WEBVTT - Why Is the Winchester House Built So Strangely? 0:00:02.040 --> 0:00:07.080 Welcome to brain Stuff from how Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff, 0:00:07.120 --> 0:00:09.879 Lauren vog obam here. Most of us want to get 0:00:09.920 --> 0:00:13.520 home construction over as soon as possible. We worry about 0:00:13.520 --> 0:00:17.720 the expense and complain about the inconvenience. But for Sarah Winchester, 0:00:17.960 --> 0:00:21.440 construction was a way of life. For thirty eight years, 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:23.760 she had construction going twenty four hours a day at 0:00:23.800 --> 0:00:27.080 her home in San Jose, California. This was no ordinary 0:00:27.120 --> 0:00:30.240 construction job. Though the house is an odd ball labyrinth 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:33.239 of rooms that at one point reached seven stories. It's 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:36.199 filled with weird things like stairs and doors that go nowhere, 0:00:36.680 --> 0:00:41.080 not to mention the ghosts, Sarah Winchester didn't start out 0:00:41.120 --> 0:00:43.839 looking for this kind of project. Born Sarah Party in 0:00:43.880 --> 0:00:46.200 eighteen thirty nine, she was one of the social stars 0:00:46.240 --> 0:00:49.120 of New Haven, Connecticut. Although she only stood four feet 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:52.240 ten inches, she was known for her beauty and sparkling personality. 0:00:52.720 --> 0:00:56.040 In eighteen sixty two, Sarah married William Winchester, who was 0:00:56.120 --> 0:00:59.400 the heir of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. The company 0:00:59.400 --> 0:01:01.840 had developed the Repeating rifle, a gun that was easy 0:01:01.880 --> 0:01:04.319 to reload and fired rapidly at a rate of one 0:01:04.360 --> 0:01:07.319 shot every three seconds. The gun was used by Northern 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:09.400 troops in the Civil War, and it was also known 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:12.199 as the Gun that Won the West. The young couple 0:01:12.280 --> 0:01:15.080 started a family in eighteen sixty six, but their daughter 0:01:15.160 --> 0:01:18.480 Annie died in infancy and mister Winchester died of tuberculosis 0:01:18.560 --> 0:01:22.440 fifteen years later. Distraught over these losses, Missus Winchester visited 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:25.400 a medium for spiritual guidance. The medium told her that 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:28.000 the Winchester family had been struck by a terrible curse 0:01:28.160 --> 0:01:30.240 and was haunted by the ghosts of all those killed 0:01:30.240 --> 0:01:33.600 by the Winchester rifle. Their spirits were seeking vengeance, and 0:01:33.640 --> 0:01:35.600 the only way to appease them was to build a 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:39.039 house for them. But the ghosts had another request that 0:01:39.120 --> 0:01:42.759 the house never be completed. Never stopped building, the medium 0:01:42.800 --> 0:01:46.400 told Missus Winchester, or you will die. We can't know 0:01:46.480 --> 0:01:49.160 exactly how she interpreted this advice. She might have thought 0:01:49.160 --> 0:01:51.120 the spirits would get her if she stopped, or she 0:01:51.200 --> 0:01:53.640 might have seen the continuous construction as a path to 0:01:53.680 --> 0:01:57.640 eternal life. Missus Winchester headed west to build a home 0:01:57.680 --> 0:02:00.320 for herself and her ghosts. She bought a sick room 0:02:00.320 --> 0:02:02.840 farmhouse on a hundred and sixty two acres in California 0:02:03.000 --> 0:02:06.400 and set to work. She served as her own architect, 0:02:06.520 --> 0:02:08.640 but it's possible that some ghosts had a hand in 0:02:08.680 --> 0:02:12.079 designing the house as well. Every night, Missus Winchester would 0:02:12.120 --> 0:02:14.720 retreat to her seance room and receive instruction from the 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:17.519 spirits on the