Speaker 1: Welcome to Haunted Road, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 2: Hey, Haunted Roadies, I know you like spooky stuff, That's
Speaker 2: why you're here, But have you taken it a step
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Speaker 2: is an online community that I created for all of
Speaker 2: us ghost nerds. It focus on ghosts, hauntings, paranormal investigations, research,
Speaker 2: you name it. So whether you're a casual ghost story
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Speaker 2: Judgment one in my very own attic of my three
Speaker 2: hundred year old house, focus on a bunch of haunted
Speaker 2: things that I've collected over the years. We also do
Speaker 2: in person stuff too, meetups at events and conferences, plus
Speaker 2: exclusive meetups just for members. If you come see me
Speaker 2: on tour, there's always a free gift waiting for Paranormal
Speaker 2: Circle members at.
Speaker 1: The merch table.
Speaker 2: So if this sounds like something you want to check out.
Speaker 1: You can start a free trial today.
Speaker 2: Head to Amybrune dot com slash join to find out
Speaker 2: more and Haunted Roadies. You can use code Haunted road
Speaker 2: ten for ten percent off your annual membership. I've tried
Speaker 2: to keep this very affordable. Full disclosure, it's eight to
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Speaker 2: Join us if you dare. We'll see you out there.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Haunted Roadies. Two decades ago, I was getting
Speaker 2: ready to investigate a dream location, a place that had
Speaker 2: been on my bucket list four years, a place I
Speaker 2: had visited many times during the day, but the whole
Speaker 2: time longed to return at night. Somehow, my team and
Speaker 2: I had this place basically to ourselves. We were entrusted
Speaker 2: with the keys to the kingdom, as they say. This
Speaker 2: massive old mansion has tours during the day, with costumed
Speaker 2: guides taking tourists through its many halls. The sun was
Speaker 2: going down and the place had been closed for hours.
Speaker 2: But as I was bringing my equipment in, there was
Speaker 2: who I believed to be one of those costumed docents
Speaker 2: scurrying across the lawn like she had some place to be.
Speaker 2: In her gray dress and bonnet, she looked quite at
Speaker 2: home in her surroundings. But I knew they had gotten
Speaker 2: off work hours ago, so I went to my other
Speaker 2: team members and let them know what I'd seen, afraid
Speaker 2: perhaps that she could contaminate our investigation. A quick call
Speaker 2: to security confirmed what we had thought originally. There were
Speaker 2: no employees there other than a few security folks. Definitely
Speaker 2: no one still in costume. So who had I seen
Speaker 2: walking across the lawn that evening? Let's find out? Shall
Speaker 2: we join me Haunted roadies as we visit the infamous
Speaker 2: Winchester Mystery House. I'm Amy Bruney, and this is Haunted Road.
Speaker 2: A very unique house sits in San Jose, California, about
Speaker 2: an hour south of San Francisco. It's called the Winchester
Speaker 2: Mystery House, and it's a Queen Anne Revival style mansion,
Speaker 2: albeit with some Romanesque and Gothic features. The yellow home
Speaker 2: has red roofs that ascend into peaks and conical turrets.
Speaker 2: If you're a Disney fan, you might think it looks
Speaker 2: a lot like their Haunted Mansion attraction, which is fair.
Speaker 2: This real home was an inspiration for the ride, and
Speaker 2: as striking as it looks from the outside, the inside
Speaker 2: of the Winchester Mystery House is truly bizarre. Some of
Speaker 2: its one hundred and sixty rooms are dark and stuffy,
Speaker 2: others are airy, with big windows to let in the sunlight. Windows, mirrors,
Speaker 2: and doors sit in unexpected places or hang at odd angles.
Speaker 2: The roof is partially made of glass. Additionally, many of
Speaker 2: the windows aren't shaped like a traditional four panel square,
Speaker 2: but like a spider web. But it's not the decor
Speaker 2: that gives Winchester its reputation, it's the layout. It sprawls
Speaker 2: across twenty four thousand square feet and features hallways that
Speaker 2: lead nowhere and doors that open to solid walls. This
Speaker 2: makes the home maze like and disorienting. Some people have
Speaker 2: even said it feels bigger on the inside than on
Speaker 2: the outside. The number thirteen seems to be important here.
Speaker 2: There's a staircase with thirteen steps, a window with thirteen
Speaker 2: panes of glass, and a ceiling with thirteen panels. For
Speaker 2: nearly one hundred and forty years, people have speculated about
Speaker 2: why the house is like this. The truth is the
Speaker 2: history of the Winchester Mystery House is inextricably tied up
Speaker 2: with the woman who designed and built it, Sarah Winchester.
Speaker 2: She was born in eighteen thirty nine in Connecticut, and
Speaker 2: even before Sarah had taken her first breath, tragedy struck
Speaker 2: her family. Her parents had previously given birth to another girl,
Speaker 2: also named Sarah. That girl died before her second birthday,
Speaker 2: and the younger Sarah was named for her deceased sister.
