Sea Beach Hotel

(and friends)

When I found this large photo version of The Sea Beach Hotel, I was quite startled by what I was seeing.

Examine the large photo taken in my home town Santa Cruz, CA and see if you can make out anything unusual.

Click on image for large version

This photo was made into several versions of a post card

that had been manipulated one way or another and colorized.

Fred Swanton

"Taking advantage of connections with people he knew from his previous business ventures,

Swanton was able to entice many notable people to vacation in Santa Cruz, including

President Teddy Roosevelt, whose highly publicized visit in 1903 proved to be a boon to the tourist industry."

Note: The "highly publicized visit" they are talking about was Teddy Roosevelt's speech he gave

at Big Trees (now Henry Cowell Redwood State Park) in 1903.

The beach was not in his itinerary.

From: The History of Santa Cruz.

This is what shocked me:

This looks like Teddy with four of his six children and Edith, his second wife.

Click for larger version

Now before you say I'm crazy, look at the rest of the image. On the sidewalk, those

salty looking dudes look like Secret Service. One of them is keeping Teddy's terrier occupied with a stick.

(Teddy had many terriers and other breeds throughout his life)

Click to enlarge

And in the first image (at top of page) of the Sea Beach Hotel, you see a lone man on the left in the sand,

who also looks like Secret Service.

And then I found this:

The rest of the photo, not included with the original at the top

or in the different versions of the post cards.

Santa Cruz PD and Secret Service.

Click to enlarge

Now the image makes sense. Police, Secret Service, entourage in the

street cars, the terrier and all kinds of people looking from the hotel windows and grounds,

including chamber maids on the right top floor balcony watching and possibly

giggling, "We're going to be in a photo with the president!"

And in 1901, Teddy Roosevelt was the first president to constantly have Secret

Service protection after he took over as president when McKinley was assassinated.

It's also possible the photo wasn't advertised as having the president in it because

it may have been construed as an endorsement to the Sea Beach Hotel and that

couldn't be allowed.

I cropped, enlarged and stitched the two photos as best I could.

(the left section was damaged, a lower resolution and smaller)

Here is the result:

Click to enlarge

So...study the photo and give me your input at my Facebook post here.