Mabel Marks Bacon

Mabel Marks Bacon (December 17, 1876 – December 14, 1966) was an American hotelier. She designed and operated several prominent hotels along the Gulf Coast in the 1930s. In the 1910s she was known for her skill with sailing, skippered a portion of a race from New York to Bermuda in 1910, and learned to drive in 1911. She raised her children in Maine and Panama, where the family lived while her husband was employed by the Panama Canal Company. In 1921, after returning to the United States, she ran a hotel known as the Inn-by-the-Sea in Pass Christian, Mississippi, which was a luxury resort built by her husband. Losing the hotel during the Great Depression, the family lived on board a boat for several months before landing at Dauphin Island, Alabama. Leasing the abandoned Fort Gaines from the government, they ran The-Sea-Fort-Inn until they discovered property while sailing along the Santa Rosa Sound. In 1935, they moved to Mary Esther, Florida, where Bacon designed and ran Bacon's-by-the-Sea. The hotel was frequented by several movie production companies and stars and was listed in 1954 as one of the top ten hotels in America in Look. Early life Mabel Marks was born on December 17, 1876 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Jeanette "Nettie" Holmes (née Colwell) and William Dennis Marks. Her father was a noted engineer, originally from St. Louis, Missouri, who taught at the University of Pennsylvania and later became president of the Edison Electric Light Company. During the height of his fame, he was painted by Thomas Eakins, and his portrait is now in the permanent collection of the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum. Her mother, originally from Chattanooga, Tennessee, raised the daughters and enjoyed playing both the piano and zither, as well as riding horses. Mark's older sister, Jeannette, known in her youth as "Gussie" would grow up to become a writer and a professor at Mount Holyoke College. Their parent's marriage was estranged and the girls lived with their mother, periodically in Philadelphia, as well as at their home on Lake Champlain, near Westport, New York. The family dynamic was marked by indifference and ambivalence, without close ties. Though well-to-do, the girls were mostly taught at home sporadically by a stream of governesses.