August 18, 2021 • 46 mins
Preston School of Industry or “Preston Castle” as it’s been known, was built between 1890 and 1894 in Ione, California. A reform school for young male offenders; the hope was to rehabilitate, not just incarcerate. But, the castle soon became known for abuse, attempted escapes, murder, and now - one of the most notorious hauntings in the foothills of California.
Special Guest: Connie Brenner.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Haunted Road, a production of I Heart Radio
and Grim and Mild from Aaron Minky. Listener discretion is advised.
Almost thirty years ago, my soon to be stepfather was
trying his best to be a relatable parental figure, as
(00:20):
many do in such situations. Hearing I had an interest
in the supernatural, he declared that he knew of a building,
a haunted castle, near by his home in El Dorado, California,
and he'd like to show it to me. Being a
reasonably snarky teenager dealing with the trauma of her parents
divorce and now her mother's insistence on moving all of
(00:41):
us three hours away from our childhood home because of
this man, I remember being a bit apprehensive about doing
anything cordial with him, but the lure of a haunted
castle in the middle of California's Gold Country proved to
be too much. I begrudgingly joined him. On the twenty
minute drive up Highway four nine on a hot, dusty
(01:01):
summer day. We passed golden rolling hills and remnants of
old barns and gold Rush era buildings until we reached
the small town of Ion, and within seconds of our arrival,
I saw a glimpse of a large red castle with
a massive bell tower that looked so incredibly out of place,
I gasped. We made our way up the driveway and
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got as close as we could to this old Romanesque
style red castle, and I don't think I had ever
seen anything like it in person in my life. And
I also somehow new, just by staring at it, the
terrible things had happened there. We got out of the
car and looked past the fence that stopped us from
getting any further, and I asked my stepfather what was
(01:45):
this place? He replied, it's Preston Castle. I nudged further,
inquiring what it had been before. He said it was
a school for troubled boys. As I peered through the fence,
trying to get a clear look in some of the
windows and pondering what it would have been like to
be a young boy dropped in front of this looming structure,
(02:06):
not knowing what could possibly be inside, my stepfather added,
I spent a year here when I was a team.
I asked him what it was like, and with almost
a lump in his throat and a quiet whisper, he said,
I don't talk about it. And headed back to the car.
Jim Little Page, my stepfather died in and whatever happened
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to him within the walls of the Preston School of Industry,
he took with him to his grave. I'm Amy Brunei,
and this is Haunted Road. Preston School of Industry, or
the Castle as it's been known, was built between eighteen
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ninety and eighteen ninety four in i own, California. In
eighteen nine, two acre parcel of land where the cast
still stands was purchased from the Ion Coal and Iron
Company for thirty dollars per acre, with one hundred acres donated.
Inmates from San Quentin and fulsome prisons helped make the
bricks that make up the castle, which were then transported
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by rail to the School of Industry. The cornerstone was
laid on December nine, with people in attendance what an
early Christmas present. The one twenty room Romanesque Revival was
a reform school for young male offenders. The hope was
to rehabilitate, not just incarceerate. The complex was highly self sufficient.
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The large acreage of the purchase allowed the boys to
grow their own food, raise livestock, and learn farming trades.
The forty six thousand square foot mansion had forty three fireplaces,
two hundred fifty seven windows, overlooking the tawny Amador County foothills,
a tower festooned on each side by intimidating gargoyles, hallways
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bedecked with ornate Wayne's coating, and as a stone exterior
in the Romanesque Revival architectural style, hence that now iconic
red color of the castle. On the first floor, there
was a reception space, the director's room, a walk in
vault attached to an office, reception and waiting areas, a
dining room, bathrooms, office for the physician, and a pharmacy.
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The second floor was home to a dorm for the
wards in twelve apartments for staff. There was also a
library and reading room. On this floor, various closets and
storage spaces, and bathrooms. On a mezzanine level, there were
two bathrooms with a few tubs. The third floor, unfinished,
had twelve rooms, the fourth, also unfinished, had six. In
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the basement, there was a playroom, separate laundry for wards
and staff, shower room, and the infamous dip pool, kitchen
and pantry. Multiple bathrooms, furnace and fuel storage, storeroom and bakery. Basically,
Preston was massive in its heyday. The sol boasted one
thousand total acres, with seven hundred fifty dedicated to farming
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for eight hundred wards. There was a staff of two hundred.
The entire campus included fifty buildings. Two weeks after the
school was completed, the first wards moved in. It became
immediately apparent that while this arrangement could provide structure and
security for wards, they were under the firm control of
the superintendent and were expected to adhere to strict rules
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and routines, and if they transgressed, they were given severe punishment.
The worst offenders were held in Company B, which consisted
only of a row of beds and a single toilet.
Upon arrival to the castle, new wards were taken immediately
to the infamous Pool of Lie to cleanse their bodies,
specifically their heads. They were herded through a side door,
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shorn of their hair stripped, and led to a pool
of harsh chemicals with only a poll for support. They
were made to walk with their heads underwater about x
feet to the pool's far end to rid their bodies
of potential pests meant to target likes. The pool likely
also exacerbated open wounds on the heads of many young wards,
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which must have been excruciating. Eventually, the state shuttered this
dipping pool practice due to its inhumanity. Sadly, many of
the incoming wards were afflicted with tuberculosis and or various
addictions to alcohol, heroin, and opium. In an effort to
rehabilitate them, their days were divided between school and learning
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a trade. There was a print shop, bakery, and cobbler
shop where the boys could learn skills for self preservation
in the real world. The boys ages seven through eighteen,
had a tennis court and a rose garden. They also
had a seven thousand book library with a veranda overlooking
the town. The more docile and agreeable boys were even
able to live in cottages surrounding the castle and learned
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traits that were more lucrative and socially acceptable. But of course,
ideal is and reform didn't always rule the day. A
Sacramento b article from eight nine seven, just two years
after the school opened, detailed accusations of abuse by a superintendent, E. S. O'Brien.
The first paragraph noted whippings that left their back stripping
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with blood. At least one of them claimed that salt
had been rubbed into his wounds to add to the
torture he was already suffering. The reports of ill treatment
were so pervasive throughout Ionn that a group of citizens
threatened to storm the castle in order to see for
themselves just how poorly the boys were treated. On numerous occasions,
O'Brien held boys with one hand while beating them in
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the face with his other. He extended paddlings by ten
to forty strokes, sometimes beating boys until they couldn't walk
without assistance. A younger boy named Roderick received a beating
that left him black and blue from the small of
his back to the middle of his thighs. For several days. Afterwards,
the boy walked around literally dragging one it after the other,
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and it said that afterward he had to be sent
to the hospital. The secretary at the time, H. R. Bernard,
recounted in an affidavit witnessing doctor O'Brien beat a ward
in the head and face with the cane. The cane
soon broke in his hands, but O'Brien continued his blows
with the part left in his hand, which was also
broken a moment later from the force of the blows
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when the doctor grabbed a poll about four ft long
and proceeded to belabor the yelling lad over the body.
The force of the blows was terrific. The same article
alleged destructive and uncontrollable behavior of Wards, not limited to
setting the building on fire at least three times. Escape
attempts were frequent and occurred nearly every week. Superintendent E. S.
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O'Brien told the wards in or prior to that he
had given orders to the guards that in the case
of an escape attempt, they were to shoot, and shoot
to kill. The property wasn't fenced with barbed wire, so
wards had one last to turn it. When it was
discovered that a ward had escaped, a horn would blow
an i own, which alerted citizens to the situation. A
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hunt would follow, and if someone discovered and returned to Ward,
they received a ten dollar reward. The kids who escaped
received corporal punishment in the form of beatings, whippings, and
solitary confinement. Country singer Merle Haggard made two escape attempts
during his time at Preston. He had memories of beatings
with a two by four and attacktoo of p s
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I on his wrist, so he never forgot the abuse.
Horrific stories of abuse and neglect became known Over the years.
Wards died of severe illnesses like tuberculosis. Other Wards were
killed by guards. During the Great Depression, parents sometimes dropped
kids off at the castle, where the Wards of the
state received three males a day, housing and a chance
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for a stable life. All of this put into perspective
why Preston Castle would be harboring ghosts and energy today.
There were an incredible number of tragedies involving Wards on
the grounds. The first we see was of Grant Walker
on June seventeenth, eighteen ninety five. At first, it seems
like he may have died from typhoid fever. However, historian
(10:10):
Jamie Rubio dug further and found a conflicting death register
that suggests Walker may have died from severe internal burns
after ingesting something toxic. On October seventeenth, nineteen eleven, Herman
Hubert and fellow Ward and friend John Karaine made an
escape just as the dinner bell rang well. They tried anyway,
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night guard J. D. French pursued the two escapees and
fired his weapon, which killed Hubert. French claimed he tried
to fire a warning shot, but Karaine maintained that French
shot herman in cold blood. On June sixth, nineteen fourteen,
a company of boys went to the pond after dinner
for a swim. Those who weren't strong swimmers were supposed
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to stay in the shallow water, but ta Himavan, confident
about his doggy paddle, dove in wards. Robert Raines and
Albert Rubideaux tried to say Van after he resurfaced clearly
in a struggle. However, they were unable to retrieve him.
