 The Ellis Hotel is an award-winning boutique style hotel located in downtown Atlanta near the aquarium, the Georgia World Congress Center, and the world of Coca-Cola. It hosts businessmen and tourists alike and is definitely a must-stay location for those coming into the city. The Ellis Hotel is also one of the most haunted locations around. Welcome to Esoteric Atlanta, my name is Bryce, and today we're talking about the notorious Titanic of Peachtree. Haunted location has to the city and the nation, we have to go way back. Like, way back. So buckle up and let's get started. William Fleming-Winecoff was born on November 9th, 1870, in Orlando, Florida. As a child, his family moved to Brunswick, Georgia, which is a coastal town between Savannah and Jacksonville, Florida. But by the late 1800s, Winecoff had his sights set on Atlanta. As a young 20-something-year-old, he was going to get in and the redevelopment of a city. Because you see, five years prior to Winecoff's birth, the American Civil War came to an end. And in 1864, before it ended, General Sherman ordered the destruction and burning of Atlanta. Now, obviously I was not alive during this time, as you watching weren't either. But I kind of see this as almost like a mini gold rush. It's like people are coming to the city to get their hands in the rising of a new economy. Now the first development project that Winecoff got involved with is the Anzley Park neighborhood. Anzley Park is still a neighborhood here today. In fact, Anzley Park is about half a mile from where I live. Anzley Park is a beautiful, beautiful neighborhood full of multi-million dollar homes. And I'm going to be honest with you, we like to walk our dog over there because that's where they have the good poop bags. Don't come at me, Anzley Park. It wasn't long though until Winecoff got his site set on another project. There was a lot that was available between Peachtree and Ellis Street. And Winecoff purchased it for $350,000. That would be about $8 million in today's currency. So it's safe to say by the early 1900s, Winecoff was doing very well for himself. The lot that was purchased was going to become a hotel. In fact, the name was going to be the Winecoff Hotel. And the building code of 1911 stated that lots less than 5,000 square feet were permitted to only have one staircase. This becomes an issue later on in our story. Now in order to make this hotel as fancy as Winecoff wanted it to be, he decided to hire a firm from New York City. He ended up hiring the William A. Fuller Company. And the architect in charge of the Winecoff Hotel was a man by the name of W. L. Stoddard. Now W. L. Stoddard decided to design this hotel in a new fashion for the day. He made it out of concrete and still. And he was so impressed with his design that he decided that he was not going to include a fire escape. In fact, he boasted that this hotel was going to be absolutely fireproof. Are we ever going to learn? In 1913, the Winecoff Hotel opened. It opened as one of the tallest buildings in Atlanta boasting 15 stories. Now, by today's standards, that's not really that tall. We have multiple skyscrapers now, but back then that was a big deal. And Winecoff moved his family from Ansley Park into the Winecoff Hotel. They lived up in suites, 1011 through 1012. Now, I grew up reading a book about a little girl named Eloise who lived in the Plaza Hotel. And I thought that that was just incredible. I wanted to live in a hotel and have that life of Eloise. And perhaps that's why as an adult, I've never, ever been interested in buying a house. I enjoy living in smaller areas and being able to walk around a city. And I think that's what Mr. Winecoff was doing when he moved his family into his hotel. He was enjoying this newfound city that he helped develop. Now, by the Great Depression, Mr. Winecoff fell on hard times, as did many Americans. And at that point, Winecoff sold his hotel to the Hightower family. And the Hightower family maintained the name, the Winecoff Hotel, and also allowed Mr. Winecoff and his family to continue living in this hotel. I actually grew up with some Hightowers. I don't know if there's any relation between their family and the family that bought this hotel. I would love to know though. So if you're watching this, send me a message. Anyway, now we're going to fast forward to 1946. By 1946, the world was recovering from World War II. From the early 1900s till now, we have gone through World War I, the Great Depression, and World War II. Big band music was all the rage. I feel like by this point there was a sense of hope returning to our world. It's the start of the baby boomer generation, which is my parents' generation. All the guys coming home from the war and wanting to start a family. It seems like a pretty positive era to be alive. However, at 3.42 a.m. on December 7th, 1946, a night manager working at the Winecoff Hotel made a call to the fire department. Sadly, by the time that call was made, it was too late. About 30 minutes prior to that phone call, a bellboy working on the fifth floor noticed a small fire. It is speculated that the fire was started by a left cigarette, something very common for the day. Building code of 1911 stated that buildings under a certain lot size only had to have one staircase. So you have this 15-story building with one staircase. And again, because our architect from New York City felt like a stainless steel building was absolutely fireproof, there was no other fire escape. Guests could not come down. No one could get around. People were stuck and the fire grew and grew and grew. Now the Atlanta Fire Department sent 385 firemen to the hotel. They only sent the firemen with 11 ladders. And unfortunately, these ladders weren't high enough to get to the people who were stuck in the upper stories. Now a lot of the guests tried jumping to the neighboring building, which was unfortunately 10 feet away. So around the building itself were bodies. Now this shins shivers down my spine. I was 18 years old when 9-11 happened and I remember seeing pictures of people jumping to their death. And I can't imagine what that must have been like to go to bed on December 6th. Super happy, excited to be in the big city. You've got a fun day planned the next day. And in the early morning hours being to be woken up by a fire and then to realize that you have no way out. I hope that I would in that situation be brave enough to take that chance. That maybe by some slim chance of fate I would make it to the other building and be safe. Now a lot of the firemen tried to send ladders up to buildings so they could people in the building so they could place the ladders across and crawl on the ladder to the neighboring building. But again, like I said, unfortunately for most people in the hotel all hope was lost. One of the bodies that was found on the sidewalk dead was the body of Weinkauf's wife. I don't know whether she fell from a window or was one of the people who tried to jump. By this point the Weinkaufs were in their 70s. Now in 2020 I feel like 70 