Buffalo Bulletin, Heritage 2019 – 39

$1.47 million in 2018 dollars.

“Apparently, there were several prominent men in town
who were building houses at the same time who had a race
to see who could build their house the quickest and the fan-
ciest,” Lara said. “I never heard who won, but the Mansion
House has certainly stood the test of time.”
After Lott’s death in 1913, his wife, Ella, opened her
home and ran a boarding house for a number of years. The
rooms housed railroad families and provided school rooms
when a local fire destroyed the schoolhouse.
In the mid 1940s, after Ella Lott’s death, the home was
locally purchased by the Young family and opened as an inn.
That original incarnation was part of the Best Western chain,
but the inn is currently operated as an independent business,
Lara said.
In 1950, the next door property across Holland Street was
renovated from a granary to a motel, to add to the number of
rooms at the Mansion House Inn, Lara said.
The Mansion House has gone through countless owners
over the years, with each making his or her own special
additions to the property – from the Melhoffs, who installed Bulletin photo by
Stephen Dow
a hot tub on the upstairs porch, to Johnnie Pond and Pam The Schuman
McFadden, who condensed existing rooms to create bigger family are
bedrooms and more bathrooms. the current
As for the Schumans, they hope to make their own stamp proprietors of
on the building while preserving what has made the Mansion the Mansion
House a Wyoming treasure. They plan to repaint the build- House Inn
ing in the near future and have eventual hopes of remodeling at 313 North
the building’s third floor, which is currently closed to the Main Street.
public.
“Buildings, like people, are living things and do change
through the generations,” Lara said. “Some changes have
had to be made to make this place comfortable for modern
visitors, but we also want to preserve the history as much as
we can because that’s what makes us special.”

Haunted (Mansion) house

The Schumans are logical people who don’t
take rumors of ghosts at the Mansion House
all that seriously. But the consistent stories
they’ve heard time and again intrigue them.
“We’ve heard from multiple people who have
seen a girl with long blonde hair and a long
white dress in a couple of the rooms upstairs,”
Paul said. “We’ve yet to see her ourselves, but
the stories have been pretty consistent.”
On another occasion, all of the Mansion
House staff and guests smelled the fumes of
burning beeswax candles in the building, Paul
said. But the source of the scent could not be
found.
“It was kind of a weird situation,” Paul said.
And the Schumans aren’t the only Mansion
House owners whose guests have experienced
spectral encounters, Lara said.
“Obviously, the previous owner (Pam
McFadden) didn’t say anything about this place
being haunted when she sold it to us,” Lara
said. “But when we told her the stories we had Bulletin courtesy photo
heard, she just lit up. She had been hearing The Mansion House Inn was built in 1903 by Dr. Howard Lott as a
the same stories from guests for years. But, home for his family and medical practice. The inn currently houses
if there is a ghost here, she seems to be a visitors to Buffalo.
friendly one, which we appreciate.”