Things That Go Bump at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Part Two: Shadows of the West Wing| The Strange History Podcast

0:00 Speaker 1: Welcome back, dear listeners, to part two of our White

0:02 Speaker 1: House Haunting series. Last time we met the presidential phantoms, Lincoln,

0:08 Speaker 1: Abigail Dolly, and the rest of the elite Afterlife Club.

0:12 Speaker 1: But tonight we're stepping into the other side of the

0:15 Speaker 1: mansion's history. The forgotten corners, the attic, the garden, the

0:20 Speaker 1: places the Secret Service doesn't list on the tour. Here's

0:23 Speaker 1: the truth. The White House isn't just haunted by the famous.

0:27 Speaker 1: It's haunted by the forgotten, the ones who died too quickly,

0:31 Speaker 1: were erased from memory, or simply refused to give up

0:34 Speaker 1: their view of the Rose Garden. So settle in light

0:39 Speaker 1: another founding Fragrance's candle. This one's called Oath of Office

0:43 Speaker 1: and Ominous Drafts. Because tonight, dear listeners, the halls are

0:48 Speaker 1: busier than you think.

0:50 Speaker 2: The shortest stay William Henry Harrison.

0:54 Speaker 1: In eighteen forty one, William Henry Harrison moved into the

0:57 Speaker 1: White House full of enthusiasm and without a coat. He

1:01 Speaker 1: gave the longest inaugural address in US history, standing in

1:06 Speaker 1: cold March rain for nearly two hours. A month later,

1:10 Speaker 1: he was dead of pneumonia. The shortest presidency in American history,

1:14 Speaker 1: just thirty one days, and yet, according to more than

1:17 Speaker 1: a century of reports, he never left. White House. Staff

1:23 Speaker 1: say the attic above the second floor sometimes echoes with slow,

1:26 Speaker 1: deliberate footsteps. One nineteen forties usher claimed he heard drawers

1:31 Speaker 1: open and shut when no one was there. Another said

1:34 Speaker 1: he felt someone breathing behind him as he inventoried old furniture,

1:38 Speaker 1: but when he turned there was only dust, motes and

1:41 Speaker 1: cold air. Even modern maintenance crews have commented on a

1:45 Speaker 1: man walking up there no pranksters, no intruders, just a

1:50 Speaker 1: lonely sound of someone searching through trunks, perhaps still unpacking

1:54 Speaker 1: for a presidency that never began. Harrison's ghost is less

1:58 Speaker 1: of a fright and more of a sigh, a reminder

2:01 Speaker 1: that sometimes the briefest stories echo the loudest. He didn't

2:06 Speaker 1: get to make history, so he made the guest list instead.

2:09 Speaker 2: The land's original owner, David Burns.

2:13 Speaker 1: Before there was a White House, there was farmland, And

2:17 Speaker 1: before there was farmland, there was David Burns, the stubborn

2:21 Speaker 1: Scottish farmer who owned the land that George Washington wanted

2:24 Speaker 1: for his new capital city. Burns didn't go quietly. He

2:28 Speaker 1: refused to sell, at first, earning himself the nickname the

2:32 Speaker 1: obstinate Mister Burns. Eventually, after some heated negotiations and a

2:37 Speaker 1: bit of presidential persuasion, he relented, but perhaps not happily.

2:43 Speaker 1: For over a century, guards and staff have reported hearing

2:46 Speaker 1: a gruff male voice in the Yellow Oval Room or

2:49 Speaker 1: near the South portico, muttering about my land or what

2:53 Speaker 1: they've done to it. In nineteen oh three, a night

2:56 Speaker 1: watchman swore he saw an older man in eighteenth century close,

3:00 Speaker 1: pacing and gesturing towards the city beyond the gates. When

3:04 Speaker 1: the watchman approached, the man vanished, leaving behind only the

3:08 Speaker 1: faint smell of pipe smoke. Some ghosts cling to people,

3:13 Speaker 1: others cling to property lines, and honestly, in DC, that's

3:17 Speaker 1: probably the most relatable haunting of all.