is still relatively young. But in 1946 70 was elderly. Now William Fleming Weinkauf himself died in the fire too. He was 76 years old and he was found in a hallway near his suite. I mean since this is the Titanic of Peachtree because they didn't think the Titanic would sink and they didn't think that this hotel would ever catch fire. I guess it's appropriate in some weird twist of fate that Weinkauf went down with his ship. Although I want us to realize that this is not Weinkauf's fault. In fact I don't even think it's the architect's fault. I think this is just basic human ignorance and a terrible accident that shouldn't have happened. Now it just so happened that on this night a Georgia Tech student by the name of Arnold Harald was walking home in the early morning hours from a dance. Now Arnold Harald heard the sirens and so he rushed over to see what was going on. He also happened to have his camera on him. Now again for my young people watching it is relatively new that we actually walk around with cameras on our phones. At this point we didn't even walk around with phones. So he had this camera with him. I'm assuming from the dance to snap pictures of his friends and himself. And as he was watching the fire happen he pulled his camera up and took a snapshot. And he caught a picture of a woman falling from the building. Now this woman was a hotel guest by the name of Daisy McCumber and believe it or not she survived the jump. She broke her leg, she broke her back, she broke her pelvis. She ended up having to have multiple operations to correct and she lived a long life. She died in 1992 at the age of 86. Oh this story she could probably tell. Anyway this particular photo taken by Arnold Harald ended up winning the 1947 Pulitzer Prize for photography. Arnold Harald's photograph was not the only thing to make national coverage for this incident. This tragedy changed building codes permanently for the whole United States. And in fact in 1947 President Harry S. Truman convened a conference to discuss issues with the Weinkopf Hotel. Now to this day this is still one of the deadliest hotel fires ever in the history of our country. The death total was 119 with 65 injured. In April of 1951 the hotel reopened. This time it was called the Peachtree Hotel because it was on Peachtree Street. Now by 1967 it was actually donated to the Georgia Baptist Convention for the elderly. After this it ended up staying vacant for two decades. But once again was reused for the 1996 Olympics where it became a souvenir shop. Today to remember this hotel is right downtown. In fact it's close to Centennial Park, a park that was built for the 1996 Olympics. And if you were here during the 1996 Olympics and you went shopping for souvenirs there is a chance that you were in the Weinkopf Hotel. But alas in April of 2006 after a $23 million renovation the Ellis Hotel was born. And on March 31st 2009 the Ellis Hotel was placed on the National Registry of Historic Places. If you happen to be in downtown Atlanta or if you're staying in the Ellis Hotel there is a memorial at the south side of the building. If you have trouble finding it I'm sure any employee will be happy to point it out to you. Now we do know that 119 people died. And as I opened this video I told you it was one of the most haunted locations in the city. So people staying in the hotel often say they see apparitions and they can hear the screams of women and children. It's also said that a lot of times the fire alarm will go off for no reason at the exact time that the fire happened all those years ago. So as a personal note when I started to plan this channel I originally wanted to do a channel that was purely mystic, purely the study of occult issues in the city. But I realized that the city of Atlanta was more than just that and I wanted to broaden the channel's topics. So I was sitting here one day and I was thinking of different things we could talk about. And one of the things that popped into my head first was haunted locations. We're in the south. We have a lot of haunted locations. I mean raise your hand if you grew up in a haunted house. I actually went to a haunted school too. So anyway, I made a list of all the places I knew to be haunted. The Ellis Hotel was on that list but it wasn't the first on the list. And once I decided that okay I need to start researching I randomly picked a place to start and I picked the Ellis Hotel. Before I started researching I had this idea that I was going to go and interview employees and just give them to talk about different experiences that they had had. And of course in order to do that I needed to know a little bit of the backstory. In fact I made it a point to not cover any places unless I could actually find a backstory. As I started studying the tragedy I realized that the date December 7th was the date that I had started studying the Ellis Hotel. And I know some people who believe in coincidence will say it was just a coincidence but I don't actually believe in coincidence. I feel a duty to this hotel. And I've shot this video now about five times trying to get it just right. At this moment it isn't so much about the ghost stories that I'm concerned with but the stories of the people, the wine cofs and all their guests who perished tragically on that night. It breaks my heart that people still hear screams of women and children and I hope that one day these people will be able to rest in peace. I'm still open to talking to people who have had experiences who have crazy Ellis Hotel situations. But I do know as somebody who has also experienced a lot of paranormal phenomenon in my life that sometimes those incidents are very personal, meant just for you. And so I'm not going to push anybody to tell me their stories. If you want to talk to me about it and if you want to be on this channel and tell the world what's happened to you in that hotel I will be more than happy to put you on. Now as I said in the beginning the Ellis Hotel is a gorgeous hotel and it's pretty reasonably priced. And I would definitely suggest the Ellis Hotel as a potential hotel for any of you guys coming into Atlanta to stay in. In fact I think I might want to go stay there one night just to see what it's like and it's only a mile and a half down the road from where I live. But I do ask that if you do stay at the hotel please, please, please be respectful. I know that ghost stories are fun but again these are people's lives that were tragically lost in some of them were children. Please be respectful. And be respectful to the employees as well. I'm sure they deal a lot with people coming in wanting to have a haunted experience. So just mind what you say. Anyway so I hope you guys enjoy this video. If you like to give us a thumbs up and hit that subscribe button. Also remember to be kind to each other. We never know when it's our last day on this earth. We never know if it's the last conversation we have with a friend or a family member. And as the late Rom Doss said we're all just walking each other home. Be good. See you soon.