Winchester Mansion
So me and Jake went up North for my spring break and went to the Winchester Mansion in San Jose. It really is the coolest house ever!! For those that have not heard of it, the Winchester Mansion is a house that began as an 8 room farm house and is now a 160 room estate. Sara Winchester baught the house after the deaths of her daughter at two weeks old and the death of her husband 5 years later. Her husband had developed the Winchester Rifle (The "gun that won the west"). A psychic told Sara that the cause of their deaths was the spirits of people killed by the rifle. The only way to appease the spirits was to move out west, buy a house, build it, and never finish it. So, she built on her house for 38 years strait until her death in 1922. She had a ridiculous ammount of money, paid double the going rate for her workers, and paid them cash. I figured everyone would be interested in the pictures. Keep in mind I am not a photographer, I was using a disposable camera, and lighting sucked. Basically, the pictures aren't great quality, so I will explain things I think look weird. I will also include interesting facts I learned on the tour, cause I'm a nerd like that! ENJOY!!
This is the front of the house.
The black chimney shaped area on the side of the house covered in vines is actually an area that was never finished at the time Sara Winchester died. They've painted all the areas around the house that were left unfinished. They assume a chimney would have gone there.
It's hard to see in this picture, but there is a white door on the side of the house...11 feet off the ground! There's a sign below it they've added that says "door to nowhere". You can only see it from the outside of the house, it doesn't leed anywere inside.
Note the height of the stairs Jake is standing on. Sara Winchester had all the stairs torn up and replaced with these once here arthritis worsened in her old age.
These stairs leed to the ceiling.
These are the "7-11" stairs. You have to go down 11 stairs, to go up 7 which put you on the same floor, but 3 feet lower...or something like that. It's nutty.
This is the room Sara Winchester died in. The furnature isn't hers though, it was given to her neice and sold at auction after she died. The furnature in the house now has been donated, but is from the same time period.
This is a window...in the floor.
Another window in the floor.
This is me standing on one side of a door they keep locked...because it opens up to a hole leeding to the floor below.
This is just a dumb-waitor. It's not really bizzare, but I think it's cool.
To get this picture you have to know how tall I am (4'11"). So think about how tall this door is. And this wasn't the smallest door in the house.
This is the smallest cabinet in the house. It opens up to the wall.
This is the biggest cabinet. It opens up to the back rooms.
The next few picture are just a couple things which show how much money Sara Winchester had to throw around.
A hand painted sink.
One of many fireplaces.
One of many many many stained glass windows from Tiffany's in New York. This was the most expensive, was made to create rainbows all over the room when sun passed through it, and was placed in a window that never gets sunlight...ever.
This was a room that was damaged by the 1906 earthquake. Sara Winchester actually got trapped in this room becuase the supporting wall began to cave, jamming the door. She thought this was a sign from the spirits that she had been spending too much time on the front 30 rooms, so she boarded them up and never went in them again. As far as we know no one ever went in them until she died (16 years later). They've left the damaged rooms as they were, so you can see plaster that had broken and fallen off the walls.
The next pictures are a few of the front 30 rooms that weren't damaged, but that were boarded up after the earthquake.
This is part of the ballroom. She spent enough money on this room to build a standard home at the time.
This is a dining room where she would have entertained guests...but she never had any.
This is a parlor.
That's all of it! Hope you liked them!
This is the front of the house.
The black chimney shaped area on the side of the house covered in vines is actually an area that was never finished at the time Sara Winchester died. They've painted all the areas around the house that were left unfinished. They assume a chimney would have gone there.
It's hard to see in this picture, but there is a white door on the side of the house...11 feet off the ground! There's a sign below it they've added that says "door to nowhere". You can only see it from the outside of the house, it doesn't leed anywere inside.
Note the height of the stairs Jake is standing on. Sara Winchester had all the stairs torn up and replaced with these once here arthritis worsened in her old age.
These stairs leed to the ceiling.
These are the "7-11" stairs. You have to go down 11 stairs, to go up 7 which put you on the same floor, but 3 feet lower...or something like that. It's nutty.
This is the room Sara Winchester died in. The furnature isn't hers though, it was given to her neice and sold at auction after she died. The furnature in the house now has been donated, but is from the same time period.
This is a window...in the floor.
Another window in the floor.
This is me standing on one side of a door they keep locked...because it opens up to a hole leeding to the floor below.
This is just a dumb-waitor. It's not really bizzare, but I think it's cool.
To get this picture you have to know how tall I am (4'11"). So think about how tall this door is. And this wasn't the smallest door in the house.
This is the smallest cabinet in the house. It opens up to the wall.
This is the biggest cabinet. It opens up to the back rooms.
The next few picture are just a couple things which show how much money Sara Winchester had to throw around.
A hand painted sink.
One of many fireplaces.
One of many many many stained glass windows from Tiffany's in New York. This was the most expensive, was made to create rainbows all over the room when sun passed through it, and was placed in a window that never gets sunlight...ever.
This was a room that was damaged by the 1906 earthquake. Sara Winchester actually got trapped in this room becuase the supporting wall began to cave, jamming the door. She thought this was a sign from the spirits that she had been spending too much time on the front 30 rooms, so she boarded them up and never went in them again. As far as we know no one ever went in them until she died (16 years later). They've left the damaged rooms as they were, so you can see plaster that had broken and fallen off the walls.
The next pictures are a few of the front 30 rooms that weren't damaged, but that were boarded up after the earthquake.
This is part of the ballroom. She spent enough money on this room to build a standard home at the time.
This is a dining room where she would have entertained guests...but she never had any.
This is a parlor.
That's all of it! Hope you liked them!