Speaker 2: Despite the early loss, Sarah grew up in a large,
Speaker 2: wealthy family. She was well educated and known for her beauty,
Speaker 2: and when she was in her early twenties, she married
Speaker 2: a man named William Winchester. William was rich in his
Speaker 2: own right. He was also the son of a gun
Speaker 2: manufacturer whose company made the Winchester rifle. It wasn't the
Speaker 2: only source of income for William, but it ensured he
Speaker 2: and his wife would never want for anything, at least
Speaker 2: nothing that could be bought with money. William and Sarah's
Speaker 2: marriage was loving, but also marked with more tragedies. Their
Speaker 2: first and only child, Annie, died in eighteen sixty six
Speaker 2: when she was barely a month old. William and Sarah
Speaker 2: were devastated by the loss and coped by designing and
Speaker 2: building a home together in New Haven, Connecticut. They both
Speaker 2: appreciated architecture and enjoyed this kind of work, so the
Speaker 2: project gave them a reason to get out of bed
Speaker 2: each day. Years later, Sarah lost her mother in May
Speaker 2: of eighteen eighty and in December of that same year,
Speaker 2: William's father passed. Sadly, William only outlived his father by
Speaker 2: about three more months. In March of eighteen eighty one,
Speaker 2: he died of tuberculosis. He was only forty three years old.
Speaker 2: After his passing, Sarah inherited half of his firearms company,
Speaker 2: as well as his family fortune, and once again Sarah
Speaker 2: had to cope with her grief.
Speaker 1: But now she.
Speaker 2: Didn't have William to lean on anymore. She never stopped mourning,
Speaker 2: and she spent the rest of her life wearing black
Speaker 2: clothes and a veil every single day. It probably didn't
Speaker 2: help that three years later, in eighteen eighty four, Sarah
Speaker 2: suffered another untimely loss. This time it was her oldest sister, Mary,
Speaker 2: who succumbed to an illness. By now, Sarah was in
Speaker 2: her mid forties and she'd lost her mother, her husband,
Speaker 2: her sister, and her only child. It was time for
Speaker 2: a fresh start, and she moved to California with her
Speaker 2: surviving siblings. This was also when she returned to the
Speaker 2: hobby that had given her such relief during an earlier
Speaker 2: period of mourning. Home design and construction. In eighteen eighty six,
Speaker 2: Sarah bought a small, eight room farmhouse in what's now
Speaker 2: San Jose. It was far too modest for her. She
Speaker 2: hoped to share the home with all three of her
Speaker 2: sisters and their families, so she hired a construction team
Speaker 2: to expand the home, and even after her sisters made
Speaker 2: separate living arrangements, she kept renovating. Sarah called the property
Speaker 2: yonada villa, translated into an English that means house on
Speaker 2: flat land, but of course it would later be known
Speaker 2: as the Winchester Mystery House. Right off the bat, Sarah
Speaker 2: broke with convention. First, she hired two different architects, but
Speaker 2: ultimately let them both go so she could design the
Speaker 2: house for herself. It was very unusual for women to
Speaker 2: do architectural work in the eighteen hundreds, so this certainly
Speaker 2: turned some heads. According to Elizabeth Savoda of Atlas Obscura.
Speaker 2: Sarah was also an unusually good boss.
Speaker 1: She paid her.
Speaker 2: Workers well and gave them frequent breaks. This may have
Speaker 2: been because she suffered from rheumatoid arthritis, which left her
Speaker 2: feeling exhausted all of the time. She also sympathized with
Speaker 2: her employees and ensured that they had a chance to
Speaker 2: rest and recover every time she needed to step back
Speaker 2: from her own responsibilities. Sarah's rheumatoid arthritis also made it
Speaker 2: difficult for her to walk up and down standard size stairs.
Speaker 2: She designed her home staircases to be shallower than usual.
Speaker 2: She also rarely interacted with anyone but her construction crews
Speaker 2: and family because her condition made it painful for her
Speaker 2: to get around town. All to say, Sarah's choices had
Speaker 2: logic to them, but her neighbors and other people in
Speaker 2: her community weren't privy to these details about her personal life.
Speaker 2: They knew Sarah as a mysterious recluse. They also noticed
Speaker 2: that by eighteen ninety six, the home was still under construction,
Speaker 2: fully ten years after she'd begun. The renovation project. By
Speaker 2: now Yanata Villa was several stories high. Sarah had also
Speaker 2: added a seven story tower then Once it was finished,
Speaker 2: she decided she didn't like it and ordered it to
Speaker 2: be torn down and rebuilt, except then she didn't like
Speaker 2: the second version of the tower or the third. According
Speaker 2: to a newspaper from the time, it took sixteen tries
Speaker 2: before the construction crews got the tower just right, and
Speaker 2: that situation wasn't unique. According to author Mary Joe Ignoffo,
Speaker 2: Sarah had several rooms torn down and rebuilt to ensure
Speaker 2: they matched her specifications. Eccentricities like these ensured that rumor
Speaker 2: and speculation flew. It was only a matter of time
Speaker 2: before people theorized that the ongoing expansions and renovations were
Speaker 2: a cult in nature. Some believed that Sarah was building
Speaker 2: without ceasing to work out guilty feelings. She may have
Speaker 2: been troubled by the fortune her husband had left her,
Speaker 2: specifically because he'd made so much of his money selling
Speaker 2: Winchester rifles. As the story went, Sarah was also an
Speaker 2: avid spiritualist who often hosted seances in her home. During
Speaker 2: one of those sessions, a medium supposedly told her that
Speaker 2: she'd lost her husband and daughter because gun sales had
Speaker 2: brought a curse down on her family. Now the ghost
Speaker 2: of every person who'd ever been killed by a Winchester
Speaker 2: rifle had come to haunt Sarah as well. She needed
Speaker 2: to keep making the house larger and larger to appease
Speaker 2: all of the lost souls. If she ever finished construction
Speaker 2: or stopped the work, they would kill her too. According
Speaker 2: to Mitch Goth of Haunted Us, Sarah hosted even more
Speaker 2: seances to consult with the ghosts about what structural changes
Speaker 2: she should make. Another rumor said that ghosts couldn't be satisfied,
Speaker 2: only avoided, so Sarah intentionally made her home huge and
Speaker 2: maze like to make it harder for the specters to
Speaker 2: find her. She also supposedly slept in a different bedroom
Speaker 2: every night, just to stay one step ahead of the spirits.
