17 May 2016 | Tregoning is in Whangarei Town Basin Marina, Whangarei, New Zealand but we are still in San Jose, CA
Photo: Front and side views of the rambling Winchester House in San Jose, CA.
The Winchester Mystery House in San Jose is a huge, 160-room, Victorian mansion, that was owned by Sarah Winchester, the widow of the gun magnate, William Winchester. Having lost her infant daughter and then her husband, Sarah was probably quite depressed when she moved from New Haven, Connecticut, to San Jose and bought an unfinished farmhouse in the Santa Clara Valley. She was extremely wealthy, due to her 50% ownership of Winchester Repeating Arms Company (most famous for their repeating rifles), having an income of $1,000 per day (equivalent to about $23,000 per day in 2013).
As soon as she took up residence in the house in 1884, Sarah started having new rooms, floors, verandahs, and hallways added. Such work, which she planned and supervised without the aid of an architect, eventually became something of a hobby. But this would not explain why she required that there always be work continuing on the house, 24 hours of every, single day for 38 years. This obsession was explained by others as being a result of her consultation with a medium in New Haven, who had recommended the move and claimed that she must continuously build a home for herself and the spirits of all of the victims of the Winchester rifles. Sarah, and many others, claimed that the ghosts of such victims did inhabit the rambling building, and work on the house only stopped at the time of her death in 1922.
Her possessions, which had been bequeathed to her niece and personal secretary, were all removed after her death but, oddly, the house itself was not mentioned in Sarah's will. Because of its size, complexity, unfinished construction, and after sustaining earthquake damage in 1906 (which had temporarily trapped Sarah in one of the rooms), the house was considered by appraisers to be worthless. It was sold to a local investor for over $135,000 and within five years of Sarah's death, it was opened to the public and has been a privately-maintained attraction ever since.
The house was built to seven stories but damage after the 1906 and 1989 earthquakes has resulted in it being only four stories today. There are many odd features to the house including: the door-to-nowhere that opens through an outside wall to a one-story drop to the ground; a door that opens to a brick wall; and an indoor staircase that goes from the floor to the ceiling. We took both the Mansion Tour and the Behind-the-Scenes Tour. On the former, more popular tour, as we walked through 110 of the rooms, the guides emphasized the oddities of the house and the mysterious beliefs and ideas of its eccentric owner. There was only one working toilet that she used, the rest being decoys for the ghosts, and she slept in a different room every night.
On the second tour, however, Sarah's ideas were treated with much more respect. It was concluded that most of the building oddities were simply the result of her reluctance to remove anything, even once its use was negated by later additions to her rambling design. She was also given much more credit for her innovative designs and additions including: three elevators; steam and force-air heating; push-button gas-lights; modern, indoor plumbing and toilets; and easy-riser staircases (very, shallow steps) which she could use despite debilitating arthritis. She did not skimp on adornments to her rooms, including several very valuable Tiffany windows, but, sadly, most of the furniture was sold at her death.
The behind-the-scenes tour also included some of the buildings that had been associated with the large farm and orchards that had originally surrounded the house. There were also small museums showing the various household and farming items and the extensive number of models of rifles that the Winchester Company produced, mostly between the 1860s and 1920s.
Randall examines some of the Winchester repeating rifles
Now surrounded by urban development rather than farmland, the ornate house appears a bit out of place in San Jose but it seems to be a popular tourist attraction. It is pretty amazing that is has been restored (started in 1973) and maintained only using the revenue that is generated through the tours, cafe, events, and gift-shop. So maybe, overplaying the "Mystery House" aspects of the mansion is understandable.