It wasn't until the next morning that they were able
to retrieve his lifeless body that had sunk to the
(11:11):
bottom of the pond. He is buried at the Preston Cemetery.
Frank Carterrella had epilepsy and experienced seizures because of it.
Instead of receiving treatment, Frank was kept in his cell.
It's heartbreaking to think about. On Valentine's Day nineteen seventeen,
Frank died by suicide after making a noose from his
shredded night shirt. In July nineteen eighteen, Samuel Gloin's arrived
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at Preston. He had been convicted of burglary. Samuel made
three escape attempts, although the punishment after the first two
must have been terrible. The third proved fatal. While trying
to escape a third time, John Kelly of Preston Guard
accidentally shot Samuel in the back. Samuel died from the wound.
He was twenty years old and only two months from
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being released from Preston. Ward Frank Algiers was admitted after
having experienced a really bad motorcycle accident. After admission, he
went straight to the infirmary, where he died just a
week later on May nineteen two. On July ninety four,
Ray Baker was shot by Guard Thomas Dooley. Baker was
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trying to escape when Dully intervened. The ward tried to
strangle the guard, who was able to retrieve his gun
and shoot Wards. Edgar Howe and Leland Price got into
a fight during a Saturday night football game in December
nineteen four. In a confusing decision made to chastise the boys,
how In Price were locked together in Preston's basement. The
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two Wards must have picked the fight back up or
a very unfortunate coincidence occurred because Price's skull was fractured
after hitting the ground and he fell into a coma.
Leland Price died the next morning. On December four, nine
Awards were digging a ditch on the property for sewage
un ex actedly, the ditch caved in and trapped six boys.
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Four were extracted, but two remained buried. William Report and
Henry Herstein both died after being buried alive. Probably the
most notable and publicized death that took place at Preston
was the murder of the head housekeeper on February twenty third,
nineteen fifty. Her body was found in the then defunct
pool room, beaten with evidence of a massive struggle. She
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had been strangled with accord, but the cause of her
death was a fatal blow to the head resulting in
a skull fracture. A rape had been attempted but not enacted.
The housekeeper was incredibly well loved and liked by the
Wards and her fellow employees alike, so much so the
Wards threatened vigilante justice if her killer was found. The
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superintendent at the time made it very clear that everyone
was a suspect, even staff and that they would be
investigating thoroughly. After six hundred fifty seven wards were questioned,
a case was formed against a ward named Eugene Monroe.
He was at Preston after being convicted of burglary, but
had been the prime suspect in a murder case prior
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to that, a murder and rape case involving the strangulation
of a high school student. Using the same type of
court in the case of the housekeeper and tied in
the same fashion. Monroe was given a lie detector test
and failed, and inconsistencies in his story, plus the fact
he had been caught trying to incinerate his clothing, was
enough to charge him. Eugene was tried three times. The
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first two resulted in a hung jury and the third
reached an acquittal. In nineteen fifty one, Eugene was convicted
of the rape and murder of a woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma,
who was pregnant at the time of her death. He
was given a life sentence. It is said that Preston's
dark past heavily ways on the old building, and that
the spirit of the housekeeper, plus so many of these
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wards that never made it out alive still very much
reside within its walls. There are eighteen boys buried in
a small sem ma terry on the property. Many died
of natural causes, and there are certainly more deaths that
took place there, but the ones buried on site most
likely had no surviving family or their loved ones were
financially unable to bury them elsewhere. In nineteen sixty, the
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Preston School of Industry closed. The state planned to demolish
the building, and a group of local women fought for
eight years to keep it standing. Finally, the state relinquished
and said while they wouldn't tear it down, they would
do nothing to keep it standing. So there it sat
until two thousand one, when the State of California leased
the property to the Preston Castle Foundation. In fourteen, the
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foundation was granted ownership of the castle and nearly thirteen
acres of property. Fundraising and repairs have been the goal
ever since, and estimates are as high as fifteen to
thirty million dollars to reverse the years of abuse and
neglect of the building. Up next, we'll talk to Connie Brenner,
a lead paranormal investigator at Pressston Castle and a member
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of the Preston Castle Foundation's board will find out what
kind of activity they experienced there, in addition to how
you can visit the castle and assist in their conservation efforts.
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So I'm sitting here now with Connie Brenner, who is
a lead investigator at Preston Castle and also a member
of the board. She's now been involved kind of on
a professional level with the castle for about two and
a half years, but her history with the castle goes
on even before that. So I think you've probably got
some great info for us, Connie, as far as what
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the history at Preston, what has happened haunting wise there
due to what happened there when it was in operation. Yes, yes,
absolutely so. Can you just kind of how me how
you came about being involved with Preston. I started out
as just a guest one night a friend of mine
was involved with the castle, and she's like, Okay, you know,
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you totally got to come up here and check this
place out because we had just kind of gotten started
in the whole paranormal field. I went up there for
a public investigation and I had never really had any
crazy experiences, and like right off the bat that night,
I mean I think. I don't know, I saw like
the holy grail of you know, in doing the paranormal stuff,
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where I actually saw a full body apparition. We were
in the doctor's office and I was facing the doorway
into the hall, and I saw what looked like a
man in a white jacket walked right past the door.
And there was another group located in the castle, but
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they were pretty far and like not even really close
to that area. And so one of the girls that
had had her back to that doorway, I asked her,
you know, did somebody just walk by? And she went
out there and looked, and she says, there's nobody. I mean,
it was pretty quick that she went and looked. It
just you know, it took me a second to realize that,
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oh my gosh, I just saw, you know, an apparition
walked right past the door. So I bet you were
hooked at that point. I mean, that's all it takes. You.
Either at that point you're completely terrified and never want
to do it again, or your interest is peaked. It
was definitely peaked. And you know, I also got touched
that night. We have an infirmary area in the castle,
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and I was touched you know, there was nothing that
could have bumped into me. It wasn't my clothing, and
so whoever's there was definitely getting my attention. Yeah, I mean,
it's interesting that you say they were wearing a lab
coat like they were maybe a doctor or someone that
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you know, obviously tended to the I guess they called
them inmates there or whatever they called them. I wouldn't
say patients even, but who do you think that could
possibly be. I think it was a doctor, you know,
I see to me now that I know a whole
lot more. But definitely seemed like a residual type haunting
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because it wasn't like it stopped and waved, you know,
through the doorway. It was almost as if he was
just going about his business, you know, maybe checking in
on the patients that were there. They actually called them wards.
Apparently he was also seen by another guest earlier that
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evening in the same area. He was definitely making his rounds. Then,
I mean, it's interesting. I'm hoping that no one you
know in your group was running around in the lab
coade or anything. So and it's interesting because he was
see through, but I could also see that in in
a weird sort of I don't even know how to
describe it, but like he had like he had dark hair,
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you know, if it was a guy that was a
part of the investigation that night. You know, usually usually
if you're going to wear some sort of a jacket,
it has logos or something on it. But this definitely
did not. No, No, definitely not. That's interesting just because
I think about Preston Castle's history and I wanted to
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ask you about that a little bit, because obviously it's
a very historic place. The history there is very dark.
And I mentioned kind of in the beginning of the show.
My stepfather actually spent time there when he was a teen,
and he would never speak of it. And he was
a pretty he was an open book. He passed away,
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but his time at Preston he never spoke of, not
even to my mom. He said it was a horrible experience, basically,
is the most we could get out of him. And so,
how do you obviously, for historical purposes, we want Preston
Castle to stick around. People work really hard to make
sure that it's still standing and it's it's got the
foundation and everything. How do you all reconcile kind of
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the history and what you do we go in. We
are extremely respectful of the spirits that could be there.
You know, we have to think about how young that
the kids were that were there. You know, we think
that there could have been kids as young as seven,
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and so, you know, we try really hard to be
somewhat I don't know, maybe nurturing towards the children that
were there, because it wasn't all fun and games there.
