Eden Park in Cincinnati, finally forcing it off the road. Remus jumped out and fatally shot Imogene in the abdomen in front of the Spring House Gazebo. George Remus acted as his own lawyer and defended himself as a man driven mad by his wife's adultery, thievery, and betrayal. He was ultimately acquitted in one of the first successful cases of the insanity defense. Legend has it that the ghost of Imogene Remus haunts the gazebo. Since that time, there have been reports of a ghost wearing a black dress in and around the gazebo, gazing at a reflecting pool nearby. Alleged sightings are usually at dusk in the autumn season.

References

{{coord, 39.11425, -84.49351, type:landmark_region:US-OH, format=dms, display=title Buildings and structures in Cincinnati Pavilions in the United States Buildings and structures completed in 1904 Reportedly haunted locations in Ohio Moorish Revival architecture in Ohio Gazebos