HGB Ep. 553 - The Hanford Bastille

Moment in Oddity - Mummified Clown (Suggested by: Savannah Marchione)

Throughout the centuries mummies have been discovered after having been mummified by environmental circumstances. However, there has also been a long history of humans mummifying their deceased for various reasons. One such mummified body is that of Achile Chatouilleu who was a circus performer that died in 1912. His clown character that he portrayed was known as "The French Tickler". Prior to his death, he told his family that he wished to be buried in his clown costume, specifically, his Shriners parade costume which he wore in the first Shriners parade. Achile's body was embalmed with arsenic and mercury. Due to that toxic combination, his body was sealed in a glass coffin which kept his body preserved, at least until June of 2022. You see, Achile had become a rental of property of sorts. The California Institute of Abnormal Arts had rented the clowns' mummified remains for many years but sadly, the location that displayed various oddities, hosted underground bands and performance artists, permanently closed on June 19, 2022. We were unable to find where Achile's body is now, however it is said that his family lives on a ranch near Yosemite National Park so he may be in residence there located in his glass coffin, looking forward to his next adventure. This may sound crass, but clown carrion, circulating entertainment venues for cash, certainly is odd.

This Month in History - Lake Nyos Explodes

In the month of August, on the 21st in 1986, Lake Nyos exploded. In all of recorded history, there have only been two exploding killer lakes and they were both in the country of Cameroon. The first occurred in 1984 at Lake Monoun which killed 37 people. The second occurred at Lake Nyos in 1986 and was more deadly. This was a limnic eruption. Also notoriously known as a 'lake overturn'. This is a unique type of natural disaster where dissolved carbon dioxide suddenly explodes from deep lake waters creating a gas cloud that asphyxiates wildlife, livestock and humans. Over three thousand animals and 1,746 villagers were killed during this event. So what exactly is an exploding killer lake? Basically, these are lakes that were formed from a hydrovolcanic eruption that created a crater in the lakes. Carbon dioxide builds up within this crater over time, just like the CO2 in a soda bottle. The water serves as a type of cap keeping the CO2 locked down, but sometimes something happens that causes that cap effect to shift. It could be an earthquake or even a monsoon-like rainstorm. In the case of Lake Nyos, it appears that a simple landslide broke the surface and released a giant cloud of carbon dioxide. It exploded upward and stripped the air of oxygen. This could have happened again but scientists discovered a way to hopefully prevent this type of disaster in the future. In 2001, French scientists installed the first degassing tube to slowly release the carbon dioxide from the lake. This is similar in theory to the burper pipes used at city dumps to release any built up methane or carbon dioxide. Two additional pipes were installed in 2011 and by 2019 it was determined that a single degassing tube would be sufficient to keep the lake explosion free.

The Hanford Bastille

The Bastille is a former jail that dates back to the Wild West and ran as a jail for nearly 70 years. The building has had many iterations after it closed as a jail. This was an art gallery, a restaurant, a bar and a nightclub. Today, it stands empty and in need of major renovations. This may or may not please the current residents of the building, the ghosts. For years, ghost stories have been told about the building. Join us as we explore the history and hauntings of the Hanford Bastille.

The Tachi Yokuts were the first to reside in the area that would become Hanford. Immigrants came and farmed the land and the settlement grew, especially after the Southern Pacific Railroad laid tracks. James Madison Hanford was the auditor for the railroad company and the town was named for him.  Most of the labor for the railroad were Chinese immigrants. James Hanford sold lots in the town and the growth continued until fires devastated Hanford in the late 1880s and early 1890s. Hanford was incorporated on August 12, 1891 to facilitate fire protection and the town became the county seat for Kings County. Growth resumed with lots of building. The only opera house between Los Angeles and San Francisco was here and a Civic Auditorium was built. Thriving towns usually find themselves dealing with crime and Kings County needed an official jail. The Bastille would become that and it resembles a small castle, so clearly it was meant to be as imposing as a smaller sized jail could be. The Bastille served as Kings County’s jail and sheriff’s office starting in 1897.

The McDougall Brothers of San Francisco designed the Bastille and it was considered state-of-the-art for the time. Frank Sharples’ Exeter Granite Company was awarded the construction contract. Something didn't bode well for the jail during construction. An associate of Sharples became disgruntled and he shot Sharples in the neck. Sharples managed to survive. The structure was hewn from solid pieces of granite that weighed around 2-tons each. The outside was overlaid with red brick and was said to be so strong that no jail break was possible. Jail cells were made from steel and there was a capacity of up to 60 inmates. The general population was kept on the first floor, while inmates thought to be insane were kept on the second floor. That only lasted for a brief period of time and then women and children were kept on the second floor. So all ages and genders were in the Bastille. A jail matron was introduced to the jail in 1917. Her name was Louise Gerrebrands and she was actually the wife of the sheriff. She was paid 25 cents per hour.  