Speaker 2: By this time in her life, Sarah was very reclusive.
Speaker 2: She never entertained guests and rarely appeared in public.
Speaker 1: She also never.
Speaker 2: Confirmed or denied any of the speculation, so it's hard
Speaker 2: to know if there was any truth to these rumors.
Speaker 2: That said, it was quite common for wealthy women at
Speaker 2: the time to host seances, and firearms were already controversial
Speaker 2: even in those days, so it is quite possible that
Speaker 2: a medium could have come to Sarah's home and warned
Speaker 2: her about the spiritual dangers associated with her family fortune. However,
Speaker 2: there's no hard evidence that Sarah ever hosted a seance
Speaker 2: at Yanatavilla, nor did she ever give any indication that
Speaker 2: she felt guilty about her association with the Winchester rifle.
Speaker 2: Whatever her reasons, Sarah continued expanding the house until disaster struck.
Speaker 2: On April eighteenth, nineteen oh six, a massive earthquake shook
Speaker 2: San Francisco and the surrounding area. This included San Jose,
Speaker 2: where Yanata Villa was standing. There's no record of where
Speaker 2: Sarah was that day, but rumor suggests she was at
Speaker 2: the Mystery House when the quake hit. The seven story
Speaker 2: tower collapsed, as did several of the upper floors. It's
Speaker 2: hard to estimate the extent of the damage because there
Speaker 2: are no blueprints showing the house's original layout, but the
Speaker 2: destruction was unquestionably intensive. As the story goes, Sarah supposedly
Speaker 2: became trapped in the room known as the Daisy Bedroom.
Speaker 2: Although she repeatedly called for help and rang a bell
Speaker 2: to notify her staff that she was in trouble, it
Speaker 2: took them hours to find her, since Sarah slept in
Speaker 2: a different room every night. They had no idea where
Speaker 2: she could have been at the time of the tremor.
Speaker 2: Luckily for Sarah, she survived the disaster and made it
Speaker 2: out alive. Sadly, her home was badly damaged. She ordered
Speaker 2: several crumbling wings and whole stories to be walled off.
Speaker 2: Those areas were never repaired, and after the earthquake, the
Speaker 2: construction work as a whole ceased.
Speaker 1: It's possible this is the true.
Speaker 2: Reason for the Mystery House's current doorways and hallways to nowhere.
Speaker 2: They might not have been built on purpose. Instead, they
Speaker 2: were left to sit unrepaired in the aftermath of the earthquake.
Speaker 2: But again it's hard to say for sure, because after
Speaker 2: the disaster, more and gossip plagued Sarah. Now People whispered
Speaker 2: that she was mentally unstable and obsessed with the apocalypse.
Speaker 2: Others said the earthquake was a sign that restless spirits
Speaker 2: were unhappy with her continued renovations. Whatever the truth lay,
Speaker 2: Sarah spent less time at Nada Villa. However, she was
Speaker 2: there on September fifth, nineteen twenty two. That's when she
Speaker 2: passed away at the age of eighty three, The Winchester
Speaker 2: Mystery House sold right away after her death, Even though
Speaker 2: appraiser said it had no monetary value whatsoever, the new
Speaker 2: owners saw its potential. Though by this time the house
Speaker 2: was already rumored to be haunted. Many thought that the
Speaker 2: stories of Sarah hiding from the ghosts of the Winchester
Speaker 2: Rifle victims had a ring of authenticity, whether they were
Speaker 2: true or not, and by summer nineteen twenty three, the
Speaker 2: new owners were marketing it as a haunted house and
Speaker 2: offering tours to their customers. In October ninth, teen twenty four,
Speaker 2: Harry Houdini himself visited. Now Houdini was there to investigate
Speaker 2: not because he believed it was haunted, but because he
Speaker 2: wanted to debunk the rumors. But according to the Winchester
Speaker 2: Mystery House website, he left the house feeling conflicted about
Speaker 2: whatever he had experienced there. These days, tourists are still
Speaker 2: allowed to walk through the home and explore its mysteries
Speaker 2: for themselves. Time magazine considers it one of the top
Speaker 2: ten most haunted places.
Speaker 1: In the whole world.
