Halton Sanitarium

Halton Building was a Jewel on the Bay

Photo credits: Sarasota County History Center

Although we imagine that Sarasota was a sleepy fishing village in the early 1900s, there were, even then, people and places that would shape the future of the area for many years to come.

These names of some of these early settlers are familiar to many of us. Names like John Hamilton Gillespie, Bertha Palmer, Owen Burns and John and Charles Ringling. However, lesser known figures also shaped Sarasota into the community we know today.

Dr. Jack Halton

One man who was prominent in Sarasota in the early years was Dr. Jack Halton, "the singing doctor." Noted for his beautiful baritone voice, he sang with national orchestras, including the Philadelphia Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra and the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

The lovely building, which Halton turned into a sanitarium, which was a landmark on Sarasota Bay from 1904 to 1961 and was associated with many significant people in Sarasota County History.

J. Louis Houle, one of Sarasota's early contractors, constructed the building for John Hamilton Gillespie in 1904. The structure is notable for its masonry block construction, a material also used in the downtown area, including the Badger Drug Store that had been on Main Street. It was on the northeast corner of the intersection of what is now U.S. 41 and Gulfstream Avenue, the site of One Sarasota Tower.

A favorite story about the building involves the time Mrs. Potter Palmer first came to Sarasota. With the news of her impending visit from Chicago also came a report that she might invest heavily in Sarasota. According to a much later account in the Sarasota Herald Tribune, with news of Mrs. Potter Palmer's first visit to Sarasota. A.B. Edwards called a hasty conference to decide where she should stay.

The Halton Sanitarium

Owen Burns

It was decided that she should stay at the Halton Sanitarium.

New furniture was purchased and all of the surgical equipment and medicine was removed so that Mrs. Palmer could use it as her headquarters during her stay.

According to the Herald Tribune, Mrs. Palmer did not discover, until years later, that the nice house she stayed in on her first visit to Sarasota was a disguised sanitarium with some impromptu furniture used as props.

According to Karl Grismer in "The Story of Sarasota," Halton was an Englishman who practiced medicine in Cincinnati and Muncie, Indiana before coming to Sarasota to escape the bleak northern winters.

He arrived on Thanksgiving Day in 1904 for a brief visit and was so impressed that he returned with his family by Christmas.

Owen Burns bought the property from Halton in 1910 shortly after Mrs. Palmer's visit. He lived there until the time of his death. Family members continued to reside in the home until 1939.

In an account provided to the Sarasota Herald Tribune in 1961 by Mrs. Owen Burns she described the house as "delightful in its early days with the view of the bay unparalleled. Downstairs, it had a large living room and on either side a sun room and music room. Upstairs there were eight bedrooms and two baths. On the third floor there were three bedrooms and a bath."

The Admiral

After being sold by Mrs. Owen Burns, the building was named The Admiral, a name that, according to her, reflected the war clouds on the horizon.

The home was turned into a rooming house, with motel accommodations added later. Demolished in December of 1961, the site was not built on again until much later. Still, today, generations of Sarasotans remember this handsome house on the bayfront.

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