Traveling with a toddler in San Jose and Santa Cruz continues with a visit to a the Winchester Mystery House.
The Winchester Mystery House is a Victorian mansion with over 160 rooms. It includes stairs and doors that lead to dead ends, windows in the floor, and many twisting and turning passageways. It is one of two officially haunted houses in the state of California.
It’s a very beautiful Victorian mansion but what makes it most interesting is the history behind it. It was owned and designed by Sarah Winchester. She was an heiress to the Winchester rifle fortune. Mrs. Winchester’s only child died six weeks after she was born. Her husband died 15 years later.
The legend says that Mrs. Winchester was so distressed by the deaths of her husband and daughter that she consulted a psychic. The psychic explained that the spirits of those killed by Winchester rifles had sought their revenge by taking the lives of her loved ones.
The legend says that these spirits had placed a curse on her and would haunt her forever. The psychic told her that she could escape the curse by building a final resting place for the spirits that were haunting her.
So, Mrs. Winchester moved from Boston to California, bought an 8 room farm house and began building. She designed every part of the house. Some legends say that she built it as the spirits directed; others say that she planed it to confuse the spirits. She spent $5,500,000 building the house that contains 160 rooms. Construction began on the house in 1884 and went on 24 hours a day for 38 years until her death in 1922.
The house is really beautiful and is interesting to tour. The first things we saw were a door that led nowhere and a staircase that led to a ceiling. Mrs. Winchester spared no expense on the building materials. There are stained glass windows and elegant touches all over the house. As Mrs. Winchester had arthritis there are many staircases that built with half stairs, our three year old was delighted to climb on the little stairs.