The Casements

Built in 1913 by Reverend Dr. Harwood Huntington and named for its casement-style windows, The Casements became the winter residence of retired Standard Oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, Sr. after he purchased it in 1918 in hopes it would help him live to age 100. Known locally as “Neighbor John,” Rockefeller spent winters there playing golf, watching automobile racing on the beach, meeting “Birthplace of Speed” race drivers, socializing at the Hotel Ormond, and welcoming friends including Will Rogers, Harvey Firestone, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford. He died in his bedroom there in May 1937, just short of his 98th birthday. Although his heirs allegedly intended to raze the house, it was instead sold in 1940 to Maud Van Woy, owner and headmistress of the Fairmont Junior College of Washington, D.C., who turned it into the Casements Junior College. After the college closed in 1951, the property served as a religious retirement facility and school, then as Casements Manor, a secular retirement facility and transient hotel, and finally as the Ormond Hotel-Casements. The property, including a separate cottage called “South House,” was enlarged over the years with staff residences, garage apartments, and dormitories, then fell into neglect and was abandoned. Saved by local citizens from demolition in the late 1960s, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973, purchased by the City of Ormond Beach in 1974, restored in 1978 with a federal Economic Development Administration grant under the Local Public Works Act, and reopened in 1979 as The Community Enrichment Center of Ormond Beach, a historical, educational, and cultural facility that also hosts community events. With later additions removed, it evokes the residence built by Reverend Dr. Huntington and purchased by John D. Rockefeller, and in November 2000 the State of Florida designated John D. Rockefeller “A Great Floridian.”

Ormond Beach, Florida · United States