3:20 Speaker 2: The daughter who kept knocking, Anna Surrett.

3:24 Speaker 1: Few stories in American history are as tragic as Anna Surret's.

3:28 Speaker 1: Her mother, Mary Surrett, owned the boarding house where John

3:32 Speaker 1: Wilkes Booth and his conspirators plotted Lincoln's assassination. When the

3:36 Speaker 1: government rounded them up, Mary was convicted and sentenced to hang.

3:41 Speaker 1: Desperate to save her, Anna spent the night before the execution,

3:45 Speaker 1: pounding on the White House doors, begging President Andrew Johnson

3:48 Speaker 1: for clemency. The guards refused to wake him. The next morning,

3:54 Speaker 1: Mary Surrat was hanged, the first woman ever executed by

3:58 Speaker 1: the US government. Years later, guards began hearing frantic knocking

4:03 Speaker 1: on the North Portico doors, especially in the humid summer

4:07 Speaker 1: months when the air felt heavy with memory. Some claimed

4:11 Speaker 1: they heard a woman's voice crying, let me in. Others

4:15 Speaker 1: described the doorknobs rattling violently, as if someone were still outside,

4:20 Speaker 1: still begging. There's something heartbreakingly human about Anna's haunting. She's

4:26 Speaker 1: not a wandering spirit. She's a memory that refuses to fade.

4:30 Speaker 1: If you ever stand before the North Portico late at

4:33 Speaker 1: night and hear a faint tapping, you might be listening

4:36 Speaker 1: to history still trying to rewrite itself.

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5:01 Speaker 2: The Unfinished War, The British soldier in eighteen fourteen.

5:06 Speaker 1: During the War of eighteen twelve, British troops marched into

5:10 Speaker 1: Washington and set fire to nearly every public building, including

5:14 Speaker 1: the White House. Legend says that one of those soldiers

5:18 Speaker 1: never left. Guards have reported seeing a shadowy figure in

5:21 Speaker 1: a red coat patrolling the north lawn, musket on shoulder,

5:25 Speaker 1: face obscured. Some call him the smoking Man because witnesses

5:30 Speaker 1: often see a faint wisp of smoke drifting up from

5:33 Speaker 1: where his pipe glows in the dark. In nineteen fifty three,

5:37 Speaker 1: a Marine sentry on duty swore he saw the figure

5:40 Speaker 1: cross the lawn, salute and vanish. Another decades later chased

5:45 Speaker 1: what he thought was an intruder, only to find the

5:48 Speaker 1: footprints ended abruptly in soft grass. Maybe he's a soldier

5:53 Speaker 1: still on guard duty, protecting the place he once destroyed.

5:57 Speaker 1: Or maybe he's just very, very lost, like a Britage

6:00 Speaker 1: tourists trying to find the nearest pub. Either way, I

6:03 Speaker 1: hope someone's told him the war's over.

6:05 Speaker 2: The Romantic Return, John Tyler.

6:09 Speaker 1: The Blue Room of the White House is one of

6:11 Speaker 1: the most elegant chambers, the sight of receptions, holiday photos,

6:15 Speaker 1: and one ghostly love story. President John Tyler, widowed during

6:20 Speaker 1: his term, became the first president to marry while in office.

6:24 Speaker 1: He proposed to his young bride, Julia Gardner, right in

6:28 Speaker 1: the Blue Room in eighteen forty four. Long after his death,

6:31 Speaker 1: Musicians performing during holiday events reported feeling a tap on

6:35 Speaker 1: the shoulder and no one there. One clarinetist said he

6:39 Speaker 1: felt a cold hand push his elbow just as he

6:42 Speaker 1: played a wrong note, as though someone disapproved of his tune.

