The Vinoy Renaissance St. Petersburg Resort & Golf Club is an historic Mediterranean Revival-style

hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a ref ...

opened in 1925 as the Vinoy Park Hotel. It is located in

St. Petersburg, Florida St. Petersburg is a city in Pinellas County, Florida, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 258,308, making it the fifth-most populous city in Florida and the second-largest city in the Tampa Bay Area, after Tampa. It is the ...

at 501 Fifth Avenue Northeast, on the bayfront area of downtown, overlooking the Vinoy Yacht Basin. The hotel is a member of

Historic Hotels of America Historic Hotels of America is a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation that was founded in 1989 with 32 charter members; the program accepts nominations and identifies hotels that have maintained their authenticity, sense of pla ...

, the official program of the

National Trust for Historic Preservation The National Trust for Historic Preservation is a privately funded, nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that works in the field of historic preservation in the United States. The member-supported organization was founded in 1949 by ...

History

The Vinoy Park Hotel was built in 1925 by oil tycoon Aymer Vinoy Laughner. Construction began on February 5 and took 10 months to complete, with a grand opening on December 31. It was a seasonal hotel, open from around December to March. Celebrities ranging from

Babe Ruth George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...

Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was an American politician who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933 and a member of the Republican Party, holding office during the onset of the Gr ...

Calvin Coolidge Calvin Coolidge (born John Calvin Coolidge Jr.; ; July 4, 1872January 5, 1933) was the 30th president of the United States from 1923 to 1929. Born in Vermont, Coolidge was a History of the Republican Party (United States), Republican lawyer ...

and

James Stewart James Maitland Stewart (May 20, 1908 – July 2, 1997) was an American actor and military pilot. Known for his distinctive drawl and everyman screen persona, Stewart's film career spanned 80 films from 1935 to 1991. With the strong morality h ...

are known to have stayed there. With the onset of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the hotel closed on July 3, 1942 and was taken over by the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...

for use as a training school. The hotel reopened in December 1944. It was then sold in 1945 to Charles Alberding for $700,000. It continued to prosper for the next couple of decades but fell out of favor and into decline and disrepair by the end of the 1960s. In 1974, the Vinoy Park closed and most of its contents were sold at auction. On September 11, 1978, it was added to the

U.S. 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 ...

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

. The hotel sat vacant until 1990, when it was bought by the Vinoy Development Corporation, which renovated it at a cost of $93 million. The hotel reopened in 1992 as the Stouffer Vinoy Resort. Stouffer Hotels was bought by Renaissance Hotels the following year, and the hotel became the Renaissance Stouffer Vinoy Resort, and then in 1996 the Renaissance Vinoy Resort. In 2005, the Vinoy earned

AAA AAA, Triple A, or Triple-A is a three-letter initialism or abbreviation which may refer to: Airports * Anaa Airport in French Polynesia (IATA airport code AAA) * Logan County Airport (Illinois) (FAA airport code AAA) Arts, entertainment, and me ...

Four-Diamond status. On April 18, 2012, the

AIA AIA or A.I.A. or Aia may refer to: Aia * Aia, a small town in the Basque province of Gipuzkoa, Spain * Aia, current Kutaisi, ancient capital of Colchis * Aia, another name for Aea (Malis), an ancient town in Greece * ''Aia'', the collected ed ...

's Florida Chapter placed it on its list of ''Florida Architecture: 100 Years. 100 Places''. In August 2018, the hotel was sold by RLJ Lodging Trust to SCG Hospitality, owned by Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ owner

Bryan Glazer Bryan Glazer (born October 27, 1964) is an American businessman. Together with his brothers, Joel Glazer and Edward Glazer, he owns part of the First Allied Corporation, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers National Football League franchise, and the Engl ...

. The sale includes a golf club and 74-slip marina as well as the 362-room hotel. The amount of the sale was reported to be $188.5 million. It is set to leave the Renaissance brand of Marriott and join the Autograph Collection brand as The Vinoy St. Petersburg Resort & Golf Club in early 2023, at the conclusion of major renovations.

Paranormal activity

Over the years, there have been reports of ghost sightings and other supernatural events at the hotel. Some of the reports were by visiting

major league baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

players and staff, who stayed at the Vinoy when in town to play the

Tampa Bay Rays The Tampa Bay Rays are an American professional baseball team based in St. Petersburg, Florida. The Rays compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) American League East, East division. Since its inception ...

. One of the reports came from a strength coordinator for the Pittsburgh Pirates. He described seeing a translucent apparition of a man near a desk in his room. Others have noted seeing a man dressed in formal attire walking the halls only to disappear without a trace.Ghosts of Vinoy Park Hotel
HauntedRooms.com

References

External links

Pinellas County listings
a
National Register of Historic Places

Official website

Marriott Hotel History Vinoy Renaissance Resort and Golf Club
Hotels in Florida National Register of Historic Places in Pinellas County, Florida Buildings and structures in St. Petersburg, Florida 1925 establishments in Florida Hotels established in 1925 Hotel buildings completed in 1925 Hotel buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Florida Historic Hotels of America

History

Paranormal activity

See also

References

External links