The Hotel Florida was situated in

Callao Square The Callao Square () is located at the centre of the Spanish capital of Madrid. History and description Shaped in 1861, the square was formally opened in June 1866; its name remembers the May 1866 battle of Callao between the Spanish naval forc ...

#2 in central

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

, Spain. It was built in 1924 and was used as a base by many of the foreign correspondents stationed in Madrid during the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

. While based in Spain as a correspondent for the North American News Association (NANA),

Ernest Hemingway Ernest Miller Hemingway ( ; July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer and journalist. Known for an economical, understated style that influenced later 20th-century writers, he has been romanticized fo ...

stayed at the hotel, where he wrote a play. The hotel was demolished in 1964 and a new building for the

Galerías Preciados Galerías Preciados, S.A. was a Spanish chain of department stores founded in 1943 by José "Pepín" Fernández Rodríguez. Named after Calle de Preciados, the street on which it stood, Galerías Preciados was, along with El Corte Inglés, one of ...

department store was built on the site.

History

The architect

Antonio Palacios Antonio Palacios Ramilo (8 January 1874 – 27 October 1945) was a Spanish architect. Distinguished by the monumental eclecticism he left as imprint in many of his projects, he helped define the architectural identity of Madrid in the first half ...

designed and built the hotel on a site in the Plaza de Callao, on the Gran Vía (then under construction). It was inaugurated in February 1924. The whole façade of the building was marble. The hotel's 200 rooms, each with a bathroom, achieved fame during the Civil War, when it became the residence of correspondents, foreign writers and intellectuals featured in Madrid during its siege.

Mikhail Koltsov Mikhail Efimovich Koltsov () (The record of the birth of Moisey Fridlyand in the metric book of the Kiev rabbinate for 1898 ( ЦГИАК Украины. Ф. 1164. Оп. 1. Д. 442. Л. 138об–139.) – February 2, 1940), born Moisey Haimovic ...

, Geoffrey Cox, Henry Buckley,

Ksawery Pruszyński Franciszek Ksawery Pruszyński (4 December 1907 – 13 June 1950) was a Polish journalist, publicist, writer and diplomat. He was one of the most active and operative of Polish newspaper reporters. Biography He was born in Wolica Kierekieszyna ...

, Wiadomosci Literackie and Herbert L. Matthews were among the members of this community, which also met in the nearby headquarters of

Telefónica , S.A. () is a Spanish multinational telecommunications company with registered office and headquarters located in two different places, both in Madrid, Spain. It is one of the largest telephone operators and mobile network providers in the ...

and the Hotel Gran Vía. For a time

and his mistress, later his third wife,

Martha Gellhorn Martha Ellis Gellhorn (8 November 1908 – 15 February 1998) was an American novelist, travel writer and journalist who is considered one of the great war correspondents of the 20th century. She reported on virtually every major world confli ...

used the hotel as their base in Madrid. Hemingway was at the hotel during the Spanish Civil War and on a daily basis he expected a bomb to land on his typewriter. He wrote '' The Fifth Column'' during the siege itself. Photographers Robert Capa with his partner Gerda Taro first met Hemingway at the Florida.

John Dos Passos John Roderigo Dos Passos (; January 14, 1896 – September 28, 1970) was an American novelist, most notable for his U.S.A. (trilogy), ''U.S.A.'' trilogy. Born in Chicago, Dos Passos graduated from Harvard College in 1916. He traveled widely as a ...

also passed through the Florida and immortalized his stay in an article called ''Room with a bathroom in the Hotel Florida'', published by ''

Esquire Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title. In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentleman ...

'' magazine in January 1938. The last such war correspondent staying in Hotel Florida was O. D. Gallagher, sent by the London ''

Daily Express The ''Daily Express'' is a national daily United Kingdom middle-market newspaper printed in Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid format. Published in London, it is the flagship of Express Newspapers, owned by publisher Reach plc. It was first ...

'', said to be the only foreigner who waited to see Franco's troops enter Madrid. The hotel was also a favourite haunt for

Frank Tinker Frank Glasgow Tinker (July 14, 1909 – June 13, 1939) was an American volunteer fighter pilot for the ''Fuerzas Aéreas de la República Española'' ("Air Forces of the Spanish Republic"; FARE), during the Spanish Civil War. Tinker was cred ...

and other U.S. mercenary fighter pilots enlisted with the loyalist forces during the civil war, who relished the opportunity to stop by for a hot bath whenever they could make it to Madrid. In 2006, the Instituto Cervantes y la Fundación Pablo Iglesias opened an exhibition in New York called the "War Correspondents in Spain", covering the work and adventures of many of the people of the Florida. The reception and main hall of the Hotel Florida were reproduced in the old train station in

Oakland, California Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, California, Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major We ...

, for the filming of the HBO production ''

Hemingway & Gellhorn ''Hemingway & Gellhorn'' is a 2012 American biographical drama television film directed by Philip Kaufman and written by Jerry Stahl and Barbara Turner, about the lives of journalist Martha Gellhorn (Nicole Kidman) and her husband, writer Er ...

'' (2012).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Florida Hotel buildings completed in 1924 Hotels in Madrid Defunct hotels in Spain Hotel Florida Hotel Florida Demolished buildings and structures in Madrid Hotels established in 1924 Hotels disestablished in 1964 Hotel Florida Hotel Florida Hotel Florida Demolished hotels Plaza del Callao

History

See also

References