and his good friend, the architect Addison Mizner, were visiting Palm Beach in the spring of 1918. Singer decided to build a hospital with Mizner as the architect. Singer had already built three hospitals in France for the wounded. It was during World War I when only war-related buildings could be built. Construction began in July. By November 1918 seven residential villas and a medical center had been built on the north side of Worth Avenue, across from the main building. Singer purchased laboratory and surgical equipment and fittings for an operating room. Singer sent out as many as 300,000 invitations to eligible Army and Navy officers, who had to be screened and had to be able to pay their own room and board. However, World War I had ended, and most former soldiers wanted to go home. The hospital was reinvisioned as a private club; the medical equipment was donated to a hospital in West Palm Beach. There was a main building, eight separate villas, tennis courts, a parking garage across the street, and a yacht basin. The club opened on 25 January 1919. Paris Singer was the President of the club and he decided who could become a member. For its second season in 1920, Mizner supervised the construction of a nine-hole golf course and the landscaping of the club's 60 acres. He also built Via Mizner, an addition on Worth Avenue with eleven apartments and sixteen shops. Mizner's design for the Everglades Club was widely considered to be the biggest success of his career." It helped establish a new architectural style for Florida. In the club's first season Mizner received four architectural commissions. He went on to become America's foremost society architect of his era. Singer began his club with twenty-five charter members. Two years later, the membership was closed at 500 members. Eliza Osgood Vanderbilt Webb was one of its earliest female members. Businessman Jack C. Massey was a member. An additional nine holes were added to the golf course in 1930.
Today (2018)
The club deliberately does not have a website. Cellphones are prohibited on the property. When journalist Ian Brown approached the club in 2016, an employee dressed "straight out of Dickens" intercepted him and, when asked, denied that it was the Everglades Club. Brown stated:
Membership policies
The Club has long been criticized for alleged discrimination against Jews and blacks. Sammy Davis, Jr. was turned away at the door. According to socialite C.Z. Guest, she and her husband were temporarily suspended from the club after they brought Jewish guests — Estée Lauder and her husband — to a party there in 1972. Joseph Kennedy, father of the slain president, resigned his membership in the early '60s "to avoid scrutiny for belonging to a club known for excluding African-American and Jewish people." The Bath & Tennis, often referred to as the B&T, is another exclusive, predominantly WASP club that opened in 1926 and excluded Jews and African-Americans. The frequent exclusion led a group of wealthy island Jews to form a new club, the Palm Beach Country Club. As of 2014, there has never been an African-American member. According to 2009 president William Panill, no black has ever applied. The Club now has Jewish members, but how many is unknown because, according to Panill, "we don't ask." As another member put it, the current policy on Jews is "Don't ask, don't tell". Panill admitted in 2009 that he receives inquiries about whether a member can bring a Jewish guest.
