Preston Castle was built to reform boys who had “gone astray.”

Completed in 1894 as the Preston School of Industry in Ione, California, the institution promised discipline, structure, and rehabilitation. What unfolded inside its stone walls was far more complicated — and far more troubling.

Boys were subjected to rigid control, isolation, forced labor, and documented abuse. In 1950, sixteen-year-old William “Billy” Gonsalves died after being beaten by staff. That same year, head housekeeper Anna Corbin was murdered on the grounds. Her accused killer, Eugene Monroe, was tried three times for her death.

Today, Preston Castle stands weathered and partially restored — its structure aging much like the system it once represented.

In this episode of Hunted & Haunted: Evidence & Echoes, we examine the history, the documented violence, and the lingering atmosphere that keeps this location on every haunted list in Northern California.

We don’t tell these stories for spectacle.
We tell them because real people lived here.
Real people suffered here.
And real people deserve to be remembered by name.

Preston Castle
Preston School of Industry
Ione California
Haunted California
Haunted Locations
California History
Reform Schools
Institutional Abuse History
William Billy Gonsalves
Anna Corbin
Eugene Monroe
Haunted Reform School
True Crime Podcast
Paranormal Podcast
Historic Prisons
Abandoned Institutions
Evidence and Echoes
Hunted and Haunted
Northern California History
Haunted Places Documentary