74-396: Rose Mackenberg (July 10, 1892 – April 10, 1968) was an American investigator specializing in fraudulent psychic mediums , known for her association with Harry Houdini . She was chief of a team of undercover investigators who investigated mediums for Houdini in the 1920s. After Houdini's death, she continued to investigate spiritualist fraud for over 20 years and was known as an expert on
148-527: A "spirit-hand" was a false limb attached on the end of the medium Daniel Dunglas Home 's arm. Merrifield also claimed to have observed Home use his foot in the séance room. The poet Robert Browning and his wife Elizabeth attended a séance on 23, July 1855 in Ealing with the Rymers. During the séance a spirit face materialized which Home claimed was the son of Browning who had died in infancy. Browning seized
222-436: A 2019 television segment on Last Week Tonight featuring prominent purported mediums including Theresa Caputo , John Edward , Tyler Henry , and Sylvia Browne , John Oliver criticized the media for promoting mediums because this exposure convinces viewers that such powers are real, and so enable neighborhood mediums to prey on grieving families. Oliver said "...when psychic abilities are presented as authentic, it emboldens
296-583: A Senate committee that Watson was also a member of the Ku Klux Klan . The Democrats swept both Congress and the presidency in the election of 1932 , and Watson lost his Senate seat in a landslide defeat. Following the election, however, Watson remained a fixture of the Washington scene, practicing law and trading stories with his former colleagues in the Republican cloakroom. He also retained, to
370-464: A connecting ledge between two iron balconies. The psychologist and psychical researcher Stanley LeFevre Krebs had exposed the Bangs Sisters as frauds. During a séance he employed a hidden mirror and caught them tampering with a letter in an envelope and writing a reply in it under the table which they would pretend a spirit had written. The British materialization medium Rosina Mary Showers
444-423: A fascinating application of psychology and not the existence of paranormal abilities. In a series of experiments holding fake séances, (Wiseman et al . 2003) paranormal believers and disbelievers were suggested by an actor that a table was levitating when, in fact, it remained stationary. After the seance, approximately one third of the participants incorrectly reported that the table had moved. The results showed
518-477: A greater percentage of believers reporting that the table had moved. In another experiment the believers had also reported that a handbell had moved when it had remained stationary and expressed their belief that the fake séances contained genuine paranormal phenomena. The experiments strongly supported the notion that in the séance room, believers are more suggestible than disbelievers for suggestions that are consistent with their belief in paranormal phenomena. In
592-441: A hearing aid she didn't need. Her very detailed written reports for Houdini have been studied and exhibited in museums. Mackenberg appeared on stage with Houdini in many tour stops, including Indianapolis , Worcester , Mass. Washington, D.C. Chicago , New York and Montreal . When Houdini performed in each city, he would debunk local mediums from the stage, presenting the gathered evidence. Houdini and his investigators became
666-411: A large sum of money to a "Spiritualistic College to Educate Mediums" at Lily Dale, New York , a famous camp and meeting place for spiritualists. The state of Pennsylvania sought to invalidate the will, in part on the argument that the bequest would benefit criminal behavior and thus would be "against public policy". Mackenberg was called as the "star witness" and the state was successful at trial. The case
740-411: A lesser degree, his power over Indiana politics. Wendell Willkie , a Republican convert and fellow Hoosier , could attest that Watson's support, or lack thereof, meant everything in the state. When Willkie ran for president in 1940, Watson would not endorse the former Democrat. Reportedly, he justified his refusal by saying, "I may welcome a repentant sinner into my church, but I wouldn't want him to lead
814-503: A medium is doing a "reading" for a particular person, that person is known as the "sitter". In the 1860s and 1870s, trance mediums, also known as trance speakers, were very popular; this allowed female adherents, many who had strong interests in social justice, to speak in public in an era where doing so went against existing social norms. Many trance mediums delivered passionate speeches on abolitionism , temperance , and women's suffrage . Scholars have described Leonora Piper as one of
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#1732793551153888-676: A prominent figure on Capitol Hill. Among other pursuits, he was a lobbyist for the American Manufacturers Association . While detractors, including members of the House, questioned the propriety of his new occupation, the criticism did not hurt his political standing in Indiana. In fact, he became known as an Indiana boss, and state politicians sought his endorsement as a necessary precursor to winning elections or appointments to higher office. In 1916, Watson entered