This It was run military style, right, yeah, And I'm
sure there were plenty of success stories that came out
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of there as well. But just having that kind of
first hand knowledge, but then also just kind of reading
through the history, I do that too, where I kind
of look back on it and I think, you know,
what was it like to be dropped off there as
a young boy and just not even know what was
coming to you? And and you know, some people were
sent there because they genuinely had um issues that needed
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to be taken care of, and then others were sent
there just because their parents couldn't take care of them anymore,
you know, especially during the depression. And so I think
that's great that you guys approach it in that way
of being kind of nurturing and you know, humanizing them,
which I think is huge. This is their home. We
are guests in their home, and we tell all of
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our guests this is not a place to come in
and demand and treat the boys, even if there's staff
around there. We really come in there with kind of
love and respect for entities or spirits that are there.
So that's definitely our approach when it comes to that,
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and I think it works because they're still around. You know,
they're there. And since COVID and you know the fact
that we had to be shut down for a year,
things have really ramped up. We're getting a ton of
activity now, I'm sure. And actually that's something that we've
noticed in our investigations, especially in some of these larger
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places that you know, the only real visitors they get
are historians or you know, people visiting in the museum sense.
But then also panormal investigators are the ones that really interact.
And I think in some cases the spirits really missed that.
And you know, when we come back in, you know,
when Adam and I investigator, if I'm out investigating, it's
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interesting how eager they are to speak again, Like I
can't imagine, I don't I don't claim to know what
time is like for them. I don't claim to know
how any of that works, but it does seem like
they're more eager to interact at the moment. Oh yeah,
I mean, and we have different stuff like going in there,
we have our hot spots in all that other stuff,
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but it's changed and we're getting more activity in areas
that we never used to, which makes it really interesting
and exciting, you know, force because we're like, okay, you know,
we get to kind of show people different areas and
all that other stuff. I mean, you know, we try
to actually let them kind of discover it themselves. We
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try not to give them too much information, you know,
but we're able to validate that after they talk with
us when and if they haven't experience. Yeah, I mean
that's great. I know, like it was open during the
Spanish flu pandemic, and I was reading through the history
because we felt like that a pandemic might be kind
of triggering for some of these older locations that had
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kind of been through it. And remarkably, I guess a
lot of people had the flu and pressed them but
they didn't lose anyone, which was kind of unheard of
for that amount of people coming down with the flu
back then. So just an interesting fact I found when
I was digging through the history. Yeah, yeah, I mean
it's crazy to think, you know, something like that that
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they didn't lose people like I guess you could say
we are now. So yeah, it's it's very interesting how
that all happens. So what is the state of the
castle right now? Obviously a post pandemic, you guys are
probably bringing people back in, But how are things going?
I haven't been, unfortunately in a few years. I used
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to go quite often just because it was about twenty
five minutes away from my family home, which now my
sister and her husband owned, But it was originally built
by my stepfather, and so I can't remember the last
time I was there. I think it must have been
about seven or eight years ago. So how how are
things going there now? Things are great? Actually, you know,
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we've done so much as far as you know, the
construction of the castle or the reconstruction of the castle,
We've been able to um do a lot of repairs.
I mean, there's so much prepare that needs to be
done to that place. I doubt I will ever see
it completed in my lifetime, and maybe not even my sons,
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who's like, you know, he's seventeen or almost seventeen, and
there's just so much and you know, it's extremely expensive
to do all the repairs on this castle, but you know,
we just keep kind of plugging away at it a
little bit at a time. Our parking lot is no
longer a gravel parking lot. We actually have asphalt now,
and which is great, you know, trying to repair some
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of the windows. And there are areas in the castle.
I don't know if you remember, but where there was
no floor from like the basement to like the fifth floor.
You know, that is still unfortunately in that type of condition.
I do remember that. I do remember that it's still
you know, empty in there. You can still see all
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the way up, but there are areas that are the
floor has been replaced. Unfortunately, they're not open to the
public yet, but the public still has three floors to
do their investigations or tours, which you know, the castle
is huge, it's shaped like a giant tea. Yeah, there's
no shortage of space in there. I remember roaming those
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halls and I do remember actually because we were doing
a public investigation there many years ago, and I do
remember I think there was some sort of fire code.
We got shut down by the by the fire department
or something because not this was before the event happened,
because they were waiting to get sprinklers, installers something. And
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that's just indicative of like what you face when you're
trying to get these historic places up and running, and
not necessarily running, but just keeping them open so people
don't forget that places like this existed. And so you know,
how important do you think the haunting aspect is in
keeping Preston open? Because I find that some of these
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historic places, I don't know that they all fully grasp
how important their ghosts can be for them as far
as funding and raising interest. Um, it's huge. Honestly. We
have so many different events that we do up there
at the castle, even like the day tours. During the
day tours, people ask, you know all the time about
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is this place haunted? Or if they know that we
do paranormal investigations there, they want the information on how
to get involved in that. I have people wanting to
be actually on the paranormal team, and it's huge. I
think that if we didn't do our paranormal investigations, it
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would definitely play a loss in the interest in coming
up there. I mean, and I'm not undermining the day
tours because the day to words are phenomenal, but the
place takes on a whole different feel when it gets
dark versus the daytime. Have you ever had any of
your daytime tour attendees have experiences that they didn't expect?
(29:15):
You know, I don't know, but I would not be
surprised because even myself, when I've been there during the day,
I've had my hair tugged, I've had whispers in my ear.
You know, I've seen things. So I would not doubt
that the guests during the day don't have their own
paranormal experience there. Yeah, what would you say? The majority
(29:38):
of the activity is like there we have, and it
seems lately we've been getting a lot of disembodied voices
where we're all in one room and it sounds like
there's conversations going on. I remember my actual first night
of running the paranorm investigation and I heard, we all heard.
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We were in the infirmary and everybody in the group
heard talking, and I thought somebody had broken into the grounds.
And we're out walking the grounds, the castle and I
panicked because this is my first night and you know,
somebody broke in, and I truly panicked. But after a
(30:24):
couple of the dose ents went outside to take a look,
there was nobody there. And so I mean, not only
did we hear voices, but we heard footsteps two at
the same time, So we get a lot of that.
You will hear voices all throughout the castle day and
night in my experience. Now, what would you say is
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the most commonly reported activity in the castle? Probably the
most common is the disembodied voices, and that seems to
be what we're getting most of all right now, we
have seen some white mists lately, and you know, it's
it's pretty hot in the castle right now, so there's
(31:07):
really nothing weather related that would necessarily cause that, you know,
like the cold or you know, somebody's breath or anything
like that. Also, we've got a couple of shadow figures
that we've been seeing also in a couple of the rooms.
One of our dose since she just recently saw her
(31:29):
first shadow figure and she's never seen what I mean,
she's been doing this and she's been to like she's
been to so many different places that you would see
that kind of stuff, But this was her first time
seeing the shadow man. Oh gosh, I know this miss
that you're describing, is it taking the shape of like
figures or is it just kind of a missed hanging
(31:51):
in the castle itself. I haven't seen it where it's
taking actual, you know, the shape of a figure. Some
of it seems to be kind of just forming and
then like floating around UM but staying together in like not.
I don't not even know how to describe it. Again,
(32:12):
not the form of a figure, but just not spread
out as what you would see like fogs or anything
like that. Right. I do remember when I was there
with ghost hunters, there was reports of a mist hanging
in there was like a really tall and open area.
I feel like it was where the wards used to
(32:33):
be and they used to be beds in there. But
I do remember it seemed like it was almost an
attic or something that's spent so long. I do remember
there was an owl in there that was attacking me.
I do remember an owl swooping down me. So, you know,
when when I'm talking to UM the guests that come,
I tell them that we have our own ecosystem in there,
(32:56):
and so the owls um, We've had fall box, We've
had you know, other critters in there in the bats,
the bats. We have a lot of bats. Yeah, so
I've been attacked by many a bat. I think that
still stands at the only owl. It scared the crap
out of me because I was just standing there and
this thing swooped down across the room and I could
(33:19):
feel the breeze of it like going over my head. So, um,
it was probably in Company B because we had an
owl in there for quite a while. Most of the
time they stay up in the tower, you know, but
you can hear them, of course when their chicks hatch.
They are screaming all night. Oh I'm sure. Well, yeah,
(33:39):
so that it was Company B then yeah. I do
remember specifically looking for this missed hanging in the room.
I did not witness it, but it's just such an
interesting phenomena that you don't care about that often kind
of along those lines, what do you think would cause
something like that or why do you think that would
be happening at the castle, You know, it's it's really
(34:00):
hard to say. I do feel like things are trying
to manifest there, and that's just their way of coming
through in the form of a miss, whether it's the
energy that the guests and us are providing for them
or just whatever equipment that we have going at that time.
(34:24):
It's I don't know, it's really hard to say. You know,
the MISS thing is is a little new for me
as far as that goes there, and I mean, I've
heard about it, but i've actually just recently, just since
we've opened up this year, is when I've seen the
miss and as well as some of the other docents.
