Experience the Greek flavor of Tarpon Springs, Fla.

Visitors come to Tarpon Springs, Fla., to admire and purchase the natural sea sponges, but they stay for the traditional Greek dishes and the delectable pastries and desserts served by authentic Greek eateries.

For more than a century, sponges harvested from the ocean floor have been sold on the “Sponge Docks” of Tarpon Springs. The city is generally regarded as the “Sponge Capital of the World.” 

These sponges are reasonably priced souvenirs for tourists to remember their visit to America’s “Little Greece” community. Buy several for assorted uses around the house.

 

There are advantages. To begin with, sea sponges are naturally odor-free, hypoallergenic and resistant to mold or bacterial growth, making them a more hygienic choice than synthetic sponges.

The softest variety, known as “wool sponges,” is an ideal choice for bathing, while durable “yellow sponges” and “grass sponges” are more suitable for general cleaning.

 

Merchants offer a few tips. Always wet the sponge fully with water before use. This makes it soft and increases its absorbency. When bathing, apply your favorite soap or body wash directly to the sponge. Massage it to create lather, which is excellent for cleansing and exfoliating.

Use a sponge in place of a cloth for dishes, scrubbing surfaces or cleaning delicate items without scratching. Use only mild soap and water. Never use bleach or detergents, as they will degrade the natural materials.

After each use, rinse the sponge thoroughly with clean, warm water. Gently squeeze out excess water, but avoid twisting, as it can tear the sponge. Don’t attempt to dry a sponge in a clothes dryer or microwave. Rather, let the sponge air dry completely in a well-ventilated area.

Monthly, give your sponge a 30-minute “deep clean” by soaking it in warm water with a little baking soda or a light vinegar mixed in to remove soap buildup. Sea sponges can last for three to five years with proper care.

The first Greek immigrants to settle in Tarpon Springs in the early 1900s were experienced sponge divers who were recruited from the Dodecanese Archipelago, a group of 12 islands in the Aegean Sea. They came by the hundreds to harvest the ocean bottom.

 

Their family members followed, and for more than a century, the Tarpon Springs community has embraced the Greek heritage and culture. About 25% of the current residents say they have Greek genes, and Tarpon Springs has more Greek Americans per capita than any other U.S. city.

Janet K. Keeler, who writes about the food and beverage industry in Florida, said locals and tourists alike especially enjoy dining at Hellas Restaurant & Bakery, located across from the “Sponge Docks” on Dodecanese Boulevard in Tarpon Springs.

 

“Hellas is one of the many Greek restaurants in town that serve a curious version of Greek salad,” she said. “It has all the expected elements: iceberg lettuce, cured black olives, sliced onion and green pepper, tomato wedges and thick slices of tangy feta cheese dressed with an herb vinaigrette. What comes as a surprise to the uninitiated is the scoop of potato salad.” (It hides beneath the lettuce.)

 

“Legend has it that Louis M. Pappamichalopoulos, who arrived in Tarpon Springs in 1904, added the potato salad to provide more sustenance for the working sponge divers,” Keeler wrote.

This authentic Greek potato salad is a no-mayonnaise side dish featuring boiled Yukon Gold potatoes cubed and tossed in a zesty vinaigrette with extra virgin olive oil, lemon juice, red wine vinegar, Kalamata olives, red onions, scallions and feta cheese with Dijon mustard, minced garlic, oregano, parsley, dill, salt and pepper. It’s best served warm or at room temperature.

 

 

Sponges generally grow very slowly, with many species adding only a few millimeters per year. Undisturbed, sponges can live for hundreds to thousands of years.

 The hawksbill sea turtle is one of the few vertebrates that feed primarily on sponges, with sponges making up to 95% of their diet in some regions. 

Some tropical fish, such as angelfish and pufferfish, have adapted to consume the toxic and structurally dense tissues of sponges.

 

  

Hellas Restaurant & Bakery opened in Tarpon Springs in 1985. The original owners were by Bob and Maria Karterouliotis, who came to the United States from Sparta, Greece. The operation continues as a family-owned business, with the third generation now principally involved.

 

The Greek warrior statue on top of Hellas is a Spartan soldier.

 

 

A menu specialty at Hellas is the “Flame-Broiled K-Bob.” Available meats are beef, chicken, lamb or pork.

 

 

“Greek pastries are legendary…and the long display case at Hellas is ‘drool-worthy,’” Janet Keeler said.

Tarpon Springs, Fla., is fondly known as ‘Little Greece’

If you’re looking for a village that exudes “Old Florida” charm, Tarpon Springs is a welcoming community. It’s located on the Gulf Coast side of the state near Tampa and St. Petersburg.

 

Today, about 26,675 people live in Tarpon Springs, and up to 25% of the population has descended from Greek immigrants. (The city has the highest per capita concentration of Greek Americans in the United States.)

