DeFuniak Springs
The railroad ran from here to anywhere in the United States. Building materials and labor were dirt cheap in 1882. And the spring-fed lake they called Open Pond was a beautiful place to get off the train for the winter. When it was chosen as a winter home for the New York Chautauqua, a cultural and religious community, the name was changed to honor Frederick deFuniak, chief engineer of the L&N Railroad. Mansions with turrets and columns, wrap-around verandas and gingerbread trim sprouted like mushrooms after a rain. By 1920, the community was ready for a grand, two-story commercial building, built to house a furniture store on the ground floor and the Masonic Lodge upstairs. During the Depression the building had to be sold, but after World War II a local buyer remodeled it with 14 bedrooms and baths in response to a post-war housing shortage. Today the old streets of DeFuniak Springs, the small hotel, and the annual Chautauqua goings-on take you back to a golden time before the war.
Sweet Dreams
Hotel DeFuniak
Grandly refurbished, this structure that was built in 1920 as a furniture store now offers rooms and suites with queen-size or twin beds. Suites have a queen-size bed and a queen-size sofa bed. Dine in the splendid Chautauqua room, relax in the library, or just hang out in the commodious lobby to watch the world go by. In recreating the Florida of the 1920s, when northern Florida was a winter spa, decorators brought in wicker furniture and palm trees, which are deliciously incongruous at these latitudes. This is the perfect place for long, romantic walking tours of the lake district. During Chautauqua, it’s a headquarters for lectures and activities.
