Hotel del Coronado

The name in the hotel register did not immediately tell investigators who had died. A young woman had arrived at Hotel del Coronado in 1892 as Lottie A. Bernard. Five days later, on November 29, she was found dead on an exterior staircase leading toward the beach. Police circulated a description by telegraph, and newspapers called her the beautiful stranger. Her identity was subsequently established as Kate Morgan.

The hotel's historical account records that Morgan had worked as a domestic in Los Angeles and was estranged from her husband. Employees said she had been waiting for a gentleman to join her. Accounts of an argument during her journey and theories about whom she expected have helped sustain the mystery, but they do not reveal all her intentions. The coroner concluded that her death was suicide. Later speculation has repeatedly revisited that conclusion, turning the short stay into a story with a much longer afterlife.