Villa Montezuma

Villa Montezuma was built in 1887 for Jesse Shepard, a pianist and singer who claimed that the spirits of great composers played through him at séance-like concerts, and who later wrote under the name Francis Grierson. He left San Diego after only a couple of years. Shepard died in Los Angeles in 1927, poor, at the keyboard during a benefit concert given in his honour. The house, with its towers and stained-glass portraits of artists and musicians, is now a museum run on limited weekend tours, with restoration work begun in 2025. Visitors have described Shepard himself, and an elderly woman who once owned the house seen at a tower window, along with a strong and unwelcome sense of being watched.