It’s on the bucket lists of many Bay Area residents, and was the setting for a 2018 fictionalized biopic starring Oscar winner Helen Mirren as Sarah Winchester. The Winchester Mystery House continues to draw visitors from a variety of demographics: teens, families, students of the paranormal, tourists. A year after her death in 1922, amusement park developer John Brown and his wife Mayme leased a portion of her land and opened it as a public attraction. Courtesy Winchester Mystery HouseĪccording to legend, she continued to build out her property to confuse the countless ghosts of those killed by Winchester rifles and create a labyrinth. The Winchester Mystery House in San Jose was owned by the widowed Sarah Winchester and opened for tours in 1923. She’d initially planned to settle in San Francisco but was discouraged by the fog and cold, so instead purchased an eight-room farmhouse in San Jose in 1886. She moved from New Haven, Conn., to the Bay Area soon after her husband’s premature death from tuberculosis in 1881 at 43. The widow of William Wirt Winchester, Sarah Lockwood Pardee Winchester inherited the fortune he made as heir to the Winchester Repeating Arms Co. The celebratory weekend will conclude with a lavish brunch on Sunday, July 2. A walk-through centennial exhibit in the gift shop will open Friday, highlighting the history of the buildings and grounds instead of its famed owner. Led by friendly tour guides in period costumes, the 110-room trek explores many of the hidden entrances, 44 staircases and 10,000 windows of a home that’s been designated a local, state and national historic landmark. At the heart of the Winchester Mystery House is the hour-long mansion tour.
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