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Louella Day McConnell –
Diamond Lil – A Flamboyant American Woman
Louella Day McConnell, a woman with many names,
personalities and more than an ounce of guile, made
her mark on St. Augustine from her arrival in 1900
until long after her generation passed on. She left
an indelible imprint in St. Augustine, most notably
with the ‘Fountain of Youth’ and the glistening
little diamond embedded in her front tooth. Many
folks thought she wasn’t in her right mind, as the
saga of her life unfolded; however, she managed to
carry her name into perpetuity sane or not!
With a little ‘Barnum & Bailey’ boldness, she was a
single woman in her mid-twenties when she was
attracted to the Klondike during the gold-rush fever
that descended on the U.S. in 1897. She was known
for her adventurous spirit and boundless imagination
and the amazing fact that she practiced medicine in
Canada (perhaps without studying medicine…but nobody
really knows the truth)! She married a steamboat
owner a year later, -tall red-haired Edward
McConnell – leaving the frigid north for the sizzlin’
south. From the huge rings on her fingers and the
glistening diamond in her tooth, she turned heads in
town…from dinners at the lavish Hotel Ponce de Leon
to daily appearances in the local society columns.
The house they purchased just north of town had a
‘flowing well surrounded by a square coquina wall on
four sides’. Disappearing and reappearing from St.
Augustine numerous times (probably to the delight of
gossipers), myth and legend has the McConnell’s
losing their fortunes AND the diamonds by the
1920’s. She was resourceful though; it was then she
began selling water from the alleged ‘fountain of
youth’ for ten cents a glass, along with charging
admission to the newly labeled park grounds.
Rumors and stories abound from friends and enemies,
Social commentators of the time earmarked the
McConnell’s as a’ wealthy couple arriving from the
Klondike’…eccentricities ad all. Louella (also known
as Lyonella, Lyonell Day, even Lynonella Murat Day –
a name she claimed as a member of the Napoleon
Bonaparte family) felt that she could do anything,
some admired her spunk but not everyone thought
kindly of her. In a speech given to the St Augustine
Tourist Club in 1909, Luella said:
I have not got insanity
I have not got hysteria
And I have not got any Ladylike Complications!
We dedicate this suite to Diamond Lil and the
myth that entices visitors to the Nation’s Oldest
City. She left her mark on the world! |
