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The Jefferson Hotel’s Four-Decade Alligator Invasion
The Jefferson Hotel had a lobby full of live gators for over 40 years. After reopening in 1907, the Richmond hotel added marble pools that soon filled with unwanted pets.
Florida tourism had boomed, and thousands of tourists bought baby alligators as souvenirs. As these reptiles grew too big for bathtubs, travelers dumped them at The Jefferson on their way home.
Soon, the gators made themselves at home. They crawled from pools to nap on fancy chairs while staff used brooms to push them back each morning. Old Pompey, the last and largest at eight feet, died in 1948…