For those first couple of decades, the Bastille was well maintained under the Gerrebrands. Then Sheriff Charles Gerrebrand retired in 1920 and things went downhill for the jail. By 1922, a jail that was meant for 60 inmates, had 260 inmates and conditions became horrible, especially for females who were incarcerated. Several of them were assaulted by both male inmates and guards. Children were abused. Several grand juries convened to try to decide what to do to improve the jail. An addition with more cells was suggested after one, but this never came to fruition. Another ordered improvements to the sanitary conditions. And again, nothing came of this. There were at least three suicides at the jail that we'll talk about later. Another inmate who tried to off himself was John Brown. Sheriff William Buckner unlocked the door to Brown's cell and Brown made a mad dash towards the steel bars of his cell and knocked himself silly, gashing his head open to the skull. A physician stitched him up and then he was strapped to a cot to keep him from doing any more self-harm. Another horrifying incident here at the jail took place in April of 1962. A Hanford laborer named John Holloman was serving a six -day sentence for public intoxication when his delirium tremens from alcohol detox got the best of him and he slashed at his throat and the inside of his arm with a razor blade. He fortunately survived and would be the last suicide attempt before the jail closed two years later. 

The Bastille was closed in 1964, but it wouldn't sit empty for long. The jail's next iteration would be as The Bastille Gallery, which was Kings County's Museum of Art. It took six months to clean up the jail and to keep costs down, the walls were covered in burlap. The gallery would remain for a decade. The City of Hanford took over the property and they thought the best move forward was to demolish the building, but thankful, many residents were dismayed and formed a committee to fight any kind of demolition. This committee sought out the help of an entrepreneur who was good and saving historic structures and turning them into new businesses. In 1977, the first restaurant and bar moved into the space. Randy Shaw is the building Superintendent. The city owns the building, but nothing is being done with it at this time because it has deteriorated so bad. Renovations would take at least a million dollars and the city council recently rejected a plan to fund those renovations here in 2024.

People claim to see faces looking out of the windows and flickering light as if it is coming from candles or lantern lights. Visitors claim to have been touched on the first floor. Shadow figures were often seen in solitary confinement. An apparition of a woman in 1920s period clothing has been seen walking on the staircase. This is more than likely not the most well known female apparition at the Bastille. That would be Mary, which legends claim was an inmate who hanged herself in the upstairs portion of the jail. A Mary Fincher had been an inmate at the jail and she did die in the jail, but it was from a heart attack. There are at least three suicides in the jail that were documented. Ben Halermann hanged himself in 1940. He was proprietor of the Brunswick Barber Shop in Corcoran and had been booked for drunkenness. He used twine wrapped around a bar above his head in the cell. An inmate named John J. Alves had been arrested for the murder of his wife and child and he attempted suicide by slicing his arm with a barber's razor. He was unsuccessful that time, but later did manage to kill himself on June 15, 1937 by hanging. He wasn't quite dead yet when they cut him down, but he died later at the hospital. The sheriff's department has the razor on display with other jail artifacts. 

Another inmate who committed suicide was named Frank McMurty. A newspaper article claimed that he had been seen 20 minutes before he was found hanging. Frank's ghost is said to be at the Bastille and he was seen quickly after he died. A newspaper article reads, "Two persons who are occupying the cell in which Frank McMurty committed suicide, at the county jail, created a great deal of excitement there last night. They both claim that McMurty's ghost put in an appearance, and it was as natural as life. When Jailer Morse, who was awakened by their screams, got down to the cell and turned on the light, they were both scared white, and begged to be removed."

Betsy Lewis wrote in The Hanford Sentinel in 1982, "An unsuspecting cocktail waitress ventured up the back stairs in the dark after closing time to find some spare staples. Something resembling a haggard woman in a jail smock was sitting by the windowsill. And it moved. ‘I heard this shriek,’ recalls Jimmy Jimenez, La Bastille’s bartender and manager. ‘I thought somebody had grabbed her. But then she just flew down those stairs a minute later.’ Within seconds another waitress, who had gone to investigate, also was making tracks out the front door. Jimenez grabbed a knife and took a look for himself…but ‘it’ had gone."