Speaker 2: Numerous visitors claim they felt a presence in the home,
Speaker 2: a friendly one that said some staffers and tourists flat
Speaker 2: out refused to go into certain rooms. That includes the
Speaker 2: so called Witch's Cap, which is in the South Turret.
Speaker 2: It's not easy to get there. Visitors have to go
Speaker 2: through a cluttered attic and a narrow hallway that's only
Speaker 2: five feet tall. Eventually they'll reach a wooden, circular room
Speaker 2: that's supposed to be a hotbed for supernatural incidents. The
Speaker 2: Daisy Bedroom is also highly active. That is the room
Speaker 2: where Sarah reportedly got trapped during the nineteen oh six earthquake,
Speaker 2: and to this day, cracks from the tremor are.
Speaker 1: Visible in the walls.
Speaker 2: Cameras don't always work properly in the Daisy Bedroom. That's
Speaker 2: according to Kathy Alexander of Legends of America. She also
Speaker 2: wrote that when visitors do manage to snap a picture,
Speaker 2: they'll often end up with a strange looking photo of
Speaker 2: a blurry, white, unidentifiable entity. Shadow figures have also appeared
Speaker 2: in this room, as have cold spots elsewhere in the home.
Speaker 2: People can hear disembodied footsteps, whispers and voices, and distant
Speaker 2: piano music. Doors open and close on their own, and
Speaker 2: sometimes the home fills with the scent of a freshly
Speaker 2: cooked meal even though no one is using the kitchen.
Speaker 2: Many reports feature a mustached specter known as Clyde. He's
Speaker 2: said to be one of the construction workers who helped
Speaker 2: build Yanata Villa, and to this day, his spirit still
Speaker 2: hauls wheelbarrows of coal around or tries to fix the
Speaker 2: fireplace in the ballroom. Clyde wears white coveralls and sometimes
Speaker 2: has a Victorian era hat over his black hair. When
Speaker 2: he notices that tourists have spotted him, he usually gives
Speaker 2: a friendly nod before getting back to work, and a
Speaker 2: few eagle eyed guests have seen a very slim four
Speaker 2: foot ten inch woman dressed all in black. She's thought
Speaker 2: to be Sarah Winchester herself. The Winchester Mystery House website
Speaker 2: says that Sarah can be spotted wandering the halls, looking
Speaker 2: out windows, and occasionally visiting the gardens, all things that
Speaker 2: she likely.
Speaker 1: Did in life as well.
Speaker 2: Apparently, it's not only the house that's haunted, but the
Speaker 2: objects within it. Over the years, different guests and tourists
Speaker 2: stole nick knacks and small items during their visits, and
Speaker 2: regularly these sticky fingered individuals would suffer from bad luck afterward,
Speaker 2: until eventually they'd mailed the stolen object back to Yanadavia.
Speaker 1: Hoping for relief.
Speaker 2: To talk about all this history and all these stories.
Speaker 2: Up next, we're going to be talking to my dear
Speaker 2: friend Aiden Sinclair, who worked at the Mystery House for years.
Speaker 2: He's got some really great stories to tell, and that
Speaker 2: is coming up after the break. So now I am
Speaker 2: joined by one of my very good friends, mister Aiden Sinclair.
Speaker 1: This is not his first time to the show. He is.
Speaker 2: I guess you're a resident magician at the Stanley Hotel
Speaker 2: and you had an affiliation with the Winchester House for
Speaker 2: a long time, So what happened there?
Speaker 3: Yeah, we've been really lucky to get to kind of
Speaker 3: perform and investigate at probably the three most famous haunted
Speaker 3: places in the US, being the Stanley Hotel, the Queen Mary,
Speaker 3: and the Winchester Mystery House, which is really kind of cool,
Speaker 3: you know, it's like a nice thing to have in
Speaker 3: your portfolio. But we did shows for the Winchester Mystery
Speaker 3: House for about three years, and we actually did their
Speaker 3: first public paranormal investigation there as well, and that was
Speaker 3: pre COVID back and I think in twenty twenty we
Speaker 3: got to do that brought in twenty people who got
Speaker 3: to have the experience, and it's just an immensely fascinating
Speaker 3: place and really really cool and obviously amazing history.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I've actually investigated there and it's been many,
Speaker 2: many years.
Speaker 1: It's funny.
Speaker 2: I think I investigated their pre TV and everything, and
Speaker 2: it was kind of when there was still kind of
Speaker 2: a novelty to a paranormal team asking to come into
Speaker 2: a location, and one of our team members actually worked there,
Speaker 2: and so we were able to go in and investigate
Speaker 2: a couple of times and it was super interesting. It's
Speaker 2: hard not to like be distracted by your surroundings the
Speaker 2: whole time because there's just so much to look at.
Speaker 2: And so now I do just want to say, I
Speaker 2: want to preface this before we get too far into this,
Speaker 2: because I did mention that you are a magician, a
Speaker 2: very skilled one at that, but you're also very much
Speaker 2: on the level when it comes to like paranormal activity.
Speaker 2: Like I trust you immensely. I don't think you're you know,
Speaker 2: conjuring spirits as they say, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: You're very respectful of the paranormal and so I just
Speaker 2: wanted to put that out there Aidan is awesome and
Speaker 2: I love how much you incorporate just in your act
Speaker 2: in general spiritualism and seances and it's just really stunning stuff.
