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My Date With The Princess

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 12, 2008

The Mount Washington Hotel clerk reached for my room packet and conference papers and with a sly smile said, "Ah, 314, you're in the Princess' room."

"Great," I thought, "Flowery prints, potpourri and foofy pillows."

It was quite a room, though, with a beautiful four-poster canopy bed, fluffy comforter, fine furniture, fireplace and a Jacuzzi tub. And, I was to find out soon, a little secret. That night, I awakened to find the room bathed in a soft, almost ethereal light. I admired it for a while and then fell back asleep. In the morning, heading to breakfast, a hotel guest spotted me and asked if it was strange sleeping in the Princess' room. My curiosity was now in high gear.

According to the hotel staff, Carolyn Foster Stickney, wife of hotel builder Joseph Stickney, ran the hotel for more than 30 years after her husband's death in 1903. She remarried a French man of royalty, becoming "Princess" Faucigny-Lucinge.

"Oh, and her ghost is still here, roaming the halls and room 314," said a staff member. "And you're sleeping in her favorite bed!"

I had to admit, a few hairs were standing on end by this time. That night, with my preset camera at the ready, I tried to sleep.

"It might not be all bad; she could be a babe," I said to no one in particular. I nodded off but was awakened in the early morning by footsteps - ladies heels on a wooden floor. My eyes were saucers. "OK, my friend Ed's in the room directly above, not likely to have a female visitor ... Cross-dressing? Not very likely, either."

After relaying my experience to fellow conference attendees, they shared their Princess ghost stories. One friend, sleeping alone in a room on the same floor, remembered being jarred awake by something (someone?) shoving her in the back. Her friend, staying in another nearby room, ran out hyperventilating as lights flipped on and off and faucets turned on and off.

When I checked out, the clerk asked me how it was in 314. He wanted to share his Princess story of the staff portrait.

A couple of years ago, the new owners wanted a group photo of the hotel staff. The hotel was cleared out and the staff assembled in the front of the hotel. Nothing unusual occurred during the shoot, but while developing the group photo, the photographer noticed something odd. In the hotel window directly below 314 was a woman, in a long-sleeved Victorian print dress.

Maybe Princess Carolyn was not to be denied. After all, it IS her hotel.

Dino Vournas

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