The Whittier Mansion: The Pacific Heights Sandstone Castle That Became a Nazi Consulate

The Nob Hill Gazette calls it one of the oddest buildings in Pacific Heights. The house at 2090 Jackson St., on the corner of Laguna Street, is very different: four floors of red Arizona sandstone with twin curved towers.

A paint fortune in stone

The mansion was built between 1894 and 1896 for William Franklin Whittier. The Nob Hill Gazette says he founded the paint maker Whittier, Fuller & Company, later Fuller O'Brien Paints. Wikipedia says the architect was Edward R. Swain and that the house has 30 rooms, steel-reinforced brick walls and one of the first residential elevators in San Francisco, installed in 1895.

The Gazette describes the style as Richardsonian Romanesque, named for Boston architect Henry Hobson Richardson. It says each of the four floors is about 3,500 square feet.

The Nazi consulate

All three sources agree that in April 1941 the house was bought for $44,000 to serve as Nazi Germany's consulate in San Francisco. The consul was Fritz Wiedemann. The Gazette says he had been Adolf Hitler's commanding officer in World War I and later his aide. Wikipedia, citing contemporary San Francisco Chronicle reporting, says neighbors hired a lawyer to fight the move before the Planning Commission, which never ruled.

The consulate didn't last long. The U.S. government ordered German consulates closed in the summer of 1941. Wikipedia puts the San Francisco consulate's closing at July 15, and Clio gives June 30 as the date the building was vacated. The sources also differ slightly on what came next. The Gazette says the Office of the Alien Property Custodian held the house until 1947, while Wikipedia and Clio say it was seized and later sold at auction in 1950.

Philosophers and historians

In the 1950s, philosopher and Great Books editor Mortimer Adler used the mansion for his Institute for Philosophical Research. The California Historical Society then made it its headquarters starting in 1956, and the Gazette says the society gave tours. Wikipedia lists the society's stay as 1956 to 1991. The house is a private residence again today, so it can only be seen from the sidewalk.

The mansion is a San Francisco landmark and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It's also had a reputation for ghost stories. The Gazette points to a 1989 book, Haunted Houses USA, which speculated that the ghost is Whittier's son Billy. It's a short walk from Alta Plaza Park and the Haas-Lilienthal House.