Speaker 2: So if you ever have the chance to see Aidan,
Speaker 2: please do. We'll talk more about it at the end,
Speaker 2: but anyway, so you get the chance to kind of
Speaker 2: run these public investigations at the house. Now before you
Speaker 2: even started doing that, like, what were some of the
Speaker 2: things that you either knew happened there or you experiences
Speaker 2: yourself in the location.
Speaker 3: Well, we on our very first trip up there, there
Speaker 3: is this It's one of those things where you see
Speaker 3: shadows out of the corner of your eye, you know,
Speaker 3: where like you definitely feel somebody there, and then you
Speaker 3: turn in it's empty space and you get that feeling
Speaker 3: a lot of being watched, which is really uncanny. You know,
Speaker 3: it makes your hair stand up on your neck. And
Speaker 3: there's this amazing history of things just being moved, you know,
Speaker 3: not in a poltergeisty way, not in a bad way,
Speaker 3: and there's definitely this presence that's there. The first trip there,
Speaker 3: we just always had that feeling of where we went
Speaker 3: in the house like somebody was with you. And learning
Speaker 3: the history of Sarah. To me, it became really kind
Speaker 3: of it felt a lot like I don't think Sarah's there,
Speaker 3: but I think all the people who took care of
Speaker 3: Sarah are very much still there taking care of her,
Speaker 3: if that makes any sense. You know, her staff was
Speaker 3: really loyal to or they were very protective of her.
Speaker 3: I think when that's part of somebody's essence in life,
Speaker 3: that maybe that hangs around afterwards, you know, and that
Speaker 3: especially with all the traffic and kind of the exploitation
Speaker 3: of the place, I think that that makes them stay,
Speaker 3: you know, and makes them feel like they have to
Speaker 3: be protective and present.
Speaker 1: That's something to kind of talk about.
Speaker 2: Do you think that, like the kind of the exploitation
Speaker 2: of her story in general, do you think that that
Speaker 2: adds to the activity. Do you think that's one of
Speaker 2: the reasons why things happen there?
Speaker 3: I think it does. I think it's fascinating that, you know,
Speaker 3: the paranormal teams that tend to be more shall we
Speaker 3: say aggressive, or you know, they kind of they could
Speaker 3: be kind of provocative when they go places, you know,
Speaker 3: and their their tonality is much darker. You know, that's
Speaker 3: always is there a demon here? You know that stuff.
Speaker 3: I think when that stuff goes into the house, I
Speaker 3: don't think the provocation generates in interactions, but I think
Speaker 3: there's a dislike for that, you know what I mean
Speaker 3: of that's not what we are and that's not what
Speaker 3: this is. And I think that stimulates some activity in
Speaker 3: a way that is not necessarily good, because I think
Speaker 3: some people will go and go, well, if you provoke
Speaker 3: the ghost, maybe you get a response, but that would
Speaker 3: be like somebody coming into your house and being rude,
Speaker 3: and of course you're going to respond in a rude way.
Speaker 3: So I don't know. I feel kind of the people
Speaker 3: there are. I think all the traffic there gives purpose
Speaker 3: to the entities there, if that makes any sense, Like
Speaker 3: they have a reason to stay there.
Speaker 2: It sounds very personal, and you know, I think that
Speaker 2: a lot of hauntings are kind of personal like that,
Speaker 2: like they feel an obligation. Now when people are doing
Speaker 2: public investigations there, I'm sure when you guys ran those,
Speaker 2: you obviously asked for them to be very respectful and whatnot,
Speaker 2: Like what kind of things happened during these investigations Regularly.
Speaker 3: We had some really cool direct conversational K two interaction
Speaker 3: there and Estes sessions there were really powerful. The Estas
Speaker 3: method is something that I just love because it's just
Speaker 3: so clean in the sense that you know, you have
Speaker 3: somebody in headphones and they're blind and they can't hear
Speaker 3: anything and they can't see anything, and when you get
Speaker 3: intelligent responses, it's just fascinating, you know, to watch that
Speaker 3: experience take place. And Esta's sessions there were really kind
Speaker 3: of responsive so long as the questioning was respectful and courteous.
Speaker 3: We always use the present tense, and we never said Sarah.
Speaker 3: We'd always say, is miss Winchester? You know, you try
Speaker 3: to keep the formality of the time, and those seem
Speaker 3: to genuate generate really good conversational responses in Estes. Anytime
Speaker 3: we would ask if Miss Winchester was in the house,
Speaker 3: we would get very definitive no, she's away, And that's
Speaker 3: kind of a cool response to get, you know, from
Speaker 3: someone who can't hear that question. Very direct conversational responses
Speaker 3: of do you take care of her? Yes? Do you
Speaker 3: take care of the house? Yes? And I think it's
Speaker 3: fascinating that most of the apparitions that have been kind
Speaker 3: of seen or witnessed in the house tend to be workmen,
Speaker 3: you know, people that are building and working on the house,
Speaker 3: or people that are in period clothing that you know,
Speaker 3: are women dressed as servants, not as not as you know,
Speaker 3: modern day people. So that's kind of fascinating.
