Whaley House Investigation

The Whaley House in San Diego, California was built around 1838 by Thomas Whaley. Whaley lent his house to be used as a court house but never received a cent in rent. There were people actually hanged on this property at a gallows erected by the court house. “Yankee Jim”, Jim Santiago was convicted of grand larceny and hung here in 1852. Whaley died in 1890. This is only one of two houses in California authenticated as being haunted by ghosts.

Address: 2476 San Diego Ave., San Diego, CA 92110

Phone: 619-786-1143

Owner: County of San Diego and managed by Old Town Trolley Tours

Website: www.whaleyhousesandiego.com

Hauntings:  The earliest documented ghost at the Whaley House is "Yankee Jim." James (aka Santiago ) Robinson was convicted of attempted grand larceny in San Diego in 1852, and hanged on a gallows off the back of a wagon on the site where the house now stands. The local newspaper reported that he "kept his feet in the wagon as long as possible, but was finally pulled off. He swung back and forth like a pendulum until he strangled to death." Although Thomas Whaley had been a spectator at the execution, he did not let it dissuade him from buying the property a few years later and building a home for his family there. According to the San Diego Union, "soon after the couple and their children moved in, heavy footsteps were heard moving about the house. Whaley described them as sounding as though they were made by the boots of a large man. Finally he came to the conclusion that these unexplained footfalls were made by Yankee Jim Robinson." Another source states that Lillian Whaley, the Whaley’s youngest daughter who lived in the house until 1953, "had been convinced the ghost of "Yankee Jim" haunted the Old House." A visitor to the museum in 1962 mentioned that "the ghost had driven her family from their visit there years earlier, her mother was unnerved by the phantom walking noise and the strange way the windows unlatched and flew up."

Many visitors to the house have reported encountering Thomas Whaley himself. The late June Reading, former curator of the museum, said, "We had a little girl perhaps 5 or 6 years old who waved to a man she said was standing in the parlor. We couldn't see him. But often children's sensitivity is greater than an adult's." However, many adults have reported seeing the apparition of Mr. Whaley, usually on the upper landing. One said he was "clad in frock coat and pantaloons, the face turned away from her, so she could not make it out. Suddenly it faded away."

The specter of Anna Whaley has also been reported, usually in the downstairs rooms or in the garden. In 1964, Mrs. Whaley's floating, drifting spirit appeared to television personality Regis Philbin. "All of a sudden I noticed something on the wall," Philbin reported. "There was something filmy white, it looked like an apparition of some kind, I got so excited I couldn't restrain myself! I flipped on the flashlight and nothing was there but a portrait of Anna Whaley, the long-dead mistress of the house." 

Other visitors have described seeing or sensing the presence of a woman in the courtroom. "I see a small figure of a woman," one visitor said, "who has a swarthy complexion. She is wearing a long full skirt, reaching to the floor. The skirt appears to be a calico or gingham, small print. She has a kind of cap on her head, dark hair and eyes and she is wearing gold hoops in her pierced ears. She seems to stay in this room, lives here, I gather." None of the Whaley’s fit this description, but the house was rented out to numerous tenants over the years. Perhaps the mysterious woman in the courtroom was one of these.

Another presence reported by visitors and docents is that of a young girl, who is usually found in the dining room. Psychic Sybil Leek encountered this spirit during a visit in the 1960s. "It was a long-haired girl," Sybil said. "She was very quick, you know, in a longish dress. She went to the table in this room and I went to the chair." Urban legend has it that this is the ghost of a playmate of the Whaley children who accidentally broke her neck on a low-hanging clothesline in the backyard, and whose name was either Annabel or Carrie Washburn. There are no historic records of any child dying this way at the Whaley House; nor is there record of any family named Washburn residing in San Diego at the time. It is believed that the legend was started by a one-time employee of the Whaley House, in an effort to add to the house's mystique.

Even animals aren't left out of the singular occurrences. A parapsychologist reported he saw a spotted dog, like a fox terrier, that ran down the hall with his ears flapping and into the dining room. The dog, he said, was an apparition. When they lived in the house, the Whaley's owned a terrier named Dolly Varden.  

Sandy Stokes from the San Diego Press Enterprise was called upon by the television show Sightings to investigate the stories of hauntings for a Halloween edition story. She contacted ghost researcher, Richard Senate, who instructed her to use a tape recorder in order to possibly capture EVPs or other sounds not necessarily audible to human hearing. She did just that.  

Upon reviewing her audio, she captured the sound of pool balls clacking together in the court room. The audio was analyzed by audio expert, Brian Black. He compared them to actual sounds of billiard balls clacking but the sound did not match.  

He consulted with billiard expert, Terry Moldenhauer and discovered that ivory balls were used in the past from the early 1800s to around the 1930s and 40s before being replaced with plastic balls used today.  

When Black repeated the test using the sound of ivory balls, the results were remarkable and matched! Why were the sounds of pool balls being recorded in the Whaley House? June Redding came up with some amazing research. Frank Whaley was the oldest boy in the family and organized what he called the Clavelle Social Club. There are still documents and even invitations to join this club where billiards was played in what later became the court house!  

For believers and skeptics alike, the house draws them back time and again, in search of those elusive ghosts. As Regis Philbin once said, "You know a lot of people pooh-pooh it because they can't see it. But there was something going on in that house."

The Ghost Research Society investigated the Whaley House on Aril 23, 2024 and the team members included: Charles Williams and Dale Kaczmarek.

Equipment setup: Hand-held equipment was employed in the theater such as digital recorders and camcorders, an Ovilus V.

Experiments performed: A single EVP session was conducted in the theater

Personal experiences:

Dale Kaczmarek: I did not feel anything out of the usual during my visit or walk-through of the building. There were several areas notorious for past experiences including an out building where a suicide happened, the theater where the piano would go off by itself and singing has been heard, a couch downstairs where a dying person was laid upon and the courthouse itself where pool balls have been heard clacking together in the past.

Evidence collected: None!

Words spoken by the Ovilus V in dictionary mode: she, huge, word and sad.

Conclusions: During most of the time the EVP session was being conducted, a player piano was playing in the background which probably caused some contamination to the EVP session. This was a building that I have longed to visit and investigate. There is an amazing history and the tour guide was pleasant and well-informed. We weren’t able to audio or video tape the walk-through even though we would not have shared or posted that tour on Facebook, YouTube or Instagram. We videotape so that we have all the history and hauntings documented for later inclusion in a report; similar to the one that you are now reading.