(34:44):
That's what they're retorting. How is Preston Castle kind of
received in I own? Is the town really interested in
skiing it kind of succeed you know? How do they
feel about the ghostly history being so prevalent. Do you
guys ever get any pushback or are people mostly very
welcoming of it? I think the town is pretty welcoming that.
(35:05):
I mean, if anybody's been there. The castle sits on
top of a hill that overlooks the entire town, which
is super super tiny, but you will see, you know,
if you go to the different restaurants or shops in
the town, you can see some picture of the castle,
whether it's part of their logo or whatever. But the castle,
the way that it sits looking over this town, it's
(35:28):
not something that you can miss. Um, it's hard to say.
It seems like they're pretty open to it. There's, of course,
with anything, you're going to have people that say, no, no,
it's not haunted, there's nothing there, and then your fair
share of people that are like, oh my god, I've
been there, and yes it's totally haunted. So um, you know,
(35:51):
it's it's probably a mixture. How often do you have
people kind of visit the castle who actually spent time
there or work there. I believe we have one volunteer
that actually worked it, or maybe he was a war there.
I can't remember, but we do have quite a few
(36:12):
people that will come through. We had an event not
that long ago, or I should say it feels like
over a year ago now that he was visiting. I
think he said he was visiting from Oregon or he
had been out of state and he came back. I
was talking to him and he was telling me about
spending time in one of the units called Tamarack, and
(36:36):
that is the solitary confinement unit. It like he was
really shook up just talking to me about it. He
said that he had actually never been in or was
never part of the main building of the castle, but
he said his experience in Tamarack was just it was
not good, but he had come up there. I guess,
(36:57):
I don't know, like just to resolve things with himself.
I'm not sure, But yeah, we do. We do have
people coming up there and talking about how either they
spent time or that they had family members that either
spent time or work there. When people bring things like
that up, or when they kind of talk about what
(37:17):
it was like there, or even just kind of what
the routine was and things, does that ever seem to
instigate activity. I don't know. I don't know. You know,
when I was talking to this particular guy, we were outside.
I don't even know if he had gone inside. I
think it was just more of him sitting on the
grounds or standing on the grounds talking to me. But
(37:38):
I don't see why it wouldn't people coming through there,
it could definitely spark some of the activity. Have you
ever gotten anything identifiable or as far as who could
be haunting Preston or are there any ghosts that you
think you know who they are specifically? You know, I
(37:58):
don't think we've gotten any specific ghosts or people that
had been there. It's really hard to say. We suspect,
but I don't think, you know, we've never really gotten
solid confirmation of any names or anything like that while
we've been investigating. And it seems like, you know, a
(38:19):
lot of the activity you describe is pretty residual in nature,
meaning that it's almost like a recording playing over and
over for people listening, like the energy of someone just
kind of going about their routine. Is there anything there
that you would say is maybe more intelligent or like
seeking some sort of help or needing something. I definitely
(38:43):
sense that there is one particular one that we've all
kind of had some sort of interaction with down in
the basement area or the intake room, which is where
the boys came in. And I've seen him as a shadow,
I've felt him as oh gosh, like he's followed me
through the basement before, and it's definitely a male presence.
(39:05):
And sometimes we've, like I said, we've seen him kind
of walking back and forth, but more of a shadow figure.
And that one, in particular, I think is intelligent and
definitely interactive. Okay, so the intake room was that the
room that had the pool. Didn't they have some sort
of pool that they kind of washed them. I think
(39:26):
they stopped using it eventually because it was harmful, but
it was that where that was. Yeah, So they enter
in through the intake and then immediately they were taken
into what we call the de lousing pool, which um is,
I think is barbaric personally, they were you know, thrown
into this pool whether they knew how to swim or
(39:49):
or not, with chemicals and all the other stuff. And
not to mention that the staff kitchen was like right
across from that, which kind of grosses me out to
think that you know, those chemical and there could have
been kind of floating around. But yes, that's where we
feel a presence for sure, and we've seen you know,
(40:10):
a shadow down there and it's definitely male. Okay. Aside
from that area, are there any other like major hot
spots in the castle where you feel like there's just
i know, the infirmary because that's where you saw the
doctor or where the doctor was seen, right. Is there
anywhere else that you feel like it's almost like guaranteed
activity if you go into a space. So, yeah, the infirmary,
(40:31):
the basement, the basements. Definitely a hot spot because we
have like a chapel school area that we've gotten, you know,
some activity in. We just had an investigation this last
Saturday and they were getting activity up in Company B.
That isn't you know typically um I would say a
(40:53):
hot spot, but once in a while we do get that.
And also on the second floor. Lately we've and getting
some activity down the hall. We actually us as docents,
got some activity in the visitor center, which is kind
of what we call home base where we had We
were sitting there, there was three of us and we
(41:14):
probably people were sitting there for a good forty five
minutes to an hour and there's like this little sink
area and all of a sudden, we heard this big
bang and we went over there and it appeared that
a knife fell off one of the shelves and hit
I mean like nothing, there was nothing there that could
(41:36):
have knocked it down or anything. And the fact that
we were just sitting there for so long and nothing
had happened, and then boom, you know, this knife falls
out to the shelf. So I don't know, that's pretty wild.
Is there any activity that people experienced there that you
think has like violent or aggressive tendencies, like any scratches
or pushing or anything like that. No, I don't think so.
(41:59):
We've had one instance of a scratch not that long ago.
She you know, is an intuitive and she didn't feel
threatened by the scratch. I think she felt more that
they were trying to get her attention and that was
down again in that basement area, and it might have
been that male presence that we all feel down in there.
(42:23):
And as far as pushing, maybe people have reported occasionally
a push, but I personally don't feel that there's anything
bad there or evil or violent or anything like that.
I think that it's more that they're just besides the
(42:43):
residual that we have there, they're just trying to get
our attention, right, I mean, I think that sometimes aggressive
activity is just that and it's mistaken for something more,
you know, sinister. But sometimes they think that some entities
just really want to get your attention and when they allies,
they can touch you or imagine being that desperate, like
you're trying to get some sort of message across, and
(43:06):
you desperately reach out to someone, And sometimes I think
that is kind of misconstrued as negative type activity well,
you know, I have a lot of respect for everything
you guys are doing at Preston. I know this last
year has been incredibly hard for historic locations, but it
sounds like you guys are back up and running and
have a lot happening soon. So if people want to visit,
(43:29):
what can they do and what do you have coming
up that people might be interested in. Definitely check out
our website which is Preston Castle dot org. And we
have a huge event coming up which is our Halloween Haunt.
It's one of our biggest events of the year and
(43:49):
that will be all through October on Friday and Saturday
nights starting October and they can go to the website
to perk as tickets, but they are selling fast. We
sell out fast on this. You don't want to miss it.
It's three floors of the castle and it's just it's
(44:13):
amazing and we change it up every year and so
the people that have come through in years past absolutely
love it. Well, that's great and obviously all the money
raise goes to a great cause and that's fabulous. Hopefully
I'll be able to get back out there soon. I
will be visiting families soon, so I will have to
pop by the castle and say hi. Absolutely all right, well,
(44:35):
thank you so much for taking the time. I appreciate it,
and hopefully I will see you soon. All right, thank you, Amy.
I have to admit, after researching Preston so intensely and
hearing the stories that came out of that building, I
wondered why we're all so intent on preserving it. But
(44:56):
there is something special about that red castle, so out
of play in the California Foothills. Architecturally alone, its significance
cannot be denied. And yes, there were tragedies, but there
were also many who left there, changed and reformed, who
might not have had the lives they did without some intervention.
I also feel like repurposing the space into something more
(45:18):
positive can be a forever reminder of the growth and
evolution we and all of society is capable of. It
can also serve as a reminder of a place we
don't want to go back to. So I urge you
to explore the California Foothills, particularly Amador and El Dorado Counties,
often overlooked areas closer to Nevada than they are to
(45:39):
San Francisco or Los Angeles, and they're filled with gold
Rush history and ghosts and as you do, make the
stop and I own to see the castle. If you
can book a tour or a ghost hunt and let
them know you know a former local me. I'm Any
Brunei and this was Haunted Road. M Haunted Road is
(46:05):
a production of I Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild
from Aaron Mankey. The podcast is written and hosted by
Amy Bruney. Executive producers include Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and
Matt Frederick. The show is produced by rima Ill Kali
and Trevor Young. Taylor Haggerdorn is the show's researcher. For
(46:25):
more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Welcome to Haunted Road, a production of I Heart Radio
and Grim and Mild from Aaron Minky. Listener discretion is advised.