Local business owner Jessica Szalai told the Hanford Sentinel in 2021, "We ate and I kept looking up to the second floor balcony. One of the servers whispered in my ear, 'Do you see it?' I was so focused on the balcony I didn’t look at the waitress I just said, 'I don’t know why I keep looking up.' I looked up and I saw a dark shadow like a silhouette of a man standing next to the rail, I was startled. The figure turned and walked right into a brick wall." This is a spot where a prisoner is believed to have hanged himself.

A cook at the Bastille was washing dishes at a sink when she saw something out of the corner of her eye. She turned and saw what she described as "kind of foggy." She couldn't see a mouth or neck, but she could see dark gray hair and two dark holes for eyes. The thing then slithered under a table. Another person described seeing Mary as gliding up a spiral staircase. Mary was in a long gown that went up her neck and was from the turn-of-the-century. By 1992, the ghost of Mary had become well known throughout the area. Seances were conducted, but without any results.

The Fresno Flyer interviewed Kaitlyn Lusk in 2022 who was the Recreational Coordinator for the Hanford Civic Center at the time. She said, "I absolutely will not come in here after dark. And I NEVER go upstairs; I just can’t do it." Lusk went on to share a time when she and a co-worker were giving a group of school chidren a tour of the Bastille. The children had just left the building and the co-worker was in a back room near the cell block when Lusk heard her screaming. Lusk ran back to the room and found her co-worker pale and shaking and the co-worker said that she felt someone she couldn't see, grab her around the neck. There was no one but the to women in the jail at the time. Lusk also told the magazine, "I’ve heard some things, like strange noises coming from upstairs when there’s nobody up there. We do have a lot of homeless people who come onto the grounds, so the first thought is that maybe someone broke in looking for a place to sleep. But, then we go to investigate and there’s nobody there."

Ghost Hunters investigated in 2023 for their episode "Dead Man Walking." It was very cool, they had Chandler Riggs of "The Walking Dead" fame join them. Victor Rosa was a former restaurant manager and he told the TAPS team that often he would have opening of closing employees claim to see something. For example, they would be downstairs cleaning and they would look up and see someone watching them from above when they were the only person in the building. Others would claim to feel as though something unseen were standing next to them. The superintendent Shaw told Jason and Steve that a bartender looked over his shoulder one night and up on the second level he saw a guard dressed in a 1920s era uniform standing there. He looked away and then thought about what he had just seen and that it wasn't possible that it was a real person and he looked back and the guard was gone.

During the investigation the heard disembodied steps on the stairs and they also heard dragging noises. They brought alcohol and cigarettes for trigger objects. They caught a voice saying something when they emptied out the Bastille. Later, with the sound amplified, the voice said, "I think they're gone." They may have debunked people seeing Mary looking out a window because part of the chandelier shows up in one of the windows and could look like a head. Steve and Tango heard disembodied footsteps made with boots in a room on the first level. Both of them later felt as though something were behind them. Tango was tapped on his back. Steve almost said, "Excuse me" when he backed up because it felt like an actual person. There was a really loud audible sound that sounded like a cupboard door closing. That was their first night of investigating.

For the second night, the Sheriff's office loaned them the razor that John Alves had attempted suicide with to use as a trigger object. They caught some really loud disembodied steps when they asked if Frank McMurty were with them. There were loud knocks captured and then there was this really loud metallic sound, which the team thought could be a big piece of metal that looked like it had been on a dust covered bench and was now on the floor. While they were talking about this, they heard a child make some kind of giggling sound that they got on the recorder. Perhaps the child was the one who dropped the piece of metal? When they tested the metal piece for the sound, it was the exact same sound. And then...the episode went off the rails because Jason brought in his daughter Satori. She and her boyfriend do this hand holding thing and go through the ABCs like table tipping. They got the letters ORVI, so I'm thinking the name is going to be Orville, but she just stops and goes, oh your fist name is Orvie? Who has ever heard of that name? Then they ask about the last name and get CL and the boyfriend goes, oh, Clyde? How do you stop after two letters? Then they asked if it was an inmate - no, then if it was someone who worked there and they got responses that led them to believe it was a sheriff. Sure enough, Jason Googles Orvie Clyde and he's in the 1940 census. Reddit called this fakery and we completely agree. Apparently this sheriff was looking for his pen and somehow they figure out to look behind a baseboard and there's an old fountain pen. We want to believe, but it just was so fake. If it wasn't, they need to hire a new video editor.

