Ira Wertenteil chooses to believe the Peabody-Whitehead Mansion has no ghostly grudge against him. Still, he prefers the idea of ghosts terrorizing him to the idea of being punished by God for some crime he’s oblivious to.

“I started this project a healthy human being,” said the 65-year-old developer, also a globe-trotting mountain climber who describes himself as an art- and architecture-school dropout (later attending University of Colorado Business School).

Wertenteil bought and began renovating the Queen Anne-style Victorian mansion at 1128 Grant St., in Denver, with his wife Cindy Powders 12 years ago. Since then, he’s been haunted by health problems.

“My hands and feet started withering away,” he said. “Then we learned my spine had completely fused, although that had been probably

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