An influx of Greek “skin divers” who arrived in the mid-1900s to harvest the sponges that grow on the ocean floor is the reason why Tarpon Springs also became known as the “Sponge Capital of the World.”

 

Visitors can experience the epicenter of Tarpon Springs’ “Little Greece” heritage by strolling Dodecanese Boulevard to listen to the music, interact with the merchants and observe the activity aboard the wooden, working dive boats that tie up in the Anclote River at the “Sponge Docks,” less than a mile from the Gulf of Mexico.

 

(Practice saying the street name. “Dodecanese” is typically pronounced “doh-dek-uh-NEEZ.” It’s a Greek word, referring to the “twelve islands” that constitute the Dodecanese Archipelago in the Aegean Sea near Turkey.)

 

How the “sponge industry” came to be in Tarpon Springs is a fascinating story.

A key player was Greek businessman John Michael Cocoris (shown above), who arrived in Tarpon Springs by way of New York City in 1896 to partner with John King Cheyney (shown below) of Philadelphia, Pa. They set their sights on harvesting the sponges that were plentiful just offshore from Tarpon Springs.

 

Early American sponge fishermen would typically venture out in small boats. Operating in fairly shallow water, they would use long poles with hooks at the end to snag and snatch sponges from the ocean floor.

Cocoris knew a better way. He began recruiting Greek sponge divers by the hundreds from the Dodecanese Islands. 

Many came from Kalymnos, which had gained the reputation as “Sponge Divers’ Island.”

(The history of sponge diving in Greece was mentioned in the writings of Homer and Aristotle. Plato referred to sponges as articles commonly used in bathing.)

The Kalymnos divers (sans swim trunks) learned to hold their breath for up to 5 minutes and were capable of reaching depths up to 100 feet. 

They used hand-held cutting tools to carefully prune the sponges, allowing the primitive marine invertebrates to regenerate.

By the 1930s, the annual value of the sponge harvest from Tarpon Springs reached approximately $3 million, surpassing competitors like Key West.

Into the 1930s, Cocoris began to outfit his sponge divers with thick rubberized suits with bronze helmets and breastplates. They were connected to air hoses. 

The new technology allowed the sponge divers to operate for extended periods of time at depths up to 125 feet.

The first Tarpon Springs diver to wear one of the bulky diver suits (weighing between 170 and 200 pounds) was Demetrios Kavasilos. He descended for 10 minutes and returned with a full bag of high-quality sponges. He exclaimed that the “Gulf beds held enough sponges to supply the world.”

The copper helmet typically weighed between 38-55 pounds, and the breastplate weighed about 18 pounds. 

Heavy boots (about 12 pounds each) helped keep the divers upright and stable on the sea floor. Additional lead weight belts or shoulder weights were added to ensure the diver can descend.

Some divers got in trouble when they tried to “extend the limits of the equipment,” which often resulted in them experiencing “decompression illnesses.”

Commercial sponge diving is still practiced in Tarpon Springs, employing professional Scuba divers. 

Tourists can view traditional sponge diving demonstrations aboard the excursion boats that operate on the Anclote River.

Atlantic Hotel anchored Morehead’s early tourism industry

Following the destruction of the “old” Atlantic Hotel in Beaufort due to the Hurricane of 1879, an investment group was quickly formed – known as the Morehead City Hotel Company.

A subsidiary of the Atlantic and North Carolina Railroad, the new enterprise was dedicated to building a “new and improved” Atlantic Hotel…but relocated to Morehead City, which was deemed “a safer place” than Beaufort – less likely to be struck by a major storm in the future.

Another factor: The railroad tracks ended in Morehead City. Travelers going on to Beaufort had to ferry across the Newport River. Sometimes, weather complicated things.

Why not eliminate “the complication” by building a new hotel adjacent to the railroad line? Then, as now, the railroad ran down the center of Morehead City. 

Passengers could step off the train right onto a covered platform and enter the hotel. How convenient.

The new hotel, constructed in the “exuberant Victorian” style of architecture, opened on June 21, 1880. It immediately became “coastal North Carolina’s premier resort destination.” 

The three-story wooden structure faced Arendell Street, between 3rd and 4th streets.

 

 

It was written: “Every door, window and piazza of the huge hotel (233 rooms) opens to the water; from the front or railroad side can be seen the pretty shore opposite where the village of Beaufort makes a pleasing picture, with its old-time houses and church spires….”

Featuring modern conveniences such as gas lighting and running water, the hotel included its own barber shop, telegraph office, lounge, billiard room and “ten pin” alley. The facility offered expansive covered porches along the front, and boardwalks at the back along Bogue Sound.

The ballroom and main dining room seated 300. It had a high-vaulted glass roof and large windows opening to the water. From a second-floor balcony called the “Buzzard’s Roost,” older hotel guests could observe activity below. Dancing would be followed by midnight suppers and moonlit sails on Bogue Sound.

 

Excursion boats took guests to view the Cape Lookout Lighthouse and to see the wild horses at Shackleford Banks. Visitors also went to the seashore for a “surf-bath.”