962-594: A series of articles on the "ghost racket," which were serialized in newspapers in 1929 and posthumously anthologized and re-published in 2016. A manuscript titled So You Want to Attend a Seance? gathered these reports, but the manuscript itself has never been published. She also assisted with investigations which were published in major media outlets such as Popular Science , The Chicago Tribune and The Saturday Evening Post . She appeared on television talk shows including Mike and Buff and Tonight Starring Steve Allen . She remained single and continued to live in
1036-537: A showgirl named Alberta Chapman. Men on the team included Clifford M. Eddy, Jr. , Robert H. Gysel , and Amadeo Vacca. While Houdini was on tour in 1925 and 1926, Mackenberg and the other investigators would precede him by up to 10 days into each city to perform undercover investigations of the local spiritualists or psychic mediums. To remain undercover, they used various disguises and false names, some of them containing puns like "Frances Raud" (for FRAUD ) and "Alicia Bunck" (for All Is A Bunk ). Mackenberg sometimes wore
1110-463: A trial Monck was convicted for his fraudulent mediumship and was sentenced to three months in prison. In 1876, William Eglinton was exposed as a fraud when the psychical researcher Thomas Colley seized a "spirit" materialization in his séance and cut off a portion of its cloak. It was discovered that the cut piece matched a cloth found in Eglinton's suitcase . Colley also pulled the beard off
1184-477: A vast underworld of unscrupulous vultures, more than happy to make money by offering an open line to the afterlife, as well as many other bullshit services." From its earliest beginnings to contemporary times, mediumship practices have had many instances of fraud and trickery. Séances take place in darkness so the poor lighting conditions can become an easy opportunity for fraud. Physical mediumship that has been investigated by scientists has been discovered to be
1258-483: A very serious scientific interest in the work of medium Eusapia Palladino . Other prominent adherents included journalist and pacifist William T. Stead (1849–1912) and physician and author Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930). After the exposure of the fraudulent use of stage magic tricks by physical mediums such as the Davenport Brothers and the Bangs Sisters , mediumship fell into disrepute. However,
1332-597: Is known as channeling . Belief in psychic ability is widespread despite the absence of empirical evidence for its existence. Scientific researchers have attempted to ascertain the validity of claims of mediumship for more than one hundred years and have consistently failed to confirm them. As late as 2005, an experiment undertaken by the British Psychological Society reaffirmed that test subjects who self-identified as mediums demonstrated no mediumistic ability. Mediumship gained popularity during
1406-545: Is played by fraud in spiritualistic practices, both in the physical and psychical, or automatic, phenomena, but especially in the former. The frequency with which mediums have been convicted of fraud has, indeed, induced many people to abandon the study of psychical research, judging the whole bulk of the phenomena to be fraudulently produced. In Britain, the Society for Psychical Research has investigated mediumship phenomena. Critical SPR investigations into purported mediums and
1480-399: Is the practice of purportedly mediating communication between familiar spirits or spirits of the dead and living human beings. Practitioners are known as "mediums" or "spirit mediums". There are different types of mediumship or spirit channelling , including séance tables , trance , and ouija . The practice is associated with spiritualism and spiritism . A similar New Age practice
1554-440: The 56th Congress and reelected to the 57th , 58th , 59th and 60th Congresses (1899–1909). Shortly after his arrival in Washington, Watson became the "right-hand man" and protégé of Speaker Joe Cannon . Cannon ensured his selection as the Republican whip , trusted him with party strategy in the House of Representatives, and placed him on the powerful Ways and Means Committee . While Cannon had his share of adversaries in
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#17327935511531628-409: The U.S. Senate race against Democratic Senator John W. Kern , but his bitter primary battle against Harry S. New threatened to divide the state Republican party. Watson won the majority of primary delegates, but according to one source, New had "convincing affidavits of fraud" committed by Watson. As a result, Republican leaders could not decide which candidate to support. They were saved from making
1702-537: The Winchester Herald . At the age of twelve, Watson accompanied his father to the 1876 Republican National Convention . Watson attended DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana and graduated in 1886. At DePauw he was a member of Phi Kappa Psi fraternity. He then studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1886 and joined his father's law firm. Watson campaigned for Republican candidates throughout
1776-404: The "materialization" and discovered it to be the bare foot of Home. To make the deception worse, Browning had never lost a son in infancy. Browning's son Robert in a letter to The Times , December 5, 1902, referred to the incident "Home was detected in a vulgar fraud." The researchers Joseph McCabe and Trevor H. Hall exposed the " levitation " of Home as nothing more than his moving across
