A Storied Address
Older than the courthouse across the street, and it has the stories to prove it.
Auburn, California · Since about 1870
Before Oakhouse
Before it was a restaurant, it was a home.
In more than 150 years, this house has been a family home, a law office and more than one restaurant. It has been remodeled top to bottom, and it still sits right where it started, facing the courthouse on Maple Street.
The Chapters
The plaque out front says John Mills White, a blacksmith, built the house in 1870 for his family. The Auburn Historical Society put it there in 1980.
A 2015 history in the Placer Herald, built on county records, tells it differently. By that account the house may be a decade older, its first owner was Walter B. Lyon, the county recorder who also ran the Placer Weekly Argus, and White took it over in 1875. Either way, the blacksmith gave the house its name. Auburn has called it the White House ever since.
Across Maple Street, the domed Placer County Courthouse opened in 1898. By then the house had been watching that corner for more than twenty years.
In December 1977 the City Council made it the first designated Auburn Historical Building. It still heads the city's Register of Historic Places.
Bay Doro Properties restored the house in 1980, and the Auburn Historical Society set the plaque that July.
A restaurant opened here in 1991, and before long the staff were trading ghost stories. More on those below.
Same address, same view of the courthouse, and a wine list John White never had.
Legends of the House
Every old house collects a few. These ones made the paper.
Servers at the restaurant here would walk past a section, sure a woman in a shawl was sitting there, and go tell a coworker. By the time they came back, nobody was.
Auburn Journal, 2006In 2006 a paranormal investigator walked the upstairs dining room with a heat meter. In the corner by the original front entrance, the temperature dropped. There's definitely something here,
he said. After the remodel, nobody can say exactly where that corner is now.
The owner at the time admitted that when a TV station called asking about a ghost, he kind of made up a story.
Then the investigator found his cold spot. It's kind of funny
it turned out to be real.
Believe what you like. Dinner is at five.
The Story Continues
A tunnel to the courthouse, a basement with a past, and a ghost hunter who came up empty. The Lounge has the rest of the story.
