Matiere Opaque : Ghost Stories Greeley's Rancho Arcana

Greeley's Whaley House Photo Album

Updated 10/22/2004

-- Ladies and Gentlemen! --
-- Photographers and Physicists of All Ages! --
-- Step Right Up and Test Your Skills! --

The Whaley House, in Old Town San Diego, is one of the most well-known 'haunted houses' in all of California. It is also one of the most photographed, owing to the alleged proclivity of its former residents to occasionally appear on film. In fact, some experts estimate that if all the 35mm film shot in the Whaley House were lain end to end in a line, it would reach to the Moon and back three times.*

Your host, while searching for the perfect Mexican restaurant in Old Town, has visited the Whaley House on several occasions over the past 20 years and has also snapped his share of photos. Some of the results have proven to be quite ...unusual.

Now, through the magic of the Internet, Greeley's Rancho Arcana invites you, dear reader, to peruse Greeley's personal Whaley House Photo Album and, should you have the appropriate qualifications, to take on a compelling <reverb>photographic mystery.</reverb>


On the following pages you will see, in sequential order, 18 photographs scanned directly from a roll of 35mm film shot during a visit to the Whaley House in the summer of 1985. These images and the original negative have not been retouched or tampered with in any way and no photographic trickery was employed. What you see is what was shot. Nothing more. Nothing less.


Many of the photos you are about to encounter contain what some ghost-photo enthusiasts call 'anomalies;' but one, and only one, actually shows something that cannot be explained away as a common photographic error. This same photo is also composed in a way that allows it to be approached objectively and subjected to a reasonable question. Can you guess which photo it is?

"Step Right Up! Step Right Up! Let's join our host and Begin The Show..."

* Actually, that's a bald-faced lie I just made up. But I wouldn't be surprised if it's true.

Background Information and Quick Navigation

> > About The Whaley House (with off site links)

Greeley's Two-Cents on The Whaley House,
and other professionally managed 'haunted' locations (coming soon)

> > Skip the Slide Show; Just Show Me The Photo!

> > Jump to the Question page

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