When the Panama Hotel opened 100 years ago in 1912 it featured private baths, steam heat, telephones, and at least one window in every room. In 2005, it reopened as the Panama Loſts and now features luxury condominiums and lower level retail space.
Before
Aſter
September 2004 for the cool guys in Galveston,” he said. “The barber in the Panama Hotel came up with a new hairstyle
that all the boys thought was cool. The buzzed, flat top was the style then, so he would buzz the top of our heads, but leave the sides long and combed back. It was actually called the “Panama.” You would go in and ask him to give you a “Panama” and that’s what you’d get. All the young guys did it. I had it, too. It was quite a fad for awhile back then.” The restaurant, called the Ship Ahoy, was owned by John Kriticos, whose family has owned restaurants in Galveston for generations. “The Ship Ahoy was a local diner only existed for a year or two in the early 1960s, but it was my brother John’s first restaurant venture outside of the family restaurants,” said Larry Kriticos, owner of the Olympia Grill at Pier 21. “John’s wife at the time was Anita Martini, whose family owned several theaters in Galveston. The recipes that they used at the Ship Ahoy came from Anita’s grandmother, who was Italian. The food was very popular.” He said that the Ship Ahoy was known as a wonderful local diner with the best spaghetti sauce ever. “No one could ever duplicate that spaghetti sauce,” he remembered. “John called it “Granny’s sauce” - it was the most unique flavor and I’ve never had anything like it ever since.” In November of 1964, The Galveston Daily News reported that
a fire broke out in the office of the Ship Ahoy and by the time the fire department arrived, the blaze was working through the ceiling in the dining room. Investigators said that in a very few more minutes, the fire could have spread to the Panama Hotel and destroyed it, but the fire was contained to the restaurant. “After the fire, John did not reopen the Ship Ahoy. He took another job elsewhere and I remember a bar opening there sometime
afterwards.” By the 1970s, things changed for all railroads in America. Interstate highways had improved and transportation by jet increased significantly, causing commerce by railroad to decline sharply. The Panama Hotel lost much of its clientele, as well as its luster. The hotel ceased operating, and fell into disrepair. It remained empty for years and was finally sold to Andrew Kaldis Development Interests, Inc., who converted it into lofts. Clifford Johnson bought a loft in 2005 in the Panama and lived there for a couple of years, becoming president of the homeowners’ association until Hurricane Ike damaged the property, causing him to move out. “It was a great place to live, and it must have been a great place to stay when it was a hotel,” he said. “The rooms on the perimeter of the hotel were two windows wide and each room was furnished with a double bed, a dresser, a fan, and a telephone. For its time, it was a very nice hotel. It was European style in the sense that there was no room service and the rooms were small, but it was very respectable and it was all about the great location for the businessmen coming in off those trains.” Although it was short-lived, the last century in Galveston began with great hope and confidence in the future. Today, business people rarely arrive in Galveston by train anymore, and the Ship Ahoy and the barbershop that once were a part of the hustle and bustle of the Panama Hotel are just memories. But Galveston takes great pride in those memories, and the Panama Hotel was dedicated as a National Historic Landmark in August of 1979, a permanent reminder of a day when passage by train was the country’s preferred mode of transportation and was the quickest way for businessmen to travel between Houston and Galveston - with a stay at the Panama Hotel in between.
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Images courtesy of Galveston Historical Foundation and John Hall
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