6:46 Speaker 1: During Christmas tours, visitors have described a sudden hush falling

6:50 Speaker 1: over the Blue Room, as if a private moment is

6:53 Speaker 1: being replayed in time. If the White House can be

6:56 Speaker 1: a battlefield, it can also be a ballroom. And if

6:59 Speaker 1: anyone deserves a lingering encore, it's a president who found

7:03 Speaker 1: love again in the middle of his presidency. The original

7:07 Speaker 1: Oval Office rom com.

7:09 Speaker 3: This episode is sponsored by Seance Safe tablecloths, stain resistant,

7:15 Speaker 3: candle friendly and guaranteed not to burst into flames during

7:18 Speaker 3: contact with the spirit realm. Sayance safe, because when you're

7:23 Speaker 3: raising the dead, presentation matters.

7:25 Speaker 2: The thing in the White House.

7:28 Speaker 1: Now, dear listeners, we come to perhaps the strangest haunting

7:31 Speaker 1: in the entire White House the thing. Between nineteen eleven

7:36 Speaker 1: and nineteen twelve, staff members began reporting something unseen, a

7:41 Speaker 1: presence that would press lightly on their shoulders, as if

7:44 Speaker 1: someone tall were peering over them. They described a feeling

7:48 Speaker 1: of cold curiosity, and then nothing. Soon rumors spread, maids

7:54 Speaker 1: refused to go into certain rooms alone, Butler's claimed to

7:58 Speaker 1: see a boy with messy hair and sad blue eyes

8:01 Speaker 1: darting through the halls. One maid, Florence Marsh, swore she

8:06 Speaker 1: saw him standing by the staircase one morning, pale, silent,

8:11 Speaker 1: watching her, before vanishing. When President William Howard Taft caught

8:16 Speaker 1: wind of the hysteria, he ordered everyone to stop talking

8:19 Speaker 1: about it. No ghosts in my administration, he said, firmly,

8:24 Speaker 1: But privately, he reportedly told his military aid to find

8:28 Speaker 1: out what in the devil they're seeing. No answer, ever, came.

8:33 Speaker 1: After nineteen twelve, the sighting stopped, but even now staff

8:37 Speaker 1: occasionally mention a strange sense of being watched in the

8:40 Speaker 1: West Wing corridors late at night, a feeling that something

8:43 Speaker 1: is almost there.

8:45 Speaker 2: What was it?

8:46 Speaker 1: A trick of light, collective imagination, the ghost of Willie

8:50 Speaker 1: Lincoln playing hide and seek? Or maybe and this is

8:54 Speaker 1: my favorite theory. The thing is the White House itself

8:58 Speaker 1: a living, breathing memory of power and consequence, because after

9:02 Speaker 1: two centuries of triumph, tragedy, and laundry, maybe the House

9:07 Speaker 1: doesn't just remember. Maybe it observes every era leaves a

9:12 Speaker 1: fingerprint on that building, every choice, every laugh, every secret.

9:18 Speaker 1: The White House isn't haunted because it's old. It's haunted

9:21 Speaker 1: because it's alive with history. And that history has a

9:24 Speaker 1: way of walking the halls when the lights go out.

9:27 Speaker 1: So next time you see a shadow move in a

9:29 Speaker 1: photo from the Lincoln Bedroom, or you hear music in

9:32 Speaker 1: an empty hall, or you get the sudden urge to

9:34 Speaker 1: knock on a locked door, remember you're in good company. Presidents, first, ladies, soldiers, children,

9:41 Speaker 1: They all left something behind. I'm Amy and this has

9:45 Speaker 1: been the Strange History podcast Things that Go Bump at

9:49 Speaker 1: sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue. If you enjoyed our little ghost tour, subscribe,

9:55 Speaker 1: leave a review, and maybe send a candle to the

9:57 Speaker 1: Lincoln bedroom. He's been working late for one hundred and

10:00 Speaker 1: sixty years. Good Night, dear listeners, and if you ever

10:04 Speaker 1: get invited to stay overnight at the White House, keep

10:07 Speaker 1: your slippers by the bed. You never know who'll be

10:10 Speaker 1: walking past your door.