Kings County Courthouse

Right across from the Bastille is the Old Kings County Courthouse. The Kings County Courthouse was built in 1896 and designed by John Haggerty and W.H. Wilcox in the Classical Revival style. There was an expansion in 1914 and it ran as a courthouse until 1976. It was remodeled in the 1980s and now houses offices, shops and restaurants. Every year it hosts a haunted house attraction for Halloween and that is fitting as people claim that something unseen lurks here, flashing on and off lights and locking and unlocking doors.

Hanford Fox Theater

William Fox had been born in Hungary in 1879 and his family immigrated to America shortly thereafter. His family was poor and William started work early to support his family by selling candy in Central park. He also worked as a newsie. Fox started his own company in 1900 and soon turned his interest to buying theaters and eventually building them too. In 1915, he founded the Fox film Corporation and in the 1920s, he founded the Fox West Coast Theaters chain. And if you're wondering, yes, 20th Century Fox gets the Fox name from him, as does Fox News, Fox Sports and the Fox Corporation. William Fox built the Hanford Fox Theater in 1929 and it was designed as an atmospheric theater, which most of our listeners are probably familiar with. These are the theaters that tried to give the impression of being outside under a night sky with twinkling stars and a crescent moon. The rest of the decor imitated a Spanish courtyard and Greco-Roman columns supported the proscenium. The large fire-proof screen at the Hanford Theater depicts a Spanish village with cypress trees and several buildings with terra cotta roofs. The exterior is designed in a mission style with a glorious tower offset from the center. The theater was set-up for stage shows with vaudeville providing entertainment before films. Interestingly, Fox thought that the moving picture flicks were a passing fad. 

The Hanford Theater wasn't doing well after television came onto the scene and it was slated to become a cheap shoe box theater or XXX palace, but it was saved by a man named J. Daniel Humason in 1979. He was a historic preservationist and he enlisted his family to help him save the theater. They renovated it and reopened it in 1982 with 889 seats downstairs and 142 seats in the balcony, which was nicknamed the Cabaret. There are live entertainers and the occasional movie and silent film. Humason has said that he hasn't experienced any kind of ghostly activity, but the custodial staff have told him that see the apparition of an old, frail woman sitting in the balcony in seat A33. Humason finds this strange because the only death at the theater was a male projectionist in the 1940s. There is also something strange going on with a prop. Humason said, "There is something going on with this prop that was left behind - a cane that keeps moving around and being found in different places. One time it was hanging from the light fixtures, which are 20 feet high. It's most likely someone playing tricks."

Fatte Albert's Pizza Co.

Just a couple of blocks away from the Bastille is Fatte Albert's Pizza Co., which is located at 110 E. Seventh Street. The owner, Wendy Gonzales, told The Hanford Sentinel that her employees were afraid to go down into the basement and that she herself had experienced creepy things. The paper shares, "Gonzales said that one evening she was visiting with one of her friends and five of her fellow employees were working in the kitchen, when suddenly the front door of the restaurant opened and slammed shut. Footsteps could be heard across the restaurant floor, then the door to the basement opened and slammed shut and pizza boxes flew off the counter. 'There was no wind that night, and our doors cannot ‘slam' shut, because they have an apparatus that forces them to close slowly,' she said. 'When it happened, both my friend and I said ‘What in the world was that?'"

Irwin Street Inn & Restaurant

The Irwin Street Inn & Restaurant is located at 522 North Irwin Street. A family by the name of Wright built the original main house in the 1890s. In 1980, preservationist Max Walden bought the house and renovated it. Walden wasn't satisfied with just that house. He purchased several other nearby buildings, so that there were eventually four buildings in the compound. The main building was always two-story, but the other three were one-story, so they were all raised up so that the "first floors" became the "second floors." All buildings were decorated with Victorian furniture and had a stained-glass window in each room and the bathrooms featured pull-chain toilets, sinks on pedestals and claw-foot tubs. The rooms have been updated again with modern amenities like showers, televisions and WiFi. Celebrities performing at the Fox Theater like to stay here and events can be hosted like weddings and banquets.

The restaurant was owned by Frank Garcia in 2010. He had claimed that he never really experienced anything, but that people through the years claimed that there were three ghosts on the property. Guests claimed to see full-bodied apparitions in the dining area and on the second floor. Garcia said, "There was one time where we were getting strange calls from Room 101 that sounded like someone speaking in tongues. The problem was, no one was in that room; we knew that for sure." Other things that have happened include sheets getting moved around, windows being slammed shut and lamps switching themselves on and off.

The city of Hanford has some very cool historic buildings in its downtown area and a few Victorian homes. Tourists say it's a nice place to visit, especially if you are seeking ghosts. Are the Bastille and these other locations in Hanford haunted? That is for you to decide!