Speaker 2: That was my experience there. So this was this was
Speaker 2: so many years ago, but we got there after hours
Speaker 2: and everything was closed and I'll never forget like I
Speaker 2: saw a woman kind of like walking across the grounds
Speaker 2: area and this was in the evening hours, like kind
Speaker 2: of you know, dusk, you know, not super dark yet,
Speaker 2: and I remember just going, oh my god, I thought
Speaker 2: everyone was gone. I didn't know there were still employees here.
Speaker 2: And someone said, no, everyone's gone, and I you know,
Speaker 2: that was one time where like you wouldn't even know
Speaker 2: if you were there during the day and you were
Speaker 2: touring and you saw someone like that, you would just
Speaker 2: assume they were part of the staff. And so it
Speaker 2: makes you wonder, like how many people just kind of
Speaker 2: traverse those halls and kind of go about their tours
Speaker 2: and see someone and go, oh, wow, that's a very
Speaker 2: clever cosplay happening, you know, but it's actually they've witnessed
Speaker 2: a full bodied apparition and.
Speaker 3: It happens a lot there with the staff, Like the
Speaker 3: staff see people all the time there and not they
Speaker 3: don't see you know, transparent ghosty things. They see people.
Speaker 3: And then they disappeared.
Speaker 2: Yeah you know, yeah, no, this looked like a solid woman.
Speaker 2: Like I was just very much convinced that someone had
Speaker 2: stayed behind. But it also didn't make sense because they
Speaker 2: had been closed for hours, and so my brain was, like,
Speaker 2: they've been closed for hours, why would there still be
Speaker 2: someone scurrying around here in a costume? And so that's
Speaker 2: why I asked, or you know, maybe it was someone
Speaker 2: playing a practical joke on us or something, because it
Speaker 2: was kind of in the earlier days. But it's still
Speaker 2: stuck with me. I cannot, of course say for sure
Speaker 2: that was a ghost, but it was very very strange.
Speaker 2: But I do think that's interesting because they it's the
Speaker 2: difference there is that there were people working on that
Speaker 2: building consistently for so long that like it might not
Speaker 2: even be their full kind of you know, consciousness there,
Speaker 2: Like it could just be like they toiled and they
Speaker 2: worked and they felt so they felt this sense of
Speaker 2: like pride and obligation to the building. Like it's almost
Speaker 2: like that essence of them is still there.
Speaker 1: If that makes sense, I know it does.
Speaker 3: And there's there was staff that literally she you know,
Speaker 3: built houses for and lived on the property and were
Speaker 3: still alive after she passed, and within a year of
Speaker 3: her passing, you know, the house was open to the public.
Speaker 3: So those people were still there and started to see
Speaker 3: that traffic right away. You know, they were there to
Speaker 3: see who dedie come in and do a say, you know,
Speaker 3: And now all of that had to feel pretty disrespectful
Speaker 3: to somebody that you love and cherish and take care of.
Speaker 3: And now all of a sudden, you know, this house
Speaker 3: they created is a spectacle. I also think it's fascinating
Speaker 3: that a lot of people get so fixated on the
Speaker 3: house that a lot of people aren't aware that, like,
Speaker 3: she had another house and that house isn't weird, it's
Speaker 3: you know, there are some motifs that transfer over. The
Speaker 3: number thirteen was present in both houses, and spider webbing
Speaker 3: and glasses you know, and is there. But it's a
Speaker 3: normal house. There's not doors to know where the construction
Speaker 3: didn't continue. She also had a house boat that she
Speaker 3: spent a lot of time on, perfectly normal, you know,
Speaker 3: So it's this idea that she just stayed in this
Speaker 3: house and never left it, and you know, the spirits
Speaker 3: made her keep building. I think that's it's a great story.
Speaker 3: But I think if you take a step back and
Speaker 3: you look at her story, you know, people deal with
Speaker 3: grief in different ways, and for me was Sarah. I
Speaker 3: think the focus of building that house, like she would
Speaker 3: build a room and when it was done, undo it
Speaker 3: and do it again. You know. So I think if
Speaker 3: you could dedicate one hundred percent of your attention and
Speaker 3: time into a project, you're not thinking about the daughter
Speaker 3: and the husband that you lost, and you know that's
Speaker 3: the house. To me, really is this exercising grief of
Speaker 3: like how do I how do I not think about that?
Speaker 3: You know, let me let me just focus on something.
Speaker 2: Which is honestly kind of a more fascinating aspect to
Speaker 2: it as far as like activity. You know, when you
Speaker 2: have someone pouring, like when a project becomes when a
Speaker 2: project becomes their coping mechanism, Like what happens at that
Speaker 2: point to that project? You know, did you find that
Speaker 2: when you investigated if you referred to it, you know
Speaker 2: as the original house name Yonadavilla, did it get more results?
Speaker 2: Because a lot of people don't even refer that name.
Speaker 3: Ever, it did so long as we kept everything in period,
Speaker 3: it was great. Well was fascinating is that as soon
Speaker 3: as we had. Of course, when people are on a
Speaker 3: public investigation, they you know, they don't do this all
Speaker 3: the time. It might be the one time that they
Speaker 3: actually get to investigate, so they're they're not always as
Speaker 3: focused in the method, I guess. So you'll kind of
Speaker 3: teach people like, hey, try to keep things period specific,
Speaker 3: try to keep things in the present tense. But inevitably
Speaker 3: someone would be like, what do you think about all
Speaker 3: these cars and everything stops? Yeah, it just stops. You know.
