Whaley House, San Diego, USA

The Whaley House must see all fans of ghosts and paranormal! The house was built by Thomas Whaley. He moved to San Diego during the gold rush, and opened shop selling equipment for gold diggers. In 1857 he started the construction of the house. It was the first two-storey house in San Diego and was built from bricks made in brickworks owned by Thomas Whaley.

The misfortunes were predetermined for the Whaley family from the very beginning: on the site where the house was built there used to be a gibbet once. They say the day the Whales moved into the new house everyone started seeing an unknown ghost in the house. It was the ghost of "Yankee Jim"- James Robinson. He was convicted in 1852 for larceny. According to spectators it took really very long time till he died hanged on gibbet. Disregarding this horrible fact Thomas Whaley decided to build his house on this very place. Disasters started in August 18, 1885 when Whaley's daughter Anna Amelia committed suicide. Thomas Whaley died 5 years later. The house went bad. Only in 1909 Thomas' son Francis decided to reconstruct the home. In February 1914 Mrs. Whaley passed away, after that on November 19, 1914 Francis Whaley died, and in 1953 Lillian, the last Whaley passed away.

However even after their death all the members of Whaley family keep living in the house. Thomas Whaley patrols the house every night to make sure that everything is all right. His wife's, Anna's specter often can be seen in the garden. There is a ghost of a little girl living in the dining room. It may sound odd, but even the ghosts of two pets of the Whaley family (Dalmatian and Fox terrier) keep living here. It seems that they all loved the house very much. Thomas Whaley turned out to be right when saying: "When the construction is over, my new house will be the most wonderful and convenient place to live in the whole city"...

On May 25, 1960 a museum was opened in the Whaley House, and the Ministry of Trade of USA officially claimed Whaley House "a haunted house". It has almost 100 000 visitors every year.

By Sona Gasparian, www.building.am

Photos by: www.spookylittlegirllikeyou.blogspot.com