From the Palm Beaches to Miami, South Florida is in a constant wave of some of the world’s most exciting new construction. Yet, in Lighthouse Point, north of Fort Lauderdale, one place survives a testament to old Florida. It’s Cap’s Place, a classic Florida seafood restaurant, a onetime speakeasy and gambling den draped in Florida history.
Originally built in the 1920s, Cap’s Place is the oldest structure in Lighthouse Point and the oldest restaurant in Broward County. In 1990 it was nominated to the National Register of Historic Places. Author Carmen McGarry calls Cap's Place, "A landmark comparable to no other in South Florida, it has withstood Prohibition, mobsters, depression, wars, the ravages of nature, and many joyful and peaceful times for nearly a century.”
In the 20s, with the exception of towns built along Flagler’s East Coast Railway, South Florida was barely settled. It was during that time that Eugene Theodore “Cap” Knight, his wife Lola, and lifelong friend Al Hasis fashioned an old barge and a ragtag collection of wooden shacks into what would become a fabled speakeasy and restaurant near the Hillsboro Lighthouse.
"Cap" Knight was born in Cape Canaveral, Florida in 1871, into a seafaring family. His father, grandfather, and brother were all lighthouse keepers and it’s reputed that Knight may have been born in the Canaveral Lighthouse. Knight left home at age 13 to join the merchant marine. His maritime career spanned more than three decades, starting as a mess boy on a lighthouse tender, working his way up to mate, and by 1919 becoming a Master on the Morgan Line Steamers that sailed between New York and New Orleans.
In 1916, Knight married his second wife, Lola Saunders, a school teacher for the children of lighthouse employees and fishermen around Hillsboro Inlet. Around 1926 Cap settled near his brother Tom who was the Hillsboro lighthouse tender. About the same time, Knight met and befriended a Pittsburgh émigré Albert Hasis, who like Knight, had left home at age 13 to find his fortune. Cap and Al developed a friendship that would eventually blossom into their business partnership.
The Bar that Al Hasis built out of salvage is still a focal point of the restaurant [Photo/William Flood]
Right on the heels of Prohibition, the Great Miami hurricane in 1926 brought an abrupt end to the “Roaring Twenties” in South Florida and plunged the area into an economic depression three years ahead of the rest of the country. But, enterprising types kept things going during those lean years with bootlegging and illegal gambling. Rumrunners brought liquor up from the Bahamas, easily smuggling it into South Florida as local officials turned a blind eye.
The Knights and Hasis were among the rumrunners, making runs between Bimini and Hillsboro Inlet, using the lighthouse as a beacon on night runs. The clan also had legal business interests including a fleet of commercial fishing boats, a wholesale fish market, and a fishing camp in the Everglades.
In 1928, Knight and Hasis began constructing what they would call Club Unique, using hardscrabble ingenuity and available materials. They started with a beached dredging barge once owned by Flagler’s company constructing the railroad. On that, they built structures using Cuban mahogany, Everglades’s bamboo, local cypress, and Dade County pine.
According to the National Register of Historic Places, “Fishnets served as curtains and parts of ships, rope, driftwood, and harpoons hung haphazardly from the ceilings. The walls were lined with shark jaws, rattlesnake skins, and Cap's collections of mugs and coins.” Hasis built the distinctive bar using a bowsprit salvaged from a sunken wreck. The bar is shrouded in everglades bamboo and topped with old ship decking. The hawser ropes used on the original barge are wrapped around a large piling in the bar.
Five buildings make up the complex, four which are considered historic - restaurant, bar, fish house, and boathouse. They’re connected by a series of docks and piers making it seem like a fish camp. The National Register of Historic Places said, “When Cap's Place was originally constructed, the peninsula on which it is located was extremely narrow.” The barge portion of the restaurant, as well as the fish house, extended out over the water.
While named Club Unique, it has always been known locally as Cap’s Place, and from the beginning was a hideaway with gambling, liquor, and dining. Slot machines lined the halls, a wheel of fortune hung in the bar, and games of chance like blackjack and roulette were available. Private memberships to the "supper club" were sold for 25 cents. According to the National Register of Historic Places, flooring in the main dining “was covered with red carpet at the request of gambling associates during the 1930s, and the room became known as the Poinsettia Room.”
While gambling remained popular until the late 1940s, by the 1950s political pressures forced an end to the practice. Fortunately, Cap’s Place was always popular for serving good local seafood. In a local interview, Talle Hasis, Al Hasis’ daughter recalls, "The original dinner menu was shrimp, snapper, pompano, Spanish mackerel, fried oysters, and chicken, “adding, "Cap didn't even believe in dessert. ‘If we haven't fed 'em enough, we're doing something wrong,' he used to say.”
Over the years, a notable cast of characters visited Cap’s Place. Among them were members of the Vanderbilt and Rockefeller families; actors Errol Flynn and Humphrey Bogart; sports figures like Jack Dempsey and Joe DiMaggio; and even mobster Al Capone. Oral history suggests that Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt may have dined there for a strategy meeting during World War II.
Cap’s Place was almost lost in 1954 when several local businessmen planned to develop what they viewed as a “jungle” into the area’s first yacht club. Fortunately, the project never materialized. Cap died in 1964 at the age of ninety. Lola, their two sons, and Al Hasis continued to operate the restaurant after his death. Lola retired in the mid-1970s and passed away in 1989; the Hasis family assumed ownership of the restaurant and continue running it today.
Outside of Cap's Place [Photo/Wikimedia Commons]
One of the greatest charms to Cap’s Place is getting there via their free motor launch. Board from Cap’s dock located next to the Lighthouse Point Yacht Basin and Marina and be treated to a brief history of the area from the boat captain on the ride over. As one customer exclaimed, “I just have to ask you. How many restaurants do you need to take a boat to get to?”
When you step off, it’s into a setting of Florida pine and mangroves not much different than it would have appeared 70 years ago. You can feel bygone days as you walk along the docks and uneven floorboards of the buildings - or when you sit at the bar, built when most of South Florida was swampland.
For almost 100 years the Knight and Hasis families have served fine seafood in a distinctive waterfront setting and continue to do so today. Enjoy fresh fish like Pompano and Wahoo, stone crab, or their signature hearts of palm salad. Sidle up to that amazing bar, have a drink, and let history’s whisper return you to old Florida.
If you’d like to visit Cap’s Place and sights nearby, you can find lodging at two RV parks:
Yacht Haven Park and Marina - on the New River in Fort Lauderdale has 250 full hookup sites (many waterfront), with 30/50 amp electric and can accommodate rigs up to 45’. The park has a boat ramp, pool, and Wi-Fi.
Paradise Island RV Resort - also in Fort Lauderdale has 232 full hookup sites, including pull-throughs, with 30/50 amp electric. There’s a heated swimming pool and two clubhouses with billiards and a fitness center. The park is four miles to the ocean.