Almost thirty years ago, my soon to be stepfather was
trying his best to be a relatable parental figure, as
(00:20):
many do in such situations. Hearing I had an interest
in the supernatural, he declared that he knew of a building,
a haunted castle, near by his home in El Dorado, California,
and he'd like to show it to me. Being a
reasonably snarky teenager dealing with the trauma of her parents
divorce and now her mother's insistence on moving all of
(00:41):
us three hours away from our childhood home because of
this man, I remember being a bit apprehensive about doing
anything cordial with him, but the lure of a haunted
castle in the middle of California's Gold Country proved to
be too much. I begrudgingly joined him. On the twenty
minute drive up Highway four nine on a hot, dusty
(01:01):
summer day. We passed golden rolling hills and remnants of
old barns and gold Rush era buildings until we reached
the small town of Ion, and within seconds of our arrival,
I saw a glimpse of a large red castle with
a massive bell tower that looked so incredibly out of place,
I gasped. We made our way up the driveway and
(01:22):
got as close as we could to this old Romanesque
style red castle, and I don't think I had ever
seen anything like it in person in my life. And
I also somehow new, just by staring at it, the
terrible things had happened there. We got out of the
car and looked past the fence that stopped us from
getting any further, and I asked my stepfather what was
(01:45):
this place? He replied, it's Preston Castle. I nudged further,
inquiring what it had been before. He said it was
a school for troubled boys. As I peered through the fence,
trying to get a clear look in some of the
windows and pondering what it would have been like to
be a young boy dropped in front of this looming structure,
(02:06):
not knowing what could possibly be inside, my stepfather added,
I spent a year here when I was a team.
I asked him what it was like, and with almost
a lump in his throat and a quiet whisper, he said,
I don't talk about it. And headed back to the car.
Jim Little Page, my stepfather died in and whatever happened
(02:29):
to him within the walls of the Preston School of Industry,
he took with him to his grave. I'm Amy Brunei,
and this is Haunted Road. Preston School of Industry, or
the Castle as it's been known, was built between eighteen
(02:52):
ninety and eighteen ninety four in i own, California. In
eighteen nine, two acre parcel of land where the cast
still stands was purchased from the Ion Coal and Iron
Company for thirty dollars per acre, with one hundred acres donated.
Inmates from San Quentin and fulsome prisons helped make the
bricks that make up the castle, which were then transported
(03:14):
by rail to the School of Industry. The cornerstone was
laid on December nine, with people in attendance what an
early Christmas present. The one twenty room Romanesque Revival was
a reform school for young male offenders. The hope was
to rehabilitate, not just incarceerate. The complex was highly self sufficient.
(03:36):
The large acreage of the purchase allowed the boys to
grow their own food, raise livestock, and learn farming trades.
The forty six thousand square foot mansion had forty three fireplaces,
two hundred fifty seven windows, overlooking the tawny Amador County foothills,
a tower festooned on each side by intimidating gargoyles, hallways
(03:57):
bedecked with ornate Wayne's coating, and as a stone exterior
in the Romanesque Revival architectural style, hence that now iconic
red color of the castle. On the first floor, there
was a reception space, the director's room, a walk in
vault attached to an office, reception and waiting areas, a
dining room, bathrooms, office for the physician, and a pharmacy.
(04:20):
The second floor was home to a dorm for the
wards in twelve apartments for staff. There was also a
library and reading room. On this floor, various closets and
storage spaces, and bathrooms. On a mezzanine level, there were
two bathrooms with a few tubs. The third floor, unfinished,
had twelve rooms, the fourth, also unfinished, had six. In
(04:41):
the basement, there was a playroom, separate laundry for wards
and staff, shower room, and the infamous dip pool, kitchen
and pantry. Multiple bathrooms, furnace and fuel storage, storeroom and bakery. Basically,
Preston was massive in its heyday. The sol boasted one
thousand total acres, with seven hundred fifty dedicated to farming
(05:05):
for eight hundred wards. There was a staff of two hundred.
The entire campus included fifty buildings. Two weeks after the
school was completed, the first wards moved in. It became
immediately apparent that while this arrangement could provide structure and
security for wards, they were under the firm control of
the superintendent and were expected to adhere to strict rules
(05:27):
and routines, and if they transgressed, they were given severe punishment.
The worst offenders were held in Company B, which consisted
only of a row of beds and a single toilet.
Upon arrival to the castle, new wards were taken immediately
to the infamous Pool of Lie to cleanse their bodies,
specifically their heads. They were herded through a side door,
(05:50):
shorn of their hair stripped, and led to a pool
of harsh chemicals with only a poll for support. They
were made to walk with their heads underwater about x
feet to the pool's far end to rid their bodies
of potential pests meant to target likes. The pool likely
also exacerbated open wounds on the heads of many young wards,
(06:10):
which must have been excruciating. Eventually, the state shuttered this
dipping pool practice due to its inhumanity. Sadly, many of
the incoming wards were afflicted with tuberculosis and or various
addictions to alcohol, heroin, and opium. In an effort to
rehabilitate them, their days were divided between school and learning
(06:31):
a trade. There was a print shop, bakery, and cobbler
shop where the boys could learn skills for self preservation
in the real world. The boys ages seven through eighteen,
had a tennis court and a rose garden. They also
had a seven thousand book library with a veranda overlooking
the town. The more docile and agreeable boys were even
able to live in cottages surrounding the castle and learned
(06:54):
traits that were more lucrative and socially acceptable. But of course,
ideal is and reform didn't always rule the day. A
Sacramento b article from eight nine seven, just two years
after the school opened, detailed accusations of abuse by a superintendent, E. S. O'Brien.
The first paragraph noted whippings that left their back stripping
(07:17):
with blood. At least one of them claimed that salt
had been rubbed into his wounds to add to the
torture he was already suffering. The reports of ill treatment
were so pervasive throughout Ionn that a group of citizens
threatened to storm the castle in order to see for
themselves just how poorly the boys were treated. On numerous occasions,
O'Brien held boys with one hand while beating them in
(07:39):
the face with his other. He extended paddlings by ten
to forty strokes, sometimes beating boys until they couldn't walk
without assistance. A younger boy named Roderick received a beating
that left him black and blue from the small of
his back to the middle of his thighs. For several days. Afterwards,
the boy walked around literally dragging one it after the other,
(08:01):
and it said that afterward he had to be sent
to the hospital. The secretary at the time, H. R. Bernard,
recounted in an affidavit witnessing doctor O'Brien beat a ward
in the head and face with the cane. The cane
soon broke in his hands, but O'Brien continued his blows
with the part left in his hand, which was also
broken a moment later from the force of the blows
(08:23):
when the doctor grabbed a poll about four ft long
and proceeded to belabor the yelling lad over the body.
The force of the blows was terrific. The same article
alleged destructive and uncontrollable behavior of Wards, not limited to
setting the building on fire at least three times. Escape
attempts were frequent and occurred nearly every week. Superintendent E. S.
(08:45):
O'Brien told the wards in or prior to that he
had given orders to the guards that in the case
of an escape attempt, they were to shoot, and shoot
to kill. The property wasn't fenced with barbed wire, so
wards had one last to turn it. When it was
discovered that a ward had escaped, a horn would blow
an i own, which alerted citizens to the situation. A
(09:07):
hunt would follow, and if someone discovered and returned to Ward,
they received a ten dollar reward. The kids who escaped
received corporal punishment in the form of beatings, whippings, and
solitary confinement. Country singer Merle Haggard made two escape attempts
during his time at Preston. He had memories of beatings
with a two by four and attacktoo of p s
(09:28):
I on his wrist, so he never forgot the abuse.
Horrific stories of abuse and neglect became known Over the years.
Wards died of severe illnesses like tuberculosis. Other Wards were
killed by guards. During the Great Depression, parents sometimes dropped
kids off at the castle, where the Wards of the
state received three males a day, housing and a chance
(09:49):
for a stable life. All of this put into perspective
why Preston Castle would be harboring ghosts and energy today.
There were an incredible number of tragedies involving Wards on
the grounds. The first we see was of Grant Walker
on June seventeenth, eighteen ninety five. At first, it seems
like he may have died from typhoid fever. However, historian
(10:10):
Jamie Rubio dug further and found a conflicting death register
that suggests Walker may have died from severe internal burns
after ingesting something toxic. On October seventeenth, nineteen eleven, Herman
Hubert and fellow Ward and friend John Karaine made an
escape just as the dinner bell rang well. They tried anyway,
(10:31):
night guard J. D. French pursued the two escapees and
fired his weapon, which killed Hubert. French claimed he tried
to fire a warning shot, but Karaine maintained that French
shot herman in cold blood. On June sixth, nineteen fourteen,
a company of boys went to the pond after dinner
for a swim. Those who weren't strong swimmers were supposed
(10:51):
to stay in the shallow water, but ta Himavan, confident
about his doggy paddle, dove in wards. Robert Raines and
Albert Rubideaux tried to say Van after he resurfaced clearly
in a struggle. However, they were unable to retrieve him.
