FRANK FONTIS AND THE EVIL EYE 

Written by David A. Kaufelt for the Sun-Sentinel

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     Yet another genuine Key West eccentric, Frank Fontis billed himself as a veteran landscape artist and local "booster and businessman."

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     He was owner of the Coffee Mill and Florida Railroad Museum, but opinion about Frank Fontis' boosterism and character is sharply divided.

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     When I told one of his champions that Fontis was notorious as a seducer of young men, the answer was, "So what? He was a creative genius." Playwright Tennessee Williams, on the other hand, believed Fontis was a "malign" spirit, that he had "genuine demonic presence ....... evil powers."

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     It was Fontis who built the fence that surrounds Williams' famous Duncan Street house, carving "Tom" (Tennessee's real name) into the fretsaw work of the gingerbread gazebo. Supposedly, this imbued it with noxious power.

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     Later, he rented the Old Coffee Mill from a Mrs. Sanchez, who gave him two ultimate Key West accolades: "He gave the biggest Christmas party in town" and "He knew the highest of the high."

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     Lending some credibility to this statement was Fontis' friendship with President Jimmy Carter's mother, Miss Lillian. On a visit to Key West, Miss Lillian had locked her keys inside her car and Fontis retrieved them for her. He entertained Miss Lillian on at least two of her subsequent visits to the island city.

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     Fontis finally achieved his boyhood ambition of running a museum when the old Mary, Star of the Sea convent was torn down. Fontis bought a valuable seashell collection from the nuns at a bargain price, and subsequently purchased two old Overseas Railroad cars and an outhouse. Displaying them in a building adjacent to the Old Coffee Mill, he opened his museum.

 

      A cleanliness freak, Fontis was particular about who came into his museum. Any tourist dropping a cigarette butt was quickly evicted and, as time went on, fewer and fewer people passed Frank's rigid scrutiny. He had, it is said, a dark sense of humor. When he was washing down his sidewalk, he was known to spritz passers-by whom he felt did not rise to his high sanitary standards.

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     He employed a variety of young men -- drifters and AWOL sailors -- who worked in his museum and in his landscape business for reputedly substandard wages. Often, when he was finished with their services, he refused to pay them anything at all. So no one was all that surprised when Frank Fontis came to an untimely end.

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     Fontis, 46 or 49, depending upon which issue of the Key West Citizen you read, was found nude... in "a pool of blood" on his front porch on Jan. 5, 1979. He had been shot in the head. Dollar bills were scattered around him, and his parrots and parakeets were making a tremendous racket.

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     Months later, warrants were issued for two men, Michael Craig Messina, 18, and James or Anthony Dillman, age unknown, who were accused of second-degree murder and robbery. About $600 in cash was missing, along with assorted jewelry, including a gold necklace from which dangled a heart bearing the letter "F" engraved in diamonds.

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     The jewelry led to the arrest of Messina and Dillman, because Dillman had been spotted wearing the heart necklace with the diamond "F." However, the evidence turned out to be circumstantial. Messina was let go. Dillman was found guilty of second-degree theft but was subsequently acquitted.

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     Alas, there were no buyers for the Coffee Mill and Florida Railroad Museum. It died shortly after its owner.