Published January 12, 2006

Ask those who know Sonoma’s Bartholomew Park Winery whether the place harbors an ethereal connection between ghosts, wine and wayward women, and they will tell you it certainly does.

Throughout its unique history, the 680-acre property (which from 1945 to 1947 housed the Sonoma Valley Community Hospital) has been host to a series of unusual enterprises and personalities. These included Kate Johnson, who owned the property in the late 1800s, grew grapes, and shared the place with 200 angora cats.
But one of the strangest endeavors happened during the 1920s when the state purchased the picturesque estate, and opened the State Farm for Delinquent Women — essentially a penitentiary for so-called “wild women.”

“They were sentenced for petty crimes, mainly prostitution,” explains Bartholomew Park tasting room manager Kathy Kennett as she walks through the small museum leading from the winery tasting room. The room displays a number of exhibits, including original newspaper clips about the controversial institution. “They were sent here to work on the farm.”

In 1921, the facility opened with a single prisoner, a “drug victim” named Betty Carey, from the Tenderloin district of San Francisco. Judges in San Francisco then began sentencing more ladies. Fallen women and flapper-types, prostitutes, alcoholics and girls accused of petty theft all were sent to the Sonoma institution. The aim was to make the women work on the farm, live an outdoor life, and become more self-supporting.

The League of Women Voters and the Women’s Christian Temperance Union applauded the institution as a socially progressive project intended to bring these urban “sisters of sin” out into the fresh Sonoma country air and teach them about poultry husbandry, raising rabbits, and milking goats.

The facility was controversial from the start.

“The Sonoma Valley neighbors hated it,” says Kennett. Detractors in the small community complained that the institution’s presence was conspicuous, had a bad influence, and was a menace to Sonoma Valley. One Glen Ellen resident protested, saying she would prefer to see the women rehabilitated in Los Angeles.

Concurrently, the local press of the time accused the inmates of being pampered and living a luxurious life, complete with electricity and other modern conveniences, instead of being locked away in a real jail where they deserved to be.

But reports show these city women hated their bucolic surroundings and were resentful of this demeaning attempt at their rehabilitation. Riots were common, women constantly tried to escape, and local law enforcement officers were forever rounding them up and taking them back.

One inmate felt that she was treated so badly by the community and scorned by the local press that she petitioned a judge to be transferred to an urban prison, complaining, “What awful, narrow-minded people are in the beautiful Sonoma Valley.”

Then, in 1923, the institution mysteriously burned down. No motive or suspect was ever identified, although the unofficial cause was a defective chimney flue. There were rumors of arson on the part of resentful inmates, and counter-rumors that some of the outraged townsfolk had started the blaze.

“Local flavor has it that it was set afire to get people out,” says Kennett.
All 65 inmates were gathered up and transferred to various state facilities. The State Farm for Delinquent Women was finally deemed a failure, never to be reintroduced.
However, over the years, people who work in the building have reported strange happenings, and eerie sounds in the cellars. According to some, it’s the unearthly presence of those past prisoners.

“We hear them singing,” former Bartholomew Park Winery Promotions Director Meg Scantlebury said in a 1996 interview with the Sonoma County Independent. “Late at night, sometimes in the afternoon. We will know, for certain, that no one is down there, and then they start. Hymns usually.”

A decade later, Kennett says weird occurrences, such as bottles smashing by themselves and water being turned on in areas of the winery when no one is there, continue on a regular basis.

Most recently, says Kennett, a tourist from upstate New York came by to do some wine tasting and immediately complained of feeling a strange presence nearby.
“It was likely to be Madeleine,” Kennett explains.

Apparently, some time after the mysterious fire, the remains of a woman were found underneath the rubble. Dental records identified her as a nurse named Madeleine who worked at the facility.

Apparently Madeleine won’t leave the premises.
“She has shown herself to the cellar crew,” says Kennett. “She appears in starched whites and a big white hat.”

The winery’s cabernet sauvignon-merlot blend is named “Apparition” in her honor.

Kennett says research shows that nurse Madeleine was not well-liked among the female inmates.
“It’s not clear whether she died in the fire or before,” she muses. “But we think she’s still here... I want to free Madeleine and let her go; I think she’s stuck.”
With this aim, Kennett is organizing an unusual wine tasting event to be held March 24 from 5 to 8 p.m. “Sip, Séance and Psychics: An Evening of Connection” will cost $20, including wine, nibbles and private consultations with psychics.

“We’ll have tarot card reading, séances, Ouija board, the whole gamut,” promises Kennett.

And Madeleine is invited.

Bartholomew Park Winery, 1000 Vineyard Lane, Sonoma. (707) 935-9511.