TAMPA — Scattered throughout the building of a historic social club are memorabilia from one of Ybor City's darkest chapters – furniture such as chairs, tables, lamps and parts of the red brick walls inside.
The clubhouse at the Centro Asturiano de Tampa turned 110 this year, but the parts there are six years older and were salvaged from an earlier clubhouse that was destroyed in a fire.
More than a century later, the cause of this fire is still disputed among members.
Some stick with the fire chief's assessment that the inferno was accidentally started by a careless smoker. Others believe it was started by a serial killer.
“I personally believe it was the serial killer,” said Cristal Lastra, president of the Centro Asturiano at 1913 N. Nebraska Ave. “We'll never know for sure… But it's part of our story and our history.”
The origins
The Centro Asturiano was founded in 1902 mainly for immigrants from Asturias in Spain, said club historian Judy Blanco. “But you didn't have to be from Asturias. We had members from Galicia, a Jewish merchant and some Italians.”
At that time, the club offered its members what it called cradle-to-grave social services – healthcare, health and life insurance, banking, and a cemetery. The clubhouse also featured live entertainment and served as a meeting place.
The Centro Asturiano's first clubhouse was on the second floor of a frame building on Seventh Avenue. Membership grew from the few dozen founders to over 2,500 by 1908, when a palatial headquarters was built where the current clubhouse stands today.
This three-story red brick building housed a bar, ballroom and theater, the largest in the city. The Tampa Tribune hailed the building as “one of the finest clubhouses you can find anywhere.”
The Killer
The fire was set on June 8, 1912. It started on the theater stage and spread throughout the first and second floors.
“The building had a large, solid concrete gable on it,” the Tampa Tribune reported. “Without warning, it broke away from the masonry and fell onto the roof of the portico below,” killing two firefighters.
The fire chief attributed the inferno to a cigar that had accidentally fallen among flammable material backstage. But two days later, the chief received a message from a mysterious man whom the newspapers had named as the arsonist.
By then, the Firebug had murdered three men and burned as many as 100 buildings downtown. In letters, he claimed the crime spree would continue until white men stopped having physical relations with black women. Witnesses sometimes saw a black man dressed as a woman running away from the fire.
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In his letter to the Centro Asturiano, The Firebug wrote that he had intended to destroy the neighboring blacksmith shop, but realized that the club's building was a better target. The fire chief told reporters that he still believes the original assessment and believes The Firebug only wanted recognition.
In the months that followed, two women and one man were shot and killed, and at least four other women and one man were injured. The arsonist claimed responsibility for all of them. All but one was shot from a distance, either from the porch or through an open window in the house. The arsonist entered the outsider's home when he murdered her. Each appeared to have been chosen at random.
The mysterious criminal was then renamed “The Killer”.
In late October, Robert Anderson, who matched the killer's description, was arrested while walking through Ybor. When police searched his home, they discovered a gun and bullets matching those used in the shooting, as well as a woman's clothing and accessories.
He was convicted and hanged.
New company headquarters
Meanwhile, work began on a new building for the Centro Asturiano in April 1913. The three-story, 3,700-square-meter yellow brick building was completed in May 1914. It also featured a theater, ballroom and bar, as well as a gym and bowling alley for the now 3,000 members.
Everything that could be salvaged from the previous headquarters was used to build the new one.
“The result is that an even more beautiful and artistic building has been constructed,” wrote the Tampa Tribune. “The new Centro Asturiano was literally built from the ashes of the old one.”
Membership peaked in the 1930s at over 5,000, Blanco says, but when Ybor's cigar factories closed and employees moved out of the community, membership began to decline.
Modern times
The cemetery is still in use today and the theater still hosts performances.
But the gym is closed, the bowling alley has been removed, and cradle-to-grave services are a thing of the past. There is no longer any insurance or health coverage for the estimated 300 members.
The organization's main mission is to preserve “the building, history and traditions” of the social club, Blanco said.
“Maintaining the lighting in the building” costs about $500,000 annually, Lastra said, with revenue coming primarily from event rentals.
They have spent over a million on restorations in recent years, including work on the theater and the roof.
Lastra estimates that completing the renovations, which include converting the unused gym into a lounge, will cost more than another $1 million.
During the renovation of the gymnasium, the plan is to tear down the wooden walls and expose the red bricks from the previous building.
Yes, says Lastra, these could represent a connection to a serial killer. But she prefers to look at the blocks with a more optimistic eye.
“They show that we have persevered,” said Lastra. “We have been here for 122 years … this building for 110 years.”
