Miami Springs landmark sold; historic designation in question
Local landmark Fair Havens Retirement Center, a Miami Springs nursing home, has been sold for $29.07 million, according to the Miami-Dade Recorder’s Office.
Fair Havens Real Estate LLC, based in Skokie, Illinois, sold the 269-room property on a 196,553square-foot lot at 201 Curtiss Pkwy to Fair Havens Propco LLC, Fair Havens Philipson TIC Member I LLC, Fair Havens Philipson TIC Member II LLC and Fair Havens Philipson TIC Member III LLC, records show.
The site was purchased in 2000 for $8,524,000.
The nursing home was previously owned by Philip Esformes, a Miami Beach healthcare mogul sentenced to 20 years in a massive Medicare fraud case and ordered to pay more than $44 million to the taxpayer-funded program and the U.S. government.e businesses, including Fair Havens Center, in Miami Springs.
Back in 1927, Fair
Havens Retirement Center was Miami Springs founder Glenn Curtiss’ masterpiece. But it was never added to the National Registry of Historic Places, according to documents obtained from the U.S. Department of Interior’s National Park Service on Friday by the Miami Herald after a records request.
“Fair Havens should be designated,” said Dr. Paul George, a history professor at Miami Dade College.
“An effort should be made by preservationists in Miami Springs and elsewhere in the county to convince its owners that there are big financial benefits to the designation.”
George urged the local historical preservation board to also get involved.
An application to add the “Hotel Country Club/Fairhaven Retirement Center” to the national registry was accepted in 1986. However, the owner objected to the listing.
On Jan. 30, 1985, William Cole, an official representing Lutheran Services for the Elderly filed an official “statement of objection.” No reason was given.
In a “statement of significance” summary, Fair Havens was the center of the thriving community that would become Miami
Springs, Park Service officials wrote. It was considered Curtiss’ “most ambitious single project and was to reflect the grandeur, style and elegance he wanted his development to project.”
Built in 1927, Fair
Havens was the “largest Pueblo Revival-style building constructed as part of the Miami Springs development,” records show.
“The building is an excellent example of Pueblo Revival style, large in size, location. Pueblo Revival features highlight its significance,” noted a Park Service official who strongly recommended that the site be accepted into the registry.
The application was accompanied by stunning historical photos of the property that detail how the site was built to resemble a Pueblo Indian village. The building’s main features included a five-story central tower, a terraced roofline and undulating parapet walls.
Its historical significance was underscored by Park
Service officials, even though it had been altered by the addition of wings at its north and south ends and the removal of some original decorative elements.
A thunderbird motif, a Pueblo Indian symbol of peace and prosperity, adorns its west façade.
Fair Havens was administered by Dr. John Kellogg, an internationally known physician and nutrition pioneer, from 1929 to 1959, during which time various alterations and additions were made to the building. It was then referred to as Miami Battle Creek.
The compound was rented to the U.S. Air Force during World War II and used as a rest center for convalescing military personnel. At the end of the war, Kellogg used it as a health facility; his patients included Thomas Edison, Harvey Firestone and George Bernard Shaw, records show.
It was acquired by Lutheran Services for the Elderly in 1962, and a number of lateral wings and annexes were added – none of which were deemed by the government to be either historically or architecturally significant.
Plans for the 4.5-acre
Fair Havens site remain unknown. A request for comment from the new buyers did not receive an immediate response.