progress of her house. The next morning 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:20.560 should present her construction workers with hand drawn sketches of 0:02:20.560 --> 0:02:23.360 what was to be done. Sometimes it seemed she didn't 0:02:23.400 --> 0:02:25.000 care what she built as long as she could hear 0:02:25.000 --> 0:02:27.240 the hammers of her crew. The crew might spend a 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:29.799 month constructing a room, only to be ordered to destroy 0:02:29.840 --> 0:02:33.080 it the next month. Because Missus Winchester paid well, no 0:02:33.120 --> 0:02:37.040 one disputed her instructions. Missus Winchester had inherited twenty million 0:02:37.120 --> 0:02:39.720 dollars and just less than half of the Winchester Repeating 0:02:39.800 --> 0:02:42.880 Arms Company stock. That left Missus Winchester with a daily 0:02:42.880 --> 0:02:45.280 income of about a thousand dollars to spend on her house. 0:02:45.639 --> 0:02:48.000 That's equal to about twenty five thousand dollars a day 0:02:48.040 --> 0:02:51.359 in today's money. But what if those doors and stairs 0:02:51.400 --> 0:02:54.160 to nowhere? Doors may open onto walls, or, in the 0:02:54.200 --> 0:02:56.880 case of a second story, door to the outside resulting 0:02:56.880 --> 0:02:58.480 in a big fall for anyone who might try to 0:02:58.520 --> 0:03:01.240 exit that way. A closet door on the second floor 0:03:01.240 --> 0:03:04.240 seance room opens onto a first floor sink several feet below, 0:03:04.680 --> 0:03:06.680 and the stairs to nowhere are pretty much what they 0:03:06.680 --> 0:03:09.040 sound like. Stairs go up until they reach the ceiling, 0:03:09.200 --> 0:03:13.160 and then they just stop. These might have a simple explanation. 0:03:13.520 --> 0:03:15.640 The stairs were likely part of the original house that 0:03:15.680 --> 0:03:18.079 Missus Winchester bought, and when she started adding on to 0:03:18.120 --> 0:03:20.600 the home, she covered up the stairs, whether it was 0:03:20.680 --> 0:03:23.760 accidentally or on purpose. Missus Winchester usually covered up her 0:03:23.760 --> 0:03:26.680 mistakes by just continuing to build around them. Because she 0:03:26.720 --> 0:03:29.560 had no master plan for the house, her architectural ideas 0:03:29.600 --> 0:03:32.799 didn't always work out since she had no deadline for completion, 0:03:32.880 --> 0:03:34.960 should either tear down the mistake or cover it up 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:37.840 with something else. But the new stairs she built also 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:40.960 zigzag back and forth, going around and around in circles, 0:03:41.000 --> 0:03:43.960 and most are only two inches about five centimeters tall. 0:03:44.720 --> 0:03:47.320 Some people think that these touches were designed to confuse 0:03:47.360 --> 0:03:50.360 the evil spirits that were haunting Missus Winchester. The height 0:03:50.400 --> 0:03:52.920 of the stairs served a very specific purpose though she 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:55.600 had very bad arthritis, and these small stairs allowed her 0:03:55.640 --> 0:03:59.400 to get around. However, Missus Winchester might have deliberately installed 0:03:59.440 --> 0:04:02.000 some of the other weird touches, believing that ghosts would 0:04:02.080 --> 0:04:04.880 get lost on stairs that went nowhere or accidentally step 0:04:04.880 --> 0:04:07.600 out of door that went outside. If this sounds strange 0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:10.200 to you today, you're not alone. Even at the time 0:04:10.200 --> 0:04:12.800 that Missus Winchester was building the house, she was regarded 0:04:12.800 --> 0:04:15.480 with suspicion. Some thought her an eccentric with too much 0:04:15.520 --> 0:04:17.280 money on her hands, and her home took on the 0:04:17.360 --> 0:04:21.320 nickname Mystery House not long after her death. Because Missus 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:24.760 Winchester left no diary or other communication, we honestly have 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:26.919 no idea what might have been going on in her mind. 