



Winchester Mystery House

San Jose, California

The Winchester Mystery House is an answer looking for a question. It was built under the direction of eccentric millionaire Sarah Winchester, and her purpose was... who knows? That's the mystery.





A funhouse ahead of its time, Winchester Mystery House has doors that open onto walls, stairs that go nowhere, windows that appear in ceilings, rooms that lack floors. Sarah Winchester never explained why she wanted these structural peculiarities, but accounts after her death fed the legend that she built her crazy home out of fear -- fear of the vengeful spirits of the people killed by her late husband's Winchester rifles.

Spirit-plagued Sarah's question might have been: "If I can't get rid of ghosts, can I at least drive them mad?" Her answer might have been to live in a house so confusing that the dead, befuddled, left her alone.

For over 35 years Sarah was a recluse, paying millions of dollars to expand her former simple farmhouse into a 160-room labyrinthine mansion. The public wanted to see it, and in February 1923, only five months after Sarah died in the house, it opened as a tourist attraction.





"New tour guides still get lost. I still get lost," said Tim O'Day, marketing director for the House. "Mrs. Winchester didn't work from blueprints, she didn't keep a diary. She was a very intelligent lady, but her house doesn't make any sense."





The "Hall of Fires," for example, includes multiple fireplaces (The house has 47 fireplaces but only 17 chimneys). Sarah would shut herself in the Hall and light all the hearths, slowly roasting herself.

The "Grand Ballroom" features a hinged wall; behind it is a wooden door, then a steel door, then a safe, then a safe inside the safe. After Sarah's death the safe was opened. Inside was some hair and the funeral notices of Sarah's husband and daughter, dead for decades.

"Every door hinge in the house is different," said Tim -- and the house has 2,000 doors.

As an attraction, the Winchester Mystery House must satisfy visitors with interests ranging from home remodeling to history to hauntings. "It is kind of tough," said Tim. "The House is many things to many people." One solution is to segment the audience. For example, the Friday the 13th Flashlight Tour focuses on the paranormal and takes ghost fans around the property after dark. The Explore More Tour leads super-curious visitors through previously unopened parts of the house -- such as the front door, which Sarah refused to open to anyone.





"Teddy Roosevelt was in the Bay Area," said Tim. "He was an admirer of Winchester firearms and he wanted to pay his respects to Mrs. Winchester. So he knocks on the front door, and was told to go around to the back; no one is allowed to use the front door. And he said, 'Dammit, I'm the President of the United States! I'm not using the back door!' And he walked off in a huff and never got to see the house."

All of Sarah Winchester's furniture -- including her death bed -- was sold off after her demise, but visitors to the house still wanted mementos. "People would come in and literally rip off pieces of wallpaper as souvenirs," said Tim. "But they'd always return the wallpaper, or any artifact that was taken, usually with a note saying, 'Ever since I took this I've had horrible luck. Please take this back.'" This cursed back-channel supply has helped in the House's restoration, which has been as perpetual as its original construction. The Winchester Mystery House claims to hold the record as the world's longest continuous home improvement project: begun in 1886, with no end in sight.

Modern studies of the house's origins haven't substantiated any "If you build it, they won't come"-motivation for Sarah, but since her death that's been an essential marketing drumbeat (and hook for Hollywood versions). Ghosts are everywhere in the Winchester Mystery House, said Tim, with disembodied footsteps, voices, and breathing; mysterious images on photographs; and things falling out of place constantly.

"Every employee has a story," Tim said. "But it isn't malevolent or evil. Whatever's here is quite happy." With 24,000 square feet of creaky doors and eerie staircases, the spirits apparently feel right at home.