When you walk through Sacramento’s Old and New Washington School historic districts on September 20, you’ll encounter more than just beautiful Queen Anne Victorian homes with their signature“wedding cake”architecture. You’ll stand in front of a house with a dark legacy—one that the current owners have decided to face head-on rather than hide.
The Dorothea Puente home on F Street is part of Preservation Sacramento’s 50th annual historic home tour, and its inclusion sparks an interesting conversation about how we preserve history, reckon with it, and ultimately move forward. Puente ran a boarding house there in the 1980s where she drugged, killed, and buried her tenants in the backyard, then collected their Social Security benefits. She died in prison at age 82. The crimes were real, the harm was profound, and the shadow they cast over that property was long.
But here’s where the story gets compelling. When the current owners—the aunt and uncle of William Burg, president of Preservation Sacramento’s, friend—first bought the house, they considered concealing its history entirely. That changed the moment a tour bus pulled up and visitors began photographing the property. They realized they couldn’t escape the legacy, but they could reframe it. What stands today is, according to Burg, a“loving family home”that’s been restored and integrated back into the fabric of the neighborhood.
That tension—between dark history and present-day redemption—is exactly what makes this tour worth experiencing. The September 20 tour spans between 12th and 19th streets and C and H streets, featuring four historic homes and two commercial buildings not normally open to the public. All four homes represent the Queen Anne Victorian style popular from the 1880s through the early 20th century. The tour also highlights the first mural created by the Royal Chicano Air Force collective, layering multiple chapters of Sacramento’s story into a single afternoon.
The broader point Burg emphasizes—the potential of these places—resonates far beyond real estate. It’s about acknowledging what happened, refusing to pretend it didn’t, and then choosing to build something better. The Puente house isn’t whitewashed or forgotten. It’s a home where a family lives, where life happens, where the neighborhood reclaims space from tragedy.
Tickets cost $30 for members and $40 for the general public. The tour runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. If you’ve driven past these homes your whole life and wondered what’s inside, this is your chance—and it’s a reminder that Sacramento’s architecture holds stories worth understanding, even the hard ones.
About the Author
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson is a contributor to LocalBeat, covering local news and community stories.
