As work nears completion on the resurrection of the Pratt Funeral Home in Downtown Jacksonville as a lodging establishment and restaurant, the building has been renamed with an eye toward the macabre and the city’s history.
Eric Adler, the owner and developer of the property at 525 W. Beaver St., posted Oct. 30 on LinkedIn that the renovated building would be called The Raven.
“The name hints at this beautiful property’s past while also looking towards the future,” Eric Adler posted on LinkedIn. “We are proud to celebrate its history – naming four of our apts after jazz legends who played in LaVilla as well as highlighting a famed aviator – Bessie Coleman – who was part of this gorgeous property’s past.”
Fans of American poet and writer Edgar Allan Poe will recognize the new name as the title of Poe’s narrative poem about a mysterious raven that visits a man grieving the death of a loved one “once upon a midnight dreary.”
Coleman, the first Black woman to earn a pilot’s license, was killed in April 1926 during a test flight. A March 31, 2020, article in thejaxsonmag.com says that the flight was at Paxon Field in Jacksonville.
Through The Raven’s website, ravenjax.com, the property is taking reservations for its 13 rooms. The site refers to the establishment as an “aparthotel” that “combines the features of a hotel with the comforts of an apartment.”
Guest rooms feature kitchenettes, in-unit laundry facilities, and the property includes such hotel amenities as an outdoor pool and free Wi-Fi, on-site parking and coffee.
The site lists studios and one- and two-bedroom units from $149 to $249 per night. The Raven website shows room availability starting Dec. 1.
In addition to a room named for Coleman, others are named after artists connected to LaVilla district’s entertainment history, such as Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday.
In May 2023, the Jacksonville City Council approved a $1.25 million forgivable loan package for Adler's restoration and adaptive reuse of the 9,482-square-foot building.
In November of that year, the city issued a permit for Avant Construction Group to renovate the structure at a cost of almost $2.1 million. Plans called for the building to have 13 apartments and a small plate restaurant and wine bar.
According to a 2022 story in the Daily Record, Lawton Pratt started a funeral home in 1900 in the 400 block of Broad Street. In 1915, Pratt moved into the building at 527 W. Beaver St. The address of the property was changed in 525 W. Beaver St. in the 1970s.
City records show the building was built in 1916, but records from that time may not be precise.
After Pratt’s death in 1943, his apprentice, Oscar Hillman, and his wife, Evelyn Hillman, took over the business and it became the Hillman-Pratt Funeral Home.
Oscar Hillman died in 1978 and the business was run by his wife until it was taken over by Anthony Walton in 2002.
It operated as Hillman-Pratt & Walton Funeral Home until it closed in 2019.