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:29.520 What we do have is her house, which is still 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:32.880 open to tourists. Missus Winchester died in her sleep in 0:04:32.960 --> 0:04:35.360 nine two, and the house was sold to a group 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:38.159 of investors who wanted to create a tourist attraction. To 0:04:38.240 --> 0:04:40.440 this day, it's hard to know exactly how many rooms 0:04:40.440 --> 0:04:42.720 are in the house because people keep getting lost when 0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:45.120 they try to count, but it's estimated that about a 0:04:45.160 --> 0:04:48.160 hundred and sixty rooms are in the home. It had 0:04:48.160 --> 0:04:50.880 reached seven stories by nineteen o six, but the top 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:54.160 three floors collapsed after the nineteen o six San Francisco earthquake. 0:04:54.760 --> 0:04:57.520 Some other famous numbers associated with the house include its 0:04:57.560 --> 0:05:02.320 forty seven fireplaces, seventeen chimneys, two basements, six kitchens, ten 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:05.839 thousand window panes, and four hundred and sixty seven doorways. 0:05:06.440 --> 0:05:10.440 Despite these impressive numbers, there are only two mirrors. Missus 0:05:10.440 --> 0:05:13.039 Winchester thought the ghosts were afraid of their own reflection. 0:05:14.240 --> 0:05:17.040 Missus Winchester also had an obsession with the number thirteen. 0:05:17.480 --> 0:05:20.400 Many things installed in the home feature thirteen of something a, 0:05:20.480 --> 0:05:24.080 thirteen window panes, thirteen wall panels, thirteen sections of flooring, 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:28.279 thirteen stairs in each staircase, their thirteen bathrooms, sinks that 0:05:28.320 --> 0:05:31.279 have thirteen drain holes, and the sands room has thirteen 0:05:31.320 --> 0:05:34.400 coat hooks. And beyond the stairs and windows to nowhere, 0:05:34.400 --> 0:05:37.840 there are other architectural oddities all over the house. Stair 0:05:37.920 --> 0:05:40.800 posts were installed upside down, and chimneys that served no 0:05:40.880 --> 0:05:43.719 purpose are all over the house. Their cabinets there are 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:45.680 less than an inch deep that's about two and a 0:05:45.720 --> 0:05:49.919 half centimeters. Missus Winchester ordered a beautiful and outlantishly expensive 0:05:49.960 --> 0:05:52.920 Tiffany glass window, but after she installed it, a wooden 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:55.160 wall was built behind it so that sunlight could never 0:05:55.160 --> 0:05:58.839 shine through the panes. Mrs Winchester was convinced that she 0:05:58.920 --> 0:06:02.159 lived with spirits, But are they still there today? Does 0:06:02.200 --> 0:06:05.400 the spirit of Mrs Winchester herself walk the halls? Some 0:06:05.520 --> 0:06:08.120 psychics say yes, that upon visiting the house they sent 0:06:08.279 --> 0:06:12.880 spirits wandering. Tour guides and visitors report mysterious footsteps, banging doors, 0:06:12.920 --> 0:06:16.039 and weird moving lights. Some see door knobs moved by 0:06:16.080 --> 0:06:19.440 themselves and feel cold spots. It may be something you'll 0:06:19.480 --> 0:06:22.559 have to determine for yourself. The Winchester Mystery House offers 0:06:22.640 --> 0:06:25.560 daily tours, and for those who want to be particularly spooked, 0:06:25.720 --> 0:06:28.680 flashlight tours are offered on Halloween and all fridays that 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:36.360 fall on the thirteenth of the month. Today's episode was 0:06:36.400 --> 0:06:39.200 written by Molly Edmonds and produced by Tyler Clang. For 0:06:39.240 --> 0:06:41.719 more on this and lots of other winding topics, visit 0:06:41.760 --> 0:06:55.160 our home planet, how Stuff Works dot com.