TAMPA, Fla. — It's time to pull out your beads and eyepatches because the Gasparilla Invasion of Tampa Bay has officially begun.
On Saturday, this annual reenactment of Tampa's historic invasion of the Gasparilla Flotilla is led by Jose Gasparilla and the swashbuckling YMKG pirates. They start by setting sail from the south of Hillsborough Bay before docking at the Tampa Convention Center, where they'll command Mayor Jane Castor to surrender the key to the city to the Captain of Ye Mystic Krewe of Gasparilla.
After snagging the key to the city, the Krewe will celebrate their victory in a Parade of Pirates down Bayshore Boulevard.
So why does the City of Tampa celebrate Gasparilla? This annual tradition first kicked off in 1904 when Tampa Tribune Society Editor Mary Louise Dodge and George Hardee collaborated on the idea, drawing inspiration from the legend of one Spanish pirate who allegedly invaded the Florida coast hundreds of years ago.
Jose Gaspar, or Gasparilla, attended the Spanish Naval Academy and became an officer. But, he joined the Navy during a rough time in Spanish history, which led him to his pirating ways.
According to the official Gasparilla website, he captured many ships from the 1780s until 1821, earning a fortune in treasure, most of which still remains lost.
During one last adventure in 1821, a US Navy ship in disguise confronted Gasparilla’s ship. Rather than being captured and defeated, Gaspar wrapped an anchor chain around his body and threw himself into the Gulf of Mexico.
But did any of this really happen? Rodney Kite-Powell from the Tampa Bay History Center begs to differ.
“The problem is, of course, Jose Gaspar never existed,” Kite-Powell told ABC Action News in 2020. “There’s no record of him in any archive, anywhere. The Spanish were very good at keeping records. He probably just is a conglomeration of true pirates who really were in Florida and the Caribbean at the time, and they’ve created this myth around him in the late 19th century.”
