Dear 'Ghost Lab': Do an Episode on the Leonis Adobe!

Next Wednesday, I'll be sitting down with Brad and Barry Klinge, paranormal investigators featured in Discovery Channel's Ghost Lab, to pitch them the merits of an episode filmed at our historic landmark, one of the most haunted houses in Los Angeles County, the Leonis Adobe.

Thanks to my connections as an entertainment writer and ties with the Discovery Channel, I want to help shine a light on our town's most historic site.

Calabasas has an amazing, blood soaked history thanks to Miguel Leonis, the Basque born King of Calabasas who stood 6 feet 4 inches tall and had piercing green-eyes, a bona fide Al Swearingen-type (Deadwood) terrorizing Los Angelenos passing through our fair city en route to Ventura or the Malibu shoreline.

The Leonis Adobe House was built in 1844, and is one of the oldest structures still viable in the area. It sits squarely in Old Town Calabasas, and was registered in the The National Register of Historic Places in 1975, and now serves as a museum with docents and tours.

The Texas brothers and their paranormal investigative team have recently tackled the home of Fall River, Massachusetts' infamous Lizzie Borden, the alleged famous "40 Whacks" killer of her father and stepmother. 

This season, the brothers head to spirit-rich Gettysburg, the site of Brad's first paranormal experience that sparked his and his brother's interest in investigating these phenomena. The team will also take on the icy depths of Lake Superior, where shipwrecks may have spirits lurking in watery graves, and later in the season, Brad and Barry head to gun-blazing Deadwood . . . where they may have to face down the ghost of Wild Bill Hickok.

But the spirit of Espiritu Chijulla, Leonis' hard-pressed Indian wife, is waiting for them at our Leonis Adobe, the perfect Halloween tour for those who like this sort of thing. This house is where her trapped spirit allegedly roams.

Miguel Leonis acquired the adobe in the mid 1800s. The story goes that Miguel purchased half of the property from the owner, but the rest of the property was had by a strategic marriage to Espiritu, who had inherited the Rancho El Escorpion upon the death of her husband. She was the daughter of the former mission Indian Chief Oden.  

Leonis, born in France in the Basque region, ruled his little fiefdom from the Leonis Adobe with a small army (reportedly over 100) of Indian and Mexican henchman.

He died in 1889 when he was killed after suffering from injuries received when he was run over by his own wagon wheel, (Karma wheel?)

The couple were married, yet no record of a marriage taking place between the two was found.  Despite this they affirmed their contractual marriage in court in testimony during the many land dispute cases involving Leonis, to his benefit.

Leonis was by many accounts a very bad husband, who treated Espiritu more like a servant than a wife, and together they had a daughter, Marcellina, who died tragically at age 20. Some say her ghost roams the Adobe, too.

After Leonis' death, his siblings warred in court over the estate. The conditions of poverty that she endured at times were Dickensian in austerity, and her mistreatment by Leonis family was horrific.  Espiritu fought for fifteen years to finally win her homestead, where she died in 1906.

The last of the Old West needs to be examined by Brad and Barry Klinge!  If you agree, talk back and tell us your thoughts, and if there is a any other paranormal hot bed in Calabasas they could check out too.

Ghost Lab will begin airing regularly on Thursdays at 10 p.m. beginning Oct. 21.