USEPPA ISLAND, Fla. — Most, if not all, historians agree the pirate named Jose Gaspar never existed. But treasure hunters believe there is truth in his tall tale, and buried treasure is out there.
Before we get to the treasure hunt, let's touch on the historical background of Jose Gaspar and how a now infamous fictitious pirate became a Tampa legend.
Since 1904, pirates have invaded the City of Tampa to kick off the Gasparilla Pirate Festival. The parade that follows is one of the largest in the country, drawing hundreds of thousands of people to Tampa Bay.
All of it is built around the story of Gaspar. The pirate is one of the most notorious in the history of pirates.
RECOMMENDED: The legend of Jose Gaspar and the history of Gasparilla
Gaspar's legend is one of a murderous, bloodthirsty swashbuckler who stole money from Spain, stole a ship, kidnapped a Spanish Princess, and left a trail of death and gold throughout the high seas.
Who created the man who is now a legend? According to historians, it was a real man named Juan "Panther John" Gomez from Gasparilla Island, or as he was known locally, John, or Panther Key John.
Other than news articles, the first story ever published in print about the Story of Gasparilla was commissioned by the Charlotte Harbor & Northern Railroad.
The Story of Gasparilla by ABC Action News on Scribd
"They were the ones that profited from the story to attract visitors to their new train stop and hotel (Gasparilla Inn)," Crystal Diff, Executive Director of the Boca Grande Historical Society and History Center, wrote in an email.
When it comes to the legend of Jose Gaspar, Diff told us to "be cautious that the information you present as there are lots of versions of this story and everyone's version is 'true.' Once it was in print, people kept spreading it as absolute truth. There has been a lot of permanent damage to archaeological sites due to the misinformation about buried treasure in prehistoric mounds, and pushing some aspects of this myth may lead to others following suit (leading to arrests and seizures as well as loss of cultural information)."
According to the railroad brochure, the "narrative was compiled by the writer from incidents told by John Gomez, better known as Panther Key John, a brother-in-law of Gasparilla and a member of his crew, who died at the age of 120 years, at Panther Key, Florida, 12 miles below Marco, in the year 1900; also from records left by John Gomez, Jr., the cabin-boy on Gasparilla's ship, who was kidnapped by Gasparilla and who witnessed the death of this pirate and all on board his vessel."
The story of Gaspar begins in 1782; the brochure states, "he stood high in the graces of the Spanish Court, so high indeed that he niched the crown jewels. Jose was also an officer of high standing in the naval affairs of the Spaniards. Some records give him the honor of being what we would call an admiral. His theft discovered, he deserted his wife and children, gathered together a nice lot of cut-throats, stole the prize vessel of the Spanish Fleet, and escaped."
The story said Gaspar hid in the Charlotte Harbor area, and "while taking the census of 1900, two gentlemen stopped at Panther Key and spent the night with *John Gomez. The race of the old buccaneer was nearly run, but all through that night, he told a story of piracy that could scarce be believed, yet it was a dying man that was clearing his soul before his Maker. He told of the looting of ships, the massacre of innocents, and last of all, when his life had nearly passed, he told the story of 'The Little Spanish Princess,' whose name he did not remember. He told where the body would be found and a sketch was prepared under his direction, and in recent years in the exact location as described, the skeleton of a beheaded woman was found."
TAMPANIANS STEAL GASPARILLA
"But if you're gonna make up the myth, you know, go big, and so why not make him, you know, all pirates rolled into one and, you know, the baddest of them all," Rodney Kite-Powell, a historian at the Tampa Bay History Center and Director of the Touchstone Map Library said.
Powell showed us museum exhibits full of gold coins recovered from shipwrecks and explained how the legend of Jose Gaspar launched the Gasparilla Pirate Festival we know and love today.
"So, it's interesting how Tampa, in a sense, stole; we were pirates ourselves. So, we stole Jose Gaspar. The Gaspar myth in the very beginning was tied to the Charlotte Harbor area. Still, it was not very soon after that, that Tampa captured that myth," Kite-Powell said. "And it was from that little nugget of information that came from the Charlotte Harbor railroad about a pirate named Gaspar that the whole legend of Gasparilla and Jose Gaspar came about, but it was Ye Mystic Krewe that fleshed it out. They gave him a first name, Jose Gaspar, and they really gave him the full backstory to create that in 1904. And to this day, Jose Gaspar returns on board his pirate ship every year to capture the city."
The story of Juan Gomez is also published in the Library of Congress.
The myth is now a Tampa tradition.
"The Gasparilla Day Parade, the big parade, is the third largest parade in this country after only the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and the Rose Bowl parade. So it is a huge, huge draw for people to come to Tampa."
THE REAL TREASURE HUNTERS
Paluska and ABC Action News photojournalist Reed Moeller took a 20-minute ferry ride from Pine Island to Useppa Island, the location where Gaspar is said to have beheaded a Spanish Princess.
The team searched the waters at low tide for a canon buried in the sand. The team used metal detectors and shovels but didn't find anything.
"The reason I believe in Gasparilla is because I believe in Juan Gomez," Mike Gattuso, a member of The Real Treasure Hunters, told Paluska. "But, what we believe is that Juan Gomez had ties to him. Whether he was his cabin boy, like it states in the story, or maybe he might have been Gasparilla himself because of all the treasure maps that we have found. We have one with Gomez's name on it."
"Jose Gaspar, from my understanding, was a name that was made up by Ye Mystic Krewe, which they tied to Gasparilla, which was tied to the railroad pamphlet that you're talking about, which that is not real. It was done for tourism purposes," Gattuso said. "We go after Juan Gomez because everything, all the treasures and everything we've come through, is tied to him. We actually located the great great, great, great-granddaughter of Juan Gomez. And she actually had maps, and she had stories that were passed down to the family about these treasures. So that's why we believe that it was Juan Gomez. And that's what we've been chasing. We've been chasing his treasures. We have seven maps."
A few months ago, Gattuso found a Calusa bone tool that is now part of the Useppa Island museum's collection.
The team found a few nails, a beer can, and a screw during this hunt. But they know long-lost treasures and artifacts are out there. Useppa Island was a military outpost, resort, Confederate stronghold, and CIA site to train Cuban exiles for the Bay of Pigs invasion and was continuously inhabited for 10,000 years by the Calusa Indians. History Gattuso will keep them busy on Useppa and across Florida.
"We do have some treasure maps, and we're working on them," Gattuso said. "You'll hear more of us, you know; we'll do this until we're old and, you know, can't do it anymore."
