VOLUSIA

Curious Coast: Is Al Capone connected in some way to New Smyrna Beach?

Tony Holt
tony.holt@news-jrnl.com

NEW SMYRNA BEACH — Rumor has it an upscale home near the river housed a mobster's mistress, contained a cache of bootlegged rum and had direct access to a man-made, river-fed stream perfectly suited for covert deliveries.

The old brick house along the Gabordy Canal shows all signs of 1920s Chicago architecture. In a neighborhood of older-than-average homes for New Smyrna Beach, the South Riverside Drive home that was built in 1926 is a stand-out.

The longtime rumor is being reprised today after an inquisitive reader posed a question for The News-Journal's project Curious Coast. Readers send questions related to Volusia and Flagler counties.

The reader who submitted the question, "Is Al Capone connected in some way to New Smyrna Beach?" is Fagg Shawver, 73, of Edgewater.

Shawver has always been intrigued by the story that has persisted for generations that the house was built for notorious mobster Al Capone — at a time when his Prohibition-era criminal empire was at its apex.

The house, according to rumors, was used as a storage facility for illegal booze and was occupied by one of his women on the side. At the time then only called New Smyrna, the city was in a "land boom," according to city documents which estimated the population at about 2,500 in 1920.

Another story is that Capone hosted card games there and it served as a hub or rest stop for those who worked for him.

There is no proof the house at 1802 S. Riverside Drive is connected in any way to Capone. The Volusia County Property Appraiser's Office couldn't find any records predating 1955, but an employee there has vowed to keep looking.

"It's all alleged," said Barbara Zaffuto, a volunteer with the New Smyrna Museum of History who leads the historic walking tours through the city. "I don't know that there's really any connection (to Capone).

"It was apparently built by a lady from Chicago," Zaffuto continued. "It's a nice, brick house. Between those two facts, people got Al Capone out of it."

Back-in-time feel

Walking through the house, or even near it, can give someone a sense of going back in time. Such historical footprints aren't so common in this part of the country.

The house itself stretches high and low. It towers above other homes along South Riverside Drive. It also has a basement, a rare feature in Florida homes. The underground room is about 720 square feet, larger than an average studio apartment. It's an ideal storage area.

The bricks are interrupted by double-hung windows arranged to allow in breezes from the Indian River to its east. The house also has high ceilings, a sunroom and a wood-burning fireplace. The current owner, who bought the property three years ago, filled it with handmade, wood decor, which only enhances its classic feel.

The homeowner requested that her name not be used in this story. Rumors have persisted about the house's connection to Capone, so she occasionally sees brazen photo-seekers standing in her front yard striking poses. She is protective of her privacy and doesn't want to attract more sightseers.

She did, however, retell many of the stories shared with her during the past few years and gave a News-Journal reporter and photographer a tour of the house.

"No one can prove this is Al Capone's house, that I know of," she said. "But I've heard so many stories."

Tunnel system

One of the most persistent rumors about the house was that it had a tunnel system that stretched to the canal. A former neighbor, who was elderly, told the homeowner that he once saw the tunnel from the inside. He was a child at the time. It was used by Capone and others to enter the house unseen, according to folk tales.

The homeowner was told the tunnel had to be filled years ago because it had started to cave in.

The canal is perpetually low these days, but people who live along it believe the water level was higher before more nearby development came along. That meant boats could easily come off the Indian River, head upstream and reach the concrete dock near the south side of the house. The dock is only about 25 feet from the exterior wall, so the tunnel didn't have to stretch far. It is likely the tunnel was located on either side of the fireplace, the homeowner said.

A wall in the house was torn down before the current homeowner bought it. She was told that a bottle of rum and a pistol were found in a hiding place.

"There was nothing out here back then," she said, suggesting the house was built for a particular purpose. "This house was out here alone."

Jeff Hostetler, 59, who owns a local painting business, was hired by the homeowner to paint the wood trims around the windows. The house has 45 windows. For that reason alone, Hostetler will always remember it, he said.

According to the rumors he heard, the house was bought in Capone's housekeeper's name, which is why local authorities were never wise to Capone's local activities.

"It's a beautiful house," he said. "It took me a hell of a long time to paint all those windows."

Hostetler posted photos of the house on Facebook and labeled the photo album "Al Capone House." Many people, like him, assume it is a known fact that Capone was the first owner of that property.

Capone across Florida

Capone's connections to Florida seem to be spread across the state. He was suspected of frequenting the Mount Plymouth Hotel and Country Club in eastern Lake County during the 1920s. There are stories on real estate sites that Capone once bought a house for his mother in St. Petersburg. He also was rumored to have visited the Indian River Lodge, which once stood in the 1200 block of South Riverside Drive, six blocks north of his rumored house in New Smyrna Beach. It was a three-story inn with a 5,000-square-foot lobby — and a basement.

One of the last people to manage it, Zaffuto said, claimed to have had a photograph of Al Capone. The story was that he had visited the bar inside the once-upscale inn. He would show up there while in town to see his mistress, according to rumors.

"When you move to New Smyrna Beach, it's one of the three things you learn," Zaffuto said of the city's alleged connection to Capone. "It's such a good story."

New Smyrna has another 1920s-era, Chicago-style brick house. It is located on South Peninsula Avenue near Flagler Avenue. It, too, is alleged to have been a home owned by a mafioso.

Zaffuto pointed out again how such rumors easily get started and how they stubbornly remain in circulation — even across generations.

There is also a stucco-and-wood house in Port Orange that allegedly is haunted by one of Capone's French mistresses and her bodyguard.

Zaffuto said liquor stills left over from the Prohibition era were found on a some of the small islands up and down the Mosquito Lagoon, which runs through New Smyrna Beach and flows to Brevard County. Evidence of those stills are backed up by old newspaper stories, she said.

Her guess is that the local bootlegging market likely wasn't large enough to attract big-time organized crime bosses like Capone.

"I don't believe it at all," she said. "He had bigger things to do, I think."

One house in Florida that is known to have been owned by Capone is located in Palm Island in Miami Beach. Capone, who was of Italian descent but was never known to have visited Italy, was drawn to the property because it conjured thoughts in his head of what the Italian shores might have looked like. He bought the mansion in 1927, but he was sentenced to prison five years later for tax evasion.

A year or so after his release from Alcatraz in 1939, Capone, who by that time was suffering from the late stages of syphilis, returned to his Palm Island home. He died there in January 1947.

Whether the story is true or not, Shawver, the question-asker, said he always had a fascination for organized crime in America and heard rumors for years that Capone had local ties.

"It's just something I've always been interested in," he said. "I drove by his house yesterday, as a matter of fact.

"Every time I go by there I think about it," Shawver said.

What else would you like to know?

Ask us anything you like below (if you don't see the forms, visit news-journalonline.com/curious-coast). Then vote in our weekly poll for the question that interests you the most, and we'll be back with the next answer.

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