Speaker 3: Anytime somebody brought up death in the house, activity stopped.
Speaker 3: You know, somebody would be like, oh, did you die here?
Speaker 3: That's it, We're done.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that happens a lot on a lot of hauntings.
Speaker 2: You're like, do you think that's really what they want
Speaker 2: to talk about? Yeah, you know, it's you know, it
Speaker 2: doesn't it's so easy to kind of fall back on that,
Speaker 2: but it's also like, once you really think about it,
Speaker 2: and sense says, maybe we need to kind of expand
Speaker 2: the conversation here, let's talk about the items in the house,
Speaker 2: I don't remember off the top of my head. Like
Speaker 2: it seems like there's a lot of artifacts there. A
Speaker 2: lot are most of them original to Sarah.
Speaker 3: It's a mix. When she passed a lot of the
Speaker 3: property was stripped from the house and sold off, and
Speaker 3: then some other people came in and tried to recover it.
Speaker 3: One of the things that is on site is the
Speaker 3: bed that she passed away in is still there right.
Speaker 3: A lot of obviously, all the furnishings, the doors and fixtures,
Speaker 3: the stairs, all of that is all original. But the
Speaker 3: interior property when you go there now, most of the
Speaker 3: furniture that you see in the house is period stuff
Speaker 3: that's been replaced. The things that are original are mostly
Speaker 3: you know, stained glass. One of the things that's really
Speaker 3: special to me is the Winchester House gave us a
Speaker 3: gift of some original pieces of the house.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: So hanging in the underground that the stanley is a
Speaker 3: piece of the wall. It's a linn crusta wallpaper, one
Speaker 3: of the original nails of the house. That's really cool,
Speaker 3: and another piece of cornice tile work. So we have
Speaker 3: that on display at the Stanley and it's just kind
Speaker 3: of cool to have that history there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what a special thing to have. I'm jealous.
Speaker 3: It's really neat. There's a funny story to it. They
Speaker 3: made thirteen of these displays when they filmed the Winchester movie,
Speaker 3: and they made them for the cast and the directors
Speaker 3: of the film, and of the thirteen that were given out,
Speaker 3: eleven of them were returned.
Speaker 1: Oh. They thought they were like haunted.
Speaker 3: They said they had range activity and just didn't want
Speaker 3: it around.
Speaker 1: Wow, And You're like, yes please.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well they were like, hey, you know, nobody seems
Speaker 3: to want this, do you want it? I was like,
Speaker 3: hell yeah, And we've never had We've never had any issues, Like,
Speaker 3: we've never had anything weird happened around the things. But
Speaker 3: I also think we treat them with a great deal
Speaker 3: of respect, and you know, I think that matters.
Speaker 2: You know, probably feels very at home in that space.
Speaker 2: I mean that space that you've created in the underground.
Speaker 2: It's probably the perfect place for it, honestly.
Speaker 3: Yeah. It's just it's neat too for when people visit
Speaker 3: the Stanley to have these connections to other places. So
Speaker 3: we have that and we have a little Teddy Bear
Speaker 3: from the Queen Mary, so people get to kind of
Speaker 3: vicariously visit other haunted locations when they come to see us.
Speaker 3: So that's kind of fun of that.
Speaker 2: Speaking of kind of artifacts is there, and did you
Speaker 2: feel like there was ever any other than those, any
Speaker 2: artifacts in the house that had activity around them.
Speaker 3: Not really, It's more to me, it seemed more localized.
Speaker 3: There's definitely a gentleman that's seen as a full body
Speaker 3: apparition who is constantly in the basement. He's seen all
Speaker 3: the time, always described in the same way. And what's
Speaker 3: fascinating is it's usually not the staff that see him,
Speaker 3: it's the tours that go through and they're like, oh,
Speaker 3: I saw this guy down the hallway. I thought we
Speaker 3: couldn't go down there, and then they described the guy
Speaker 3: to a tour guide and they give an accurate description
Speaker 3: of someone you know that is actually in a photograph
Speaker 3: on property. So that's kind of cool, you know that
Speaker 3: you it tends to be more about location than thing,
Speaker 3: if that makes sense.
Speaker 2: I was going to ask that, like, are there any
Speaker 2: rooms that you feel like have more of a vibe
Speaker 2: to them or more activity?
Speaker 3: Yeah, the basement definitely, and then upstairs there is a
Speaker 3: room called the Widow's cap and that's actually where Houdini
Speaker 3: did a seance right after Sarah had passed, about a
Speaker 3: year after, so that's kind of got a cool vibe
Speaker 3: to it, and it seems to have some activity up
Speaker 3: there that there is this question of there have been
Speaker 3: many mediums who have gone and done seances in that space,
Speaker 3: so there's always this question of is is what's there
Speaker 3: part of the house or have people invited things in
Speaker 3: too much there?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was actually wondering if that was an aspect
Speaker 2: of the haunting there, like if just having I think
Speaker 2: people think about the hauntings there so often, and you know,
Speaker 2: some of these locations that are so notorious for being
Speaker 2: haunted almost become beacons, you know. Do you think that's
Speaker 2: kind of, you know, something that could be influencing activity there.