It wasn't until the next morning that they were able
to retrieve his lifeless body that had sunk to the
(11:11):
bottom of the pond. He is buried at the Preston Cemetery.
Frank Carterrella had epilepsy and experienced seizures because of it.
Instead of receiving treatment, Frank was kept in his cell.
It's heartbreaking to think about. On Valentine's Day nineteen seventeen,
Frank died by suicide after making a noose from his
shredded night shirt. In July nineteen eighteen, Samuel Gloin's arrived
(11:36):
at Preston. He had been convicted of burglary. Samuel made
three escape attempts, although the punishment after the first two
must have been terrible. The third proved fatal. While trying
to escape a third time, John Kelly of Preston Guard
accidentally shot Samuel in the back. Samuel died from the wound.
He was twenty years old and only two months from
(11:58):
being released from Preston. Ward Frank Algiers was admitted after
having experienced a really bad motorcycle accident. After admission, he
went straight to the infirmary, where he died just a
week later on May nineteen two. On July ninety four,
Ray Baker was shot by Guard Thomas Dooley. Baker was
(12:20):
trying to escape when Dully intervened. The ward tried to
strangle the guard, who was able to retrieve his gun
and shoot Wards. Edgar Howe and Leland Price got into
a fight during a Saturday night football game in December
nineteen four. In a confusing decision made to chastise the boys,
how In Price were locked together in Preston's basement. The
(12:41):
two Wards must have picked the fight back up or
a very unfortunate coincidence occurred because Price's skull was fractured
after hitting the ground and he fell into a coma.
Leland Price died the next morning. On December four, nine
Awards were digging a ditch on the property for sewage
un ex actedly, the ditch caved in and trapped six boys.
(13:03):
Four were extracted, but two remained buried. William Report and
Henry Herstein both died after being buried alive. Probably the
most notable and publicized death that took place at Preston
was the murder of the head housekeeper on February twenty third,
nineteen fifty. Her body was found in the then defunct
pool room, beaten with evidence of a massive struggle. She
(13:26):
had been strangled with accord, but the cause of her
death was a fatal blow to the head resulting in
a skull fracture. A rape had been attempted but not enacted.
The housekeeper was incredibly well loved and liked by the
Wards and her fellow employees alike, so much so the
Wards threatened vigilante justice if her killer was found. The
(13:46):
superintendent at the time made it very clear that everyone
was a suspect, even staff and that they would be
investigating thoroughly. After six hundred fifty seven wards were questioned,
a case was formed against a ward named Eugene Monroe.
He was at Preston after being convicted of burglary, but
had been the prime suspect in a murder case prior
(14:07):
to that, a murder and rape case involving the strangulation
of a high school student. Using the same type of
court in the case of the housekeeper and tied in
the same fashion. Monroe was given a lie detector test
and failed, and inconsistencies in his story, plus the fact
he had been caught trying to incinerate his clothing, was
enough to charge him. Eugene was tried three times. The
(14:30):
first two resulted in a hung jury and the third
reached an acquittal. In nineteen fifty one, Eugene was convicted
of the rape and murder of a woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma,
who was pregnant at the time of her death. He
was given a life sentence. It is said that Preston's
dark past heavily ways on the old building, and that
the spirit of the housekeeper, plus so many of these
(14:52):
wards that never made it out alive still very much
reside within its walls. There are eighteen boys buried in
a small sem ma terry on the property. Many died
of natural causes, and there are certainly more deaths that
took place there, but the ones buried on site most
likely had no surviving family or their loved ones were
financially unable to bury them elsewhere. In nineteen sixty, the
(15:15):
Preston School of Industry closed. The state planned to demolish
the building, and a group of local women fought for
eight years to keep it standing. Finally, the state relinquished
and said while they wouldn't tear it down, they would
do nothing to keep it standing. So there it sat
until two thousand one, when the State of California leased
the property to the Preston Castle Foundation. In fourteen, the
(15:39):
foundation was granted ownership of the castle and nearly thirteen
acres of property. Fundraising and repairs have been the goal
ever since, and estimates are as high as fifteen to
thirty million dollars to reverse the years of abuse and
neglect of the building. Up next, we'll talk to Connie Brenner,
a lead paranormal investigator at Pressston Castle and a member
(16:01):
of the Preston Castle Foundation's board will find out what
kind of activity they experienced there, in addition to how
you can visit the castle and assist in their conservation efforts.
(16:29):
So I'm sitting here now with Connie Brenner, who is
a lead investigator at Preston Castle and also a member
of the board. She's now been involved kind of on
a professional level with the castle for about two and
a half years, but her history with the castle goes
on even before that. So I think you've probably got
some great info for us, Connie, as far as what
(16:49):
the history at Preston, what has happened haunting wise there
due to what happened there when it was in operation. Yes, yes,
absolutely so. Can you just kind of how me how
you came about being involved with Preston. I started out
as just a guest one night a friend of mine
was involved with the castle, and she's like, Okay, you know,
(17:12):
you totally got to come up here and check this
place out because we had just kind of gotten started
in the whole paranormal field. I went up there for
a public investigation and I had never really had any
crazy experiences, and like right off the bat that night,
I mean I think. I don't know, I saw like
the holy grail of you know, in doing the paranormal stuff,
(17:35):
where I actually saw a full body apparition. We were
in the doctor's office and I was facing the doorway
into the hall, and I saw what looked like a
man in a white jacket walked right past the door.
And there was another group located in the castle, but
(17:57):
they were pretty far and like not even really close
to that area. And so one of the girls that
had had her back to that doorway, I asked her,
you know, did somebody just walk by? And she went
out there and looked, and she says, there's nobody. I mean,
it was pretty quick that she went and looked. It
just you know, it took me a second to realize that,
(18:20):
oh my gosh, I just saw, you know, an apparition
walked right past the door. So I bet you were
hooked at that point. I mean, that's all it takes. You.
Either at that point you're completely terrified and never want
to do it again, or your interest is peaked. It
was definitely peaked. And you know, I also got touched
that night. We have an infirmary area in the castle,
(18:43):
and I was touched you know, there was nothing that
could have bumped into me. It wasn't my clothing, and
so whoever's there was definitely getting my attention. Yeah, I mean,
it's interesting that you say they were wearing a lab
coat like they were maybe a doctor or someone that
(19:05):
you know, obviously tended to the I guess they called
them inmates there or whatever they called them. I wouldn't
say patients even, but who do you think that could
possibly be. I think it was a doctor, you know,
I see to me now that I know a whole
lot more. But definitely seemed like a residual type haunting
(19:25):
because it wasn't like it stopped and waved, you know,
through the doorway. It was almost as if he was
just going about his business, you know, maybe checking in
on the patients that were there. They actually called them wards.
Apparently he was also seen by another guest earlier that
(19:47):
evening in the same area. He was definitely making his rounds. Then,
I mean, it's interesting. I'm hoping that no one you
know in your group was running around in the lab
coade or anything. So and it's interesting because he was
see through, but I could also see that in in
a weird sort of I don't even know how to
describe it, but like he had like he had dark hair,
(20:09):
you know, if it was a guy that was a
part of the investigation that night. You know, usually usually
if you're going to wear some sort of a jacket,
it has logos or something on it. But this definitely
did not. No, No, definitely not. That's interesting just because
I think about Preston Castle's history and I wanted to
(20:30):
ask you about that a little bit, because obviously it's
a very historic place. The history there is very dark.
And I mentioned kind of in the beginning of the show.
My stepfather actually spent time there when he was a teen,
and he would never speak of it. And he was
a pretty he was an open book. He passed away,
(20:50):
but his time at Preston he never spoke of, not
even to my mom. He said it was a horrible experience, basically,
is the most we could get out of him. And so,
how do you obviously, for historical purposes, we want Preston
Castle to stick around. People work really hard to make
sure that it's still standing and it's it's got the
foundation and everything. How do you all reconcile kind of
(21:13):
the history and what you do we go in. We
are extremely respectful of the spirits that could be there.
You know, we have to think about how young that
the kids were that were there. You know, we think
that there could have been kids as young as seven,
(21:35):
and so, you know, we try really hard to be
somewhat I don't know, maybe nurturing towards the children that
were there, because it wasn't all fun and games there.
