Exploring Winter Park’s hotel history with the Winter Park History Museum

Everyone knows Winter Park is a city filled with fun historical notes.

Since its chartering in 1887, the city has seen its share of people and businesses come and go, but there is one aspect that has become of interest to the Winter Park History Museum — hotels.

Throughout the years, Winter Park has been home to a slew of historic hotels that have etched themselves into the annals of the city’s lore. Because of that, the History Museum is hosting its “Stories from the Langford and Park Plaza” Friday, Sept. 21, in downtown Winter Park.

“There are a lot of people still living who have fond memories of the Langford, and I swam there as a little child — it was really the place to be in the 60s and 70s,” said Susan Skolfield, executive director at the museum. “I think it is just a nod to those times.”

The panel itself — part of a speaker series hosted as a collaboration between the museum and the Winter Park Public Library — will take place from noon to 1 p.m. and feature the stories of Bob Langford, Gerry Langford Liff and Suzy Spang. Each participant has his or her own connection to Winter Park’s past hotels.

For instance, Bob and Gerry are the son and daughter of Langford Hotel founder Robert Langford, while Spang co-owns the Park Plaza with her sister, Mindy. Their parents were the original owners of the hotel that sits on Park Avenue.

The panel works in conjunction with the current “Wish You Were Here: The Hotels and Motels of Winter Park” on display at the museum.

Although the panel simply covers the Langford and Park Plaza, the exhibit explores all of the historic hotels and motels dating back to the city’s first hotel — The Rogers House — founded in 1882. That hotel went through multiple name changes — from Rogers House to The Seminole Inn to finally The Virginia Inn — before the property was sold in 1966.

“We just thought it was a subject that people of all ages could kind of relate to and enjoy,” Skolfield said. “And like the Alabama — that was a hotel that’s now a condominium, but that’s probably the only structure from that time that is still here. Our hotels are limited now.”

Although the Langford no longer exists — it closed in 2000 — its history helped pave a way for the reputation that the city holds.

Founded in 1956 on the corner of New England and Interlachen avenues, the Langford was known for its Empire Room Supper Club, Olympic-sized swimming pool — which was used to teach local kids how to swim — and a 150-animal zoo that was added in the 1970s.

It attracted celebrities such as Bob Dylan and Charlton Heston. It was also the hideout for former White House Counsel attorney John Dean during the Watergate hearings.

“They had amazing dinner events outside by the pool, and they would call them ‘extravaganzas’ — they’d have synchronized ballet and ice skating,” Skolfield said. “It was amazing — and there wasn’t anyone else in town doing that. And they had the Empire Room, with a piano bar and singers.”

Meanwhile, down on Park Avenue, the Park Plaza sits in the same place it has been since it was founded in 1922. The old hotel — originally named the Hamilton Hotel — was founded to serve as a modest hotel close to the Rollins College campus. 

The Spang family bought the hotel and transformed it into the business it is today, which includes 27 rooms that feature a European-style boutique feel.

The hotels that have come and gone throughout the years play an important role in the Winter Park community, Skolfield said.

“Hotels were such an anchor, because it was a planned community,” Skolfield said. “A hotel had to be here before anything, so that people could come and stay here and then ultimately purchase land and begin to build. That’s how the whole community rose up was, because the hotels, essentially.”