When Bolles students arrive on campus each day, they are greeted by a beautiful building they know as Bolles Hall.What some people fail to realize is that Bolles Hall is much more than some classrooms and dorm rooms, it was formerly a hotel
The story of Bolles Hall started in 1907, when Governor Napoleon Broward asked Richard J. Bolles, (who had made a fortune in Colorado mining), to come to Florida and help drain our swamps. He first stopped in Miami and then in 1908 came to Jacksonville. He was accompanied by his secretary, Agnes W. Cain. When Bolles died in 1917, care of his estate went to her. Later, Cain would get her hands on what was The San Jose Hotel, but now Bolles Hall.
The San Jose Hotel was designed to be the centerpiece of San Jose. San Jose itself would have become a city if it wasn’t for the Great Depression.
Talks about the construction of the San Jose community began in 1914 when The San Jose Company was established by Claude Nolan. Nolan, the owner of Claude Nolan Cadaliac, backed the project because he believed automobiles would foster the growth of outlying suburban communities. These plans were significantly delayed due to the beginning of World War 1.
Construction would resume in 1925 when the San Jose Company hired John Nolen, America’s first professional city planner. Nolen, who was responsible for laying out cities such as West Palm Beach and Sarasota, was in charge of the layout of San Jose. Nolen envisioned San Jose as its own functioning city. Architects Marsh and Saxlebye were asked to render the effect of an ancient Spanish castle.
Before the construction of the hotel began, The San Jose Company donated it to the estate of Bolles, which Cain controlled.
The San Jose Hotel was spacious, containing 65,332 square feet. The first unit of the hotel which sits on the St. Johns River contained 100 rooms and cost 14.7 million to build in today’s money. The secondary pieces (outside of Bolles Hall) contained another 125 rooms. The hotel opened in January of 1926, and Charles A Johnson was hired as the hotel manager. The first mortgage payment, paid by Cain, was 200,000 dollars.
The first unit of the hotel, which is now the modern Bolles Hall, has three stories. The first floor, which looks the same today, contains an elevator and dining hall that looks out to the river. The first floor used to have a barber shop and a beauty parlor.
The hotel provided endless activities for their guests. such as, golf, yachting, boating, swimming, horseback riding, polo, tennis, fishing, and trap shooting.
The hotel’s golf course, which is now part of the San Jose Country Club, was famously known for being one of Florida’s most luxury courses during the time. The course consisted of 18 holes and was built as part of the hotel by Scottish golfer Donald Ross. Ross designed roughly 400 golf courses in the United States and Canada between 1900 and 1948. Four of these courses are in Jacksonville. Ross was known for attention to detail and made his courses stand out as a more challenging than others.
During the planning of San Jose, Nolen wanted to make sure The San Jose Hotel could be easy to access. During this time period, there were five trunk railroads that connected San Jose and Jacksonville to the entire United States. The Clyde Steamship company also ran routes to Jacksonville regularly. San Jose also had the ability to land aircraft across the St. Johns River.
When the San Jose Hotel opened in 1926, hotel bookings were great. Unfortunately, this did not last forever as Florida’s real estate boom became a bust thanks to the Great Depression, when the economy started to collapse.
In 1928, The San Jose Company canceled the construction of the second hotel south of San Jose Hotel, The Vanderbilt. The San Jose Hotel was forced to shut its doors. Cain foreclosed on the hotel’s mortgage and took possession of the property.
What do you do with a million dollar tourist hotel when the real estate market has fallen out? You play it smart. Cain formed a corporation (Bolles Investment Company). She elected herself as president and sold the hotel to the same Bolles Investment Company for $225,000.
After this sale, she leased the property to a hotel group that paid $100,000 immediately. Then to the Florida Military Academy for three years.
When the summer of 1932 came around, the military academy failed to meet their financial obligations and were given notice that same year. The former hotel was now vacant. With Cain out of ideas, local attorney John C. Cooper had a suggestion for her. “Why don’t you form a school out there? The community needs one.”
So , that’s exactly what Cain and her husband did, creating what we now know as The Bolles School. In 1933 The Bolles school officially opened.
Today, Bolles Hall is known to be one of the 25 structures of the San Jose Estates development that is still standing. The building is unquestionably the most architecturally distinguished structure associated with the early development of the San Jose Estates subdivision.
Bolles often uses the hall in their marketing and advertising because that’s what the school is commonly known for.