This It was run military style, right, yeah, And I'm
sure there were plenty of success stories that came out
(21:56):
of there as well. But just having that kind of
first hand knowledge, but then also just kind of reading
through the history, I do that too, where I kind
of look back on it and I think, you know,
what was it like to be dropped off there as
a young boy and just not even know what was
coming to you? And and you know, some people were
sent there because they genuinely had um issues that needed
(22:20):
to be taken care of, and then others were sent
there just because their parents couldn't take care of them anymore,
you know, especially during the depression. And so I think
that's great that you guys approach it in that way
of being kind of nurturing and you know, humanizing them,
which I think is huge. This is their home. We
are guests in their home, and we tell all of
(22:41):
our guests this is not a place to come in
and demand and treat the boys, even if there's staff
around there. We really come in there with kind of
love and respect for entities or spirits that are there.
So that's definitely our approach when it comes to that,
(23:02):
and I think it works because they're still around. You know,
they're there. And since COVID and you know the fact
that we had to be shut down for a year,
things have really ramped up. We're getting a ton of
activity now, I'm sure. And actually that's something that we've
noticed in our investigations, especially in some of these larger
(23:23):
places that you know, the only real visitors they get
are historians or you know, people visiting in the museum sense.
But then also panormal investigators are the ones that really interact.
And I think in some cases the spirits really missed that.
And you know, when we come back in, you know,
when Adam and I investigator, if I'm out investigating, it's
(23:44):
interesting how eager they are to speak again, Like I
can't imagine, I don't I don't claim to know what
time is like for them. I don't claim to know
how any of that works, but it does seem like
they're more eager to interact at the moment. Oh yeah,
I mean, and we have different stuff like going in there,
we have our hot spots in all that other stuff,
(24:05):
but it's changed and we're getting more activity in areas
that we never used to, which makes it really interesting
and exciting, you know, force because we're like, okay, you know,
we get to kind of show people different areas and
all that other stuff. I mean, you know, we try
to actually let them kind of discover it themselves. We
(24:27):
try not to give them too much information, you know,
but we're able to validate that after they talk with
us when and if they haven't experience. Yeah, I mean
that's great. I know, like it was open during the
Spanish flu pandemic, and I was reading through the history
because we felt like that a pandemic might be kind
of triggering for some of these older locations that had
(24:48):
kind of been through it. And remarkably, I guess a
lot of people had the flu and pressed them but
they didn't lose anyone, which was kind of unheard of
for that amount of people coming down with the flu
back then. So just an interesting fact I found when
I was digging through the history. Yeah, yeah, I mean
it's crazy to think, you know, something like that that
(25:11):
they didn't lose people like I guess you could say
we are now. So yeah, it's it's very interesting how
that all happens. So what is the state of the
castle right now? Obviously a post pandemic, you guys are
probably bringing people back in, But how are things going?
I haven't been, unfortunately in a few years. I used
(25:32):
to go quite often just because it was about twenty
five minutes away from my family home, which now my
sister and her husband owned, But it was originally built
by my stepfather, and so I can't remember the last
time I was there. I think it must have been
about seven or eight years ago. So how how are
things going there now? Things are great? Actually, you know,
(25:54):
we've done so much as far as you know, the
construction of the castle or the reconstruction of the castle,
We've been able to um do a lot of repairs.
I mean, there's so much prepare that needs to be
done to that place. I doubt I will ever see
it completed in my lifetime, and maybe not even my sons,
(26:16):
who's like, you know, he's seventeen or almost seventeen, and
there's just so much and you know, it's extremely expensive
to do all the repairs on this castle, but you know,
we just keep kind of plugging away at it a
little bit at a time. Our parking lot is no
longer a gravel parking lot. We actually have asphalt now,
and which is great, you know, trying to repair some
(26:39):
of the windows. And there are areas in the castle.
I don't know if you remember, but where there was
no floor from like the basement to like the fifth floor.
You know, that is still unfortunately in that type of condition.
I do remember that. I do remember that it's still
you know, empty in there. You can still see all
(27:02):
the way up, but there are areas that are the
floor has been replaced. Unfortunately, they're not open to the
public yet, but the public still has three floors to
do their investigations or tours, which you know, the castle
is huge, it's shaped like a giant tea. Yeah, there's
no shortage of space in there. I remember roaming those
(27:24):
halls and I do remember actually because we were doing
a public investigation there many years ago, and I do
remember I think there was some sort of fire code.
We got shut down by the by the fire department
or something because not this was before the event happened,
because they were waiting to get sprinklers, installers something. And
(27:45):
that's just indicative of like what you face when you're
trying to get these historic places up and running, and
not necessarily running, but just keeping them open so people
don't forget that places like this existed. And so you know,
how important do you think the haunting aspect is in
keeping Preston open? Because I find that some of these
(28:06):
historic places, I don't know that they all fully grasp
how important their ghosts can be for them as far
as funding and raising interest. Um, it's huge. Honestly. We
have so many different events that we do up there
at the castle, even like the day tours. During the
day tours, people ask, you know all the time about
(28:27):
is this place haunted? Or if they know that we
do paranormal investigations there, they want the information on how
to get involved in that. I have people wanting to
be actually on the paranormal team, and it's huge. I
think that if we didn't do our paranormal investigations, it
(28:51):
would definitely play a loss in the interest in coming
up there. I mean, and I'm not undermining the day
tours because the day to words are phenomenal, but the
place takes on a whole different feel when it gets
dark versus the daytime. Have you ever had any of
your daytime tour attendees have experiences that they didn't expect?
(29:15):
You know, I don't know, but I would not be
surprised because even myself, when I've been there during the day,
I've had my hair tugged, I've had whispers in my ear.
You know, I've seen things. So I would not doubt
that the guests during the day don't have their own
paranormal experience there. Yeah, what would you say? The majority
(29:38):
of the activity is like there we have, and it
seems lately we've been getting a lot of disembodied voices
where we're all in one room and it sounds like
there's conversations going on. I remember my actual first night
of running the paranorm investigation and I heard, we all heard.
(30:03):
We were in the infirmary and everybody in the group
heard talking, and I thought somebody had broken into the grounds.
And we're out walking the grounds, the castle and I
panicked because this is my first night and you know,
somebody broke in, and I truly panicked. But after a
(30:24):
couple of the dose ents went outside to take a look,
there was nobody there. And so I mean, not only
did we hear voices, but we heard footsteps two at
the same time, So we get a lot of that.
You will hear voices all throughout the castle day and
night in my experience. Now, what would you say is
(30:46):
the most commonly reported activity in the castle? Probably the
most common is the disembodied voices, and that seems to
be what we're getting most of all right now, we
have seen some white mists lately, and you know, it's
it's pretty hot in the castle right now, so there's
(31:07):
really nothing weather related that would necessarily cause that, you know,
like the cold or you know, somebody's breath or anything
like that. Also, we've got a couple of shadow figures
that we've been seeing also in a couple of the rooms.
One of our dose since she just recently saw her
(31:29):
first shadow figure and she's never seen what I mean,
she's been doing this and she's been to like she's
been to so many different places that you would see
that kind of stuff, But this was her first time
seeing the shadow man. Oh gosh, I know this miss
that you're describing, is it taking the shape of like
figures or is it just kind of a missed hanging
(31:51):
in the castle itself. I haven't seen it where it's
taking actual, you know, the shape of a figure. Some
of it seems to be kind of just forming and
then like floating around UM but staying together in like not.
I don't not even know how to describe it. Again,
(32:12):
not the form of a figure, but just not spread
out as what you would see like fogs or anything
like that. Right. I do remember when I was there
with ghost hunters, there was reports of a mist hanging
in there was like a really tall and open area.
I feel like it was where the wards used to
(32:33):
be and they used to be beds in there. But
I do remember it seemed like it was almost an
attic or something that's spent so long. I do remember
there was an owl in there that was attacking me.
I do remember an owl swooping down me. So, you know,
when when I'm talking to UM the guests that come,
I tell them that we have our own ecosystem in there,
(32:56):
and so the owls um, We've had fall box, We've
had you know, other critters in there in the bats,
the bats. We have a lot of bats. Yeah, so
I've been attacked by many a bat. I think that
still stands at the only owl. It scared the crap
out of me because I was just standing there and
this thing swooped down across the room and I could
(33:19):
feel the breeze of it like going over my head. So, um,
it was probably in Company B because we had an
owl in there for quite a while. Most of the
time they stay up in the tower, you know, but
you can hear them, of course when their chicks hatch.
They are screaming all night. Oh I'm sure. Well, yeah,
(33:39):
so that it was Company B then yeah. I do
remember specifically looking for this missed hanging in the room.
I did not witness it, but it's just such an
interesting phenomena that you don't care about that often kind
of along those lines, what do you think would cause
something like that or why do you think that would
be happening at the castle, You know, it's it's really
(34:00):
hard to say. I do feel like things are trying
to manifest there, and that's just their way of coming
through in the form of a miss, whether it's the
energy that the guests and us are providing for them
or just whatever equipment that we have going at that time.
