What do you think?
Rate this book
Captive of the Labyrinth: Sarah L. Winchester, Heiress to the Rifle Fortune, Revised and Updated Edition
Captive of the Labyrinth is reissued here to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the death of rifle heiress Sarah L. Winchester in 1922. After inheriting a vast fortune upon the death of her husband in 1881, Winchester purchased a simple farmhouse in San José, California. She built additions to the house and continued construction for the next twenty years. When neighbors and the local press could not imagine her motivations, they invented fanciful ones of their own. She was accused of being a ghost-obsessed spiritualist, and to this day it is largely believed that the extensive construction she executed on her San José house was done to thwart death and appease the spirits of those killed by the Winchester rifle.
Author and historian Mary Jo Ignoffo’s definitive biography unearths the truth about this reclusive eccentric, revealing that she was not a maddened spiritualist driven by remorse but an intelligent, articulate woman who sought to protect her private life amidst the chaos of her public existence and the social mores of the time. The author takes readers through Winchester’s several homes, explores her private life, and, by excerpting from personal correspondence, one learns the widow’s true priority was not dissipating her fortune on the mansion in San José but endowing a hospital to eradicate a dread disease.
Sarah Winchester has been exploited for profit for over a century, but Captive of the Labyrinth finally puts to rest the myths about this American heiress, and, in the process, uncovers her true legacies.
Author and historian Mary Jo Ignoffo’s definitive biography unearths the truth about this reclusive eccentric, revealing that she was not a maddened spiritualist driven by remorse but an intelligent, articulate woman who sought to protect her private life amidst the chaos of her public existence and the social mores of the time. The author takes readers through Winchester’s several homes, explores her private life, and, by excerpting from personal correspondence, one learns the widow’s true priority was not dissipating her fortune on the mansion in San José but endowing a hospital to eradicate a dread disease.
Sarah Winchester has been exploited for profit for over a century, but Captive of the Labyrinth finally puts to rest the myths about this American heiress, and, in the process, uncovers her true legacies.
332 pages, Paperback
Published September 5, 2022
1 person is currently reading
11 people want to read
About the author
Mary Jo Ignoffo
12 books8 followersMary Jo Ignoffo, author of Captive of the Labyrinth: Sarah L. Winchester, Heiress to the Rifle Fortune, available from the University of Missouri Press, is a historian committed to reaching beyond academia to present history to the public through exhibits, books, articles, lectures and forums.
The Chicago-born, Los Angeles-raised, longtime resident of the San Francisco Bay Area has spent much of the last twenty years researching and writing about California and community history. Her work with museums includes the permanent outdoor Orchard Heritage Park Interpretive Exhibit in Sunnyvale, California and permanent and changing exhibits at Heritage Park Museum, also in Sunnyvale. She has been curator for more than ten installations at the California History Center at De Anza College in Cupertino, and historian and author for the 2010 exhibit on Sarah Winchester at the Los Altos History Museum in Los Altos, California.
Her Gold Rush Politics (2000) is a detailed narrative about Californias first legislature convened in 1849 as the Gold Rush erupted, and as people in California waited on the U.S. Congress to admit the territory as the nations thirty-first state. This publication was sponsored by the California State Senate as its Sesquicentennial Project, celebrating Californias 150 years of statehood, and earned Ignoffo a Resolution from the California State Legislature. Ignoffos articles have appeared in the San Jose Mercury News, Santa Clara Magazine, and The Californian. She has been interviewed for documentaries including Sunnyvale Voices, a film compilation of stories about the defense and agricultural industries in California, and Million Dollar Dirt about the demise of farmland in the San Francisco Bay Area. Ignoffo has worked as a preservation consultant, participating in surveys of historic buildings undertaken in compliance with Californias Office of Historic Preservation.
Mary Jo Ignoffo teaches U.S. history and topics in California history at De Anza College in Cupertino, California. She resides in Santa Clara with her husband and two children.
"
The Chicago-born, Los Angeles-raised, longtime resident of the San Francisco Bay Area has spent much of the last twenty years researching and writing about California and community history. Her work with museums includes the permanent outdoor Orchard Heritage Park Interpretive Exhibit in Sunnyvale, California and permanent and changing exhibits at Heritage Park Museum, also in Sunnyvale. She has been curator for more than ten installations at the California History Center at De Anza College in Cupertino, and historian and author for the 2010 exhibit on Sarah Winchester at the Los Altos History Museum in Los Altos, California.
Her Gold Rush Politics (2000) is a detailed narrative about Californias first legislature convened in 1849 as the Gold Rush erupted, and as people in California waited on the U.S. Congress to admit the territory as the nations thirty-first state. This publication was sponsored by the California State Senate as its Sesquicentennial Project, celebrating Californias 150 years of statehood, and earned Ignoffo a Resolution from the California State Legislature. Ignoffos articles have appeared in the San Jose Mercury News, Santa Clara Magazine, and The Californian. She has been interviewed for documentaries including Sunnyvale Voices, a film compilation of stories about the defense and agricultural industries in California, and Million Dollar Dirt about the demise of farmland in the San Francisco Bay Area. Ignoffo has worked as a preservation consultant, participating in surveys of historic buildings undertaken in compliance with Californias Office of Historic Preservation.
Mary Jo Ignoffo teaches U.S. history and topics in California history at De Anza College in Cupertino, California. She resides in Santa Clara with her husband and two children.
"
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
No one has reviewed this book yet.