Speaker 3: I think so, And I think a long time ago,
Speaker 3: John Tenny, I think, was talking about how you know,
Speaker 3: if ghosts are intelligent and they are people, and you
Speaker 3: know that people go to certain locations to go to
Speaker 3: talk to the dead, then maybe you go there. You
Speaker 3: know that that's right. If I want to talk to
Speaker 3: somebody and I'm not here then and I know that
Speaker 3: people are going to these places, then maybe that's a
Speaker 3: good place to be heard. So I think that's a
Speaker 3: I think there's a valid theory there. You know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've noticed that. I don't know if it's ever
Speaker 2: the case. It doesn't sound like it at the Winchester House,
Speaker 2: but like I've noticed that. You know, sometimes during investigations,
Speaker 2: you'll be speaking with someone who seems like they might
Speaker 2: be from, you know, another time period, and then suddenly
Speaker 2: you've got some modern ghosts busting in and you're like,
Speaker 2: where did you come from?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think it's also like any place that
Speaker 3: you know, anybody that becomes attached to it in life.
Speaker 3: You know that there are people who love that house.
Speaker 3: That's just their favorite place in the world. People get
Speaker 3: married there, people have been engaged there that I mean,
Speaker 3: it's a that I think also makes them places like
Speaker 3: that they become touchdows, you know of you know, when
Speaker 3: you when you pass on, maybe that's a thing that
Speaker 3: you can go stay in your favorite memory. There's a
Speaker 3: lot of those memories there.
Speaker 1: I love that. It's a It is a beautiful place.
Speaker 2: I grew up, you know, in the Bay area nearby,
Speaker 2: and so I got to visit a few times and
Speaker 2: it was just a treat to be able to investigate it,
Speaker 2: and I'm sure it was a real treat for you
Speaker 2: to just be in there regularly. I'm very but you're
Speaker 2: doing so much like let us like what is aid
Speaker 2: and up to these days.
Speaker 3: Well, presently we have the Underground at the Stanley Hotel.
Speaker 3: It is a underground kind of speakeasy theater at the
Speaker 3: Stanley and we present shows there all year round during
Speaker 3: the winter where they're Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and from
Speaker 3: May through Halloween we're they are seven days a week
Speaker 3: and we present theatrical Magic, which is their magic shows
Speaker 3: that have a narrative and a story to them, and
Speaker 3: they tend to dabble in the supernatural a little bit.
Speaker 3: The current show running is called Fate and Futility and
Speaker 3: it's really about the concept of fate and free will,
Speaker 3: and you know, it delves into the tarot and a
Speaker 3: lot of kind of mysticism in its presentation, so it's
Speaker 3: really kind of a fun atmosphere to play. And we
Speaker 3: also do a theatrical Sounce at the Stanley as well,
Speaker 3: and presently my better half Beca is doing all the
Speaker 3: paranormal investigating on the Queen Mary. She has a project
Speaker 3: called the Great Ghost Project and they do public paranormal
Speaker 3: investigations Friday through Sunday on the ship.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2: I'm looking We're Strange Escapes is heading there in January,
Speaker 2: which is not on the website yet.
Speaker 1: I know everybody's very excited though.
Speaker 2: And I'm really looking forward to working with her on that.
Speaker 2: And I'm going back to the Stanley in October. They
Speaker 2: hired me back this year, so i will see you
Speaker 2: again in October, which I'm super stoked about.
Speaker 3: Can't wait. We'll have more Mexican food.
Speaker 1: That was awesome. I really know.
Speaker 2: It's always nice to, you know, have margaritas before you're
Speaker 2: supposed to go on stage.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Well, I super appreciate you taking the time. I know
Speaker 2: you're getting over having the flu and I'm glad you're
Speaker 2: on the mend and everyone I encourage you if you
Speaker 2: have the chance to support whatever Aiden is doing. Like
Speaker 2: I said, he's one of my dearest friends. I love
Speaker 2: him a lot, and you will not be disappointed. And
Speaker 2: thank you again, sir anytime.
Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me until we meet again.
Speaker 2: Throughout her life, Sarah Winchester was a very private person.
Speaker 2: She didn't openly talk about why she designed her house
Speaker 2: in the way that she did, or about much of
Speaker 2: anything else. That led to unfounded gossip, which was so
Speaker 2: widespread that it's almost impossible to get a sense of
Speaker 2: who she really was. That said, perhaps today the truly
Speaker 2: curious can visit the Winchester Mystery House and ask her
Speaker 2: for themselves. I am Amy Bruney and this was Haunted Road.
Speaker 2: Haunted Road is a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm and
Speaker 2: Miles from Aaron Minkey. Haunted Road is hosted and written
Speaker 2: by me Amy Bruney, with additional research by Cassandra de Alba.
Speaker 1: This show is edited.
Speaker 2: And produced by supervising producer Rima el Kali, with executive producers.
Speaker 1: Aaron Mank, Trevor Young, and Matt Frederick.
Speaker 2: Learn more about this show over at Grimandmild dot com,
Speaker 2: and for more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.