(34:24):
It's I don't know, it's really hard to say. You know,
the MISS thing is is a little new for me
as far as that goes there, and I mean, I've
heard about it, but i've actually just recently, just since
we've opened up this year, is when I've seen the
miss and as well as some of the other docents.
(34:44):
That's what they're retorting. How is Preston Castle kind of
received in I own? Is the town really interested in
skiing it kind of succeed you know? How do they
feel about the ghostly history being so prevalent. Do you
guys ever get any pushback or are people mostly very
welcoming of it? I think the town is pretty welcoming that.
(35:05):
I mean, if anybody's been there. The castle sits on
top of a hill that overlooks the entire town, which
is super super tiny, but you will see, you know,
if you go to the different restaurants or shops in
the town, you can see some picture of the castle,
whether it's part of their logo or whatever. But the castle,
the way that it sits looking over this town, it's
(35:28):
not something that you can miss. Um, it's hard to say.
It seems like they're pretty open to it. There's, of course,
with anything, you're going to have people that say, no, no,
it's not haunted, there's nothing there, and then your fair
share of people that are like, oh my god, I've
been there, and yes it's totally haunted. So um, you know,
(35:51):
it's it's probably a mixture. How often do you have
people kind of visit the castle who actually spent time
there or work there. I believe we have one volunteer
that actually worked it, or maybe he was a war there.
I can't remember, but we do have quite a few
(36:12):
people that will come through. We had an event not
that long ago, or I should say it feels like
over a year ago now that he was visiting. I
think he said he was visiting from Oregon or he
had been out of state and he came back. I
was talking to him and he was telling me about
spending time in one of the units called Tamarack, and
(36:36):
that is the solitary confinement unit. It like he was
really shook up just talking to me about it. He
said that he had actually never been in or was
never part of the main building of the castle, but
he said his experience in Tamarack was just it was
not good, but he had come up there. I guess,
(36:57):
I don't know, like just to resolve things with himself.
I'm not sure, But yeah, we do. We do have
people coming up there and talking about how either they
spent time or that they had family members that either
spent time or work there. When people bring things like
that up, or when they kind of talk about what
(37:17):
it was like there, or even just kind of what
the routine was and things, does that ever seem to
instigate activity. I don't know. I don't know. You know,
when I was talking to this particular guy, we were outside.
I don't even know if he had gone inside. I
think it was just more of him sitting on the
grounds or standing on the grounds talking to me. But
(37:38):
I don't see why it wouldn't people coming through there,
it could definitely spark some of the activity. Have you
ever gotten anything identifiable or as far as who could
be haunting Preston or are there any ghosts that you
think you know who they are specifically? You know, I
(37:58):
don't think we've gotten any specific ghosts or people that
had been there. It's really hard to say. We suspect,
but I don't think, you know, we've never really gotten
solid confirmation of any names or anything like that while
we've been investigating. And it seems like, you know, a
(38:19):
lot of the activity you describe is pretty residual in nature,
meaning that it's almost like a recording playing over and
over for people listening, like the energy of someone just
kind of going about their routine. Is there anything there
that you would say is maybe more intelligent or like
seeking some sort of help or needing something. I definitely
(38:43):
sense that there is one particular one that we've all
kind of had some sort of interaction with down in
the basement area or the intake room, which is where
the boys came in. And I've seen him as a shadow,
I've felt him as oh gosh, like he's followed me
through the basement before, and it's definitely a male presence.
(39:05):
And sometimes we've, like I said, we've seen him kind
of walking back and forth, but more of a shadow figure.
And that one, in particular, I think is intelligent and
definitely interactive. Okay, so the intake room was that the
room that had the pool. Didn't they have some sort
of pool that they kind of washed them. I think
(39:26):
they stopped using it eventually because it was harmful, but
it was that where that was. Yeah, So they enter
in through the intake and then immediately they were taken
into what we call the de lousing pool, which um is,
I think is barbaric personally, they were you know, thrown
into this pool whether they knew how to swim or
(39:49):
or not, with chemicals and all the other stuff. And
not to mention that the staff kitchen was like right
across from that, which kind of grosses me out to
think that you know, those chemical and there could have
been kind of floating around. But yes, that's where we
feel a presence for sure, and we've seen you know,
(40:10):
a shadow down there and it's definitely male. Okay. Aside
from that area, are there any other like major hot
spots in the castle where you feel like there's just
i know, the infirmary because that's where you saw the
doctor or where the doctor was seen, right. Is there
anywhere else that you feel like it's almost like guaranteed
activity if you go into a space. So, yeah, the infirmary,
(40:31):
the basement, the basements. Definitely a hot spot because we
have like a chapel school area that we've gotten, you know,
some activity in. We just had an investigation this last
Saturday and they were getting activity up in Company B.
That isn't you know typically um I would say a
(40:53):
hot spot, but once in a while we do get that.
And also on the second floor. Lately we've and getting
some activity down the hall. We actually us as docents,
got some activity in the visitor center, which is kind
of what we call home base where we had We
were sitting there, there was three of us and we
(41:14):
probably people were sitting there for a good forty five
minutes to an hour and there's like this little sink
area and all of a sudden, we heard this big
bang and we went over there and it appeared that
a knife fell off one of the shelves and hit
I mean like nothing, there was nothing there that could
(41:36):
have knocked it down or anything. And the fact that
we were just sitting there for so long and nothing
had happened, and then boom, you know, this knife falls
out to the shelf. So I don't know, that's pretty wild.
Is there any activity that people experienced there that you
think has like violent or aggressive tendencies, like any scratches
or pushing or anything like that. No, I don't think so.
(41:59):
We've had one instance of a scratch not that long ago.
She you know, is an intuitive and she didn't feel
threatened by the scratch. I think she felt more that
they were trying to get her attention and that was
down again in that basement area, and it might have
been that male presence that we all feel down in there.
(42:23):
And as far as pushing, maybe people have reported occasionally
a push, but I personally don't feel that there's anything
bad there or evil or violent or anything like that.
I think that it's more that they're just besides the
(42:43):
residual that we have there, they're just trying to get
our attention, right, I mean, I think that sometimes aggressive
activity is just that and it's mistaken for something more,
you know, sinister. But sometimes they think that some entities
just really want to get your attention and when they allies,
they can touch you or imagine being that desperate, like
you're trying to get some sort of message across, and
(43:06):
you desperately reach out to someone, And sometimes I think
that is kind of misconstrued as negative type activity well,
you know, I have a lot of respect for everything
you guys are doing at Preston. I know this last
year has been incredibly hard for historic locations, but it
sounds like you guys are back up and running and
have a lot happening soon. So if people want to visit,
(43:29):
what can they do and what do you have coming
up that people might be interested in. Definitely check out
our website which is Preston Castle dot org. And we
have a huge event coming up which is our Halloween Haunt.
It's one of our biggest events of the year and
(43:49):
that will be all through October on Friday and Saturday
nights starting October and they can go to the website
to perk as tickets, but they are selling fast. We
sell out fast on this. You don't want to miss it.
It's three floors of the castle and it's just it's
(44:13):
amazing and we change it up every year and so
the people that have come through in years past absolutely
love it. Well, that's great and obviously all the money
raise goes to a great cause and that's fabulous. Hopefully
I'll be able to get back out there soon. I
will be visiting families soon, so I will have to
pop by the castle and say hi. Absolutely all right, well,
(44:35):
thank you so much for taking the time. I appreciate it,
and hopefully I will see you soon. All right, thank you, Amy.
I have to admit, after researching Preston so intensely and
hearing the stories that came out of that building, I
wondered why we're all so intent on preserving it. But
(44:56):
there is something special about that red castle, so out
of play in the California Foothills. Architecturally alone, its significance
cannot be denied. And yes, there were tragedies, but there
were also many who left there, changed and reformed, who
might not have had the lives they did without some intervention.
I also feel like repurposing the space into something more
(45:18):
positive can be a forever reminder of the growth and
evolution we and all of society is capable of. It
can also serve as a reminder of a place we
don't want to go back to. So I urge you
to explore the California Foothills, particularly Amador and El Dorado Counties,
often overlooked areas closer to Nevada than they are to
(45:39):
San Francisco or Los Angeles, and they're filled with gold
Rush history and ghosts and as you do, make the
stop and I own to see the castle. If you
can book a tour or a ghost hunt and let
them know you know a former local me. I'm Any
Brunei and this was Haunted Road. M Haunted Road is
(46:05):
a production of I Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild
from Aaron Mankey. The podcast is written and hosted by
Amy Bruney. Executive producers include Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and
Matt Frederick. The show is produced by rima Ill Kali
and Trevor Young. Taylor Haggerdorn is the show's researcher. For
(46:25):
more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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