1850-638: The "products of the medium's own psychological dynamics." A fraudulent medium may obtain information about their sitters by secretly eavesdropping on sitter's conversations or searching telephone directories, the internet and newspapers before the sittings. A technique called cold reading can also be used to obtain information from the sitter's behavior, clothing, posture, and jewellery. The psychologist Richard Wiseman has written: Cold reading also explains why psychics have consistently failed scientific tests of their powers. By isolating them from their clients, psychics are unable to pick up information from
1924-418: The 1880s and moved to Rushville, Indiana in 1893. He was elected as U.S. Representative from Indiana's 4th congressional district in 1894 to the 54th Congress (1895–1897), defeating the incumbent Democratic William S. Holman , in part by speaking German , the language of many of his constituents. He was defeated by Holman in 1896, but was elected from Indiana's 6th congressional district in 1898 to
1998-585: The 1920s, was among the most prominent debunkers of psychic fraud during the mid-20th century. Many 19th century mediums were discovered to be engaged in fraud . While advocates of mediumship claim that their experiences are genuine, the Encyclopædia Britannica article on spiritualism notes in reference to a case in the 19th century that "...one by one, the Spiritualist mediums were discovered to be engaged in fraud, sometimes employing
2072-721: The Biblical account of the Witch of Endor . Mediumship became quite popular in the 19th-century United States and the United Kingdom after the rise of Spiritualism as a religious movement. Modern Spiritualism is said to date from practices and lectures of the Fox sisters in New York State in 1848. The trance mediums Paschal Beverly Randolph and Emma Hardinge Britten were among the most celebrated lecturers and authors on
2146-512: The House to run for Governor of Indiana in 1908. Opposed by organized labor, he lost the election to Thomas R. Marshall , the future vice president under Woodrow Wilson . He resumed a private law practice in Rushville, though he continued to participate in Washington politics, supporting Cannon after House Democrats and Republican "insurgents" attempted to oust the speaker in 1909. The following year, Watson wrote Cannon's famous speech defending
2220-548: The House, Watson enjoyed the attention of a wide circle of friends. An enthusiastic storyteller and poker player, he attracted members from both parties. Colleagues would come to the House chamber just to hear him speak—not to be swayed by his conservative views, but to see him put on a good show. As one writer observed, Watson "would work himself up to an astonishing pitch, tear off his collar and necktie, then throw aside his coat and vest, until, clad in trousers, shirt, and suspenders, he could really let himself go." Watson left
2294-913: The New York City area in a "well lighted" apartment "because I get tired of dark rooms". Her friends called her "Mac". She died in April 1968. In 2017, Mackenberg was featured alongside Houdini in re-enactment sequences during season 14, episode 13 of the Travel Channel 's documentary series Mysteries at the Museum . The re-enactments included Mackenberg's investigations of spiritualist seances and her 1926 congressional testimony. In 2023, The Museum of Revelatory Fakes podcast produced an episode about Rose Mackenberg and Harry Houdini that features commentary by scholars Efram Sera-Shriar, Matt Tompkins, and Christine Ferguson. Mediumship Mediumship
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2368-705: The United States, Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom. In the United Kingdom, over 340 Spiritualist churches and centres open their doors to the public and free demonstrations of mediumship are regularly performed. In 1958, American Spiritualist C. Dorreen Phillips wrote of her experiences with a medium at Camp Chesterfield , Indiana : "In Rev. James Laughton's séances there are many Indians . They are very noisy and appear to have great power. [...] The little guides, or doorkeepers, are usually Indian boys and girls [who act] as messengers who help to locate
2442-528: The accusation but unofficial denials were made known in the press. Ultimately H.R. 8989 did not pass, but the hearings received wide press coverage. After Houdini's death in October 1926, Mackenberg continued to investigate fraudulent psychics for over 20 years and served as an expert on them in various venues. One court case in Pennsylvania involved the 1939 will of Augustus T. Lockwood. He had bequeathed
2516-576: The arts of the séance" by Herne and was repeatedly exposed as a fraudulent medium. The medium Henry Slade was caught in fraud many times throughout his career. In a séance in 1876 in London Ray Lankester and Bryan Donkin snatched his slate before the "spirit" message was supposed to be written, and found the writing already there. Slade also played an accordion with one hand under the table and claimed spirits would play it. The magician Chung Ling Soo revealed how Slade had performed
2590-407: The best-known forms involve a spirit purportedly taking control of a medium's voice and using it to relay a message, or where the medium simply "hears" the message and passes it on. Other forms involve materializations of the spirit or the presence of a voice, and telekinetic activity. In Spiritism and Spiritualism the medium has the role of an intermediary between the world of the living and
2664-497: The bill. Her testimony on May 18, 1926, included the revelation that Coates had told her that Senators Capper , Watson , Dill , and Fletcher "had come to her for readings" and that "table tipping seances are held at the White House" with President Coolidge and