The Styx

A Pinkerton detective is hired to protect a Palm Beach tycoon in this Reconstruction-era tale of luxury hotels, corruption, and murder.

The Great Migration of the 1890s remade south Florida as Northern developers, former sharecroppers, and recent immigrants rushed to the state to seek their fortunes. Sitting atop it all was the Royal Poinciana Hotel, built on the shores of Palm Beach by real estate tycoon Henry Flagler. Nearby was the Styx, an African American community that housed many of the Royal Poinciana’s 1,200 workers. Shortly after the hotel’s completion, the Styx would be mysteriously burned to the ground in a tragedy clouded for generations by rumor and myth—until now.