Tour brings Spain's king to Florida

The monarch received a warm welcome during his stop in St. Augustine.

[AP photo] King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia of Spain wave to supporters as they walk along St. George Street in St. Augustine on Sunday.

By THOMAS C. TOBIN

© St. Petersburg Times, published April 2, 2001

ST. AUGUSTINE -- How far we have come.

On Sunday, the king of a nation that once lorded over this small city -- as well as the rest of Florida -- toured the only building in town that his country still owns.

The Casa del Hildalgo, once a sort of Spanish chamber of commerce, is vacant now, filled with empty glass display cases and unused offices. But there is hope, officials said, that the small building in St. Augustine's otherwise bustling historic district might soon reopen as a beacon for Spanish culture.

The 10-minute visit by King Juan Carlos I of Spain and his wife, Queen Sofia, was a small moment amid a bright afternoon filled with pomp, ceremony and color. But it spoke frankly about Spain's diminished role in the land it once occupied.

Seeking to keep alive their country's heritage in America, the royal couple ate, drank and shook hands in America's oldest city, and thanked the U.S. for nurturing the 500-year-old legacy of Spanish influence in the hot peninsula Juan Ponce de Leon dubbed La Florida, "the flowery land."

The king spoke shortly after 1 p.m. from the balcony of Government House overlooking the city's Plaza de la Constitution, the spot where Spanish citizens held off two British invasions in the 1700s and where the rustic garrison once imprisoned three signers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence.

Juan Carlos praised "the innate philanthropic spirit of the U.S. citizens" for helping to preserve the city, which was founded by the Spanish in 1565 but often escapes the notice of a public that associates America's European roots with the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock and the English at Jamestown.

The Spanish arrival on what is now the continental United States preceded both events by decades, yet many Floridians, new and old, are only faintly aware of the state's Spanish history -- perhaps only because of the Spanish-style buildings that decorate their cities and the Spanish-sounding names on their roads, parks and shopping centers.

By coincidence, the royal visit came during a week when the U.S. Census Bureau officially confirmed that Hispanics are the largest minority in Florida, a piece of news that fit right in Sunday's effort to rekindle the state's Spanish fires.

Encarnacion Hennessey of Tampa cried after the king's 10-minute speech, moved, she said, by pangs for her native Spain, which she left in 1961 to be with her American husband, Robert. The royal appearance gave rise to thoughts of nine older brothers and sisters who still live back home.

"It was a great moment," she said, dabbing tears. "To us, it is like being home today. . . . It's in our heart; it's in our soul."

Hennessey, who chuckled at her Irish married name, entered the plaza in a festive mood with 31 fellow members of the Club Iberico Espanol, a group of Spanish natives from Tampa who are dedicated to preserving their culture.

An hour before the royals arrived, they waved a red and yellow Spanish flag and danced when the 12-piece orchestra from the Jacksonville Symphony happened to play the jaunty song they sing at every meeting, Viva Espana.

The royal visit was part of a cultural tour through the U.S. that last week took Juan Carlos and Sofia to Washington, D.C., Dallas and Jackson, Miss. They were expected to attend a dinner today in Miami with Gov. Jeb Bush and the city's business and political elite.

From the moment St. Augustine officials were told about the trip in January, they began primping. The balcony from which the king spoke was given a new coat of brown paint and bedecked with thick burgundy bunting. Lamp posts were were decorated with Spanish flags, and the historic monument to the Spanish Constitution of 1812 was replastered.

From its post under the balcony, the small orchestra, dressed in tuxedos and sashes, played with a robust Spanish flair, heavy on the snare drums, tambourines and castanets.

Red carnations, a symbol of the Spanish monarch, were everywhere.

The St. Augustine Garrison, a group of re-enactors who dress in the blue-and-red uniforms of colonial era Spanish soldiers, had the daylong task of escorting the king.

Everywhere the royal couple went, the Garrison cleared the way, marching crisply to orders barked in Spanish and raising long muskets that had to be checked out in advance by security officers.

The U.S. Secret Service was along for the trip, but Spain's palace security was clearly in charge.

The royal entourage of about 50 also included several Spanish government ministers, a platoon of secretaries, two doctors, a "sanitary technical assistant," the queen's hairdresser and the palace photographer.

From the Government House, where Secretary of State Katherine Harris was Florida's highest-ranking government official on hand, the royal couple went to lunch with 200 locals at the four-star Casa Monica Hotel.

They dined on sea bass and pan-seared chicken, and faithfully heeded the protocol tips that were discreetly placed inside the menu: Keep the chatter down and don't speak or shake hands with the royals unless approached.

After lunch, Juan Carlos and Sofia strode north along St. George Street, a narrow lane where hundreds of tourists clapped and took their pictures, some coming within feet of the famous couple.

From there, he visited the old Spanish Quarter and then walked across San Marco Avenue to the Castillo de San Marcos, the fort the Spanish began building in 1672 to protect the city from the English.

Inside, the king chuckled when a federal park ranger showed him the sword he presented to the city in 1971, when he was just a prince.

It was the first time any Spanish king had visited St. Augustine, and a "signal moment" in the city's history, said Michael V. Gannon, a noted historian who spoke before the king, driving home the sweep of Spanish influence in Florida.

It will take until 2055 before the U.S. flag has flown over St. Augustine longer than the Spanish one did from 1565 to 1763, and again from 1784 to 1821, Gannon told the crowd.

"We were founded one year following the death of Michelangelo and the birth of William Shakespeare."

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