Many guests made long visits; some stayed for the entire summer season (typically June through October).

In 1884, Richard Beverly Raney (shown below) of Raleigh signed an eight-year lease to manage the Atlantic Hotel. He was the proprietor of the Yarborough House, a popular Raleigh hotel. Raney marketed Morehead City and the Atlantic Hotel as the “Summer Capital of North Carolina.”

 

The heyday of the Atlantic Hotel lasted into the 20th century, but Morehead City’s tourism industry dried up during the World War I years and afterward because of the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918. (More than 500 million people – about a third of the world’s population at the time – became infected by the virus through April 1920.)

It wasn’t until 1921 that the “old crowd” began to come back to the hotel for summer vacations, but a “return to normalcy” was thwarted by the arrival of hard economic times during the Great Depression.

Tragically, on April 15, 1933, fishermen noticed smoke coming from the resort. 

Fire departments from five other communities responded to help the Morehead City firefighters. Trucks came from Newport, New Bern, Kinston, Washington and Greenville.

The hotel’s heart pine construction made it vulnerable to the flame and in little more than an hour, the building was reduced to ruins.

The hotel had not yet opened for the summer season and was unoccupied.

The hotel was never rebuilt. Many of the regular hotel guests began to build their own family cottages along the shore, and the tourism landscape began to change once more.

Beaufort’s grand hotel re-emerges as ‘tourist destination’

Once Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox (Va.) Court House on April 9, 1865, to effectively end the Civil War, communities throughout the South began to pick up the pieces and restart their economies.

 

Carteret County was no exception. The center of commerce was Beaufort, and the heirs of Josiah Solomon Pender renovated the Atlantic Hotel, which had looked like a “giant haunted house,” wrote the late Virginia Pou “Sammy” Doughton (shown below).

The grand hotel had been trashed by Yankee soldiers in 1862…but then was miraculously revived as a Union hospital. It was scrubbed from top to bottom by the Sisters of Mercy, a contingent of nine Catholic nuns who came from New York City to nurse injured and ill soldiers back to health.

The Atlantic Hotel reopened in June 1866, “and almost immediately recaptured its former reputation as the social headquarters of North Carolina during the summer season,” Doughton said.

The Pender family sold the 100-room hotel in 1874 to Capt. Robert Davidson Graham (shown below), a Charlotte attorney. (His father was William Alexander Graham, a U.S. Senator from North Carolina, who went on to serve as North Carolina’s governor.)

 

Doughton said that Capt. Graham arranged for “excursion trains from Charlotte to Morehead City” via the Atlantic and North Carolina Railroad. 

Guests boarded sailboats for the last leg of the trip to Beaufort…“a wonderful relief from the hot cinders of the rail ride.”

 “Salt air breathed deeply was supposed to relieve any type of illness, mental or physical. The hotel stayed full,” Doughton wrote.

By 1879, the hotel had been refurbished, and every room freshly painted, by the new proprietor, Dr. George Kendrick Bagby, a surgical dentist in Beaufort.

The Atlantic Hotel’s amenities included “a bar with the best wines, cigars and liquor, a billiard room and 10-pin alley, amusements for children, croquet on the lawn” and nightly dances.

North Carolina Gov. Thomas Jordan Jarvis and his wife, Mary Woodson Jarvis, were guests in the hotel during August 1879.

The three-story hotel was at 100% occupancy on Aug. 17, 1879, when a storm was detected approaching Beaufort. Surf watchmen reportedly sent word to the hotel manager urging him to evacuate the hotel.

He declined, convincing Gov. Jarvis and the vacationers that Beaufort hadn’t had a major storm in more than 20 years, and “there was nothing to worry about. Guests went to bed that night without a care in the world,” Doughton wrote.

Two local men stepped up. Henry Congleton sounded the alarm about 3 a.m. on Aug. 18. He and Capt. Palmer Davis helped get people out, as an 8-foot surge overwhelmed the hotel. Davis grabbed as many children as he could carry.

Hurricane-force winds were reported to be in the range of 138 to 165 miles per hour (the equivalent of Category 4 and 5 in today’s grading system). The Jarvises were on the second floor and barely got out before the hotel collapsed.

 

“The good people of Beaufort went to their attics and found clothing for 150 destitute refugees,” Doughton said. 

“Gov. Jarvis was given a sailor suit that had been used in the War of 1812; his elegant wife seemed happy for a calico wrapper, the equivalent of today’s housecoat.”

Congleton perished trying to rescue people, as did guests John Dunn and John Daves Hughes, both of New Bern. They were believed to be the only three fatalities from the Hurricane of 1879.

Gov. Jarvis expressed his sympathy and hailed their heroism. He gave Capt. Davis a special citation.

(Capt. Davis, a native of Davis Shore in Down East Carteret County, was the well-known pilot of the mailboat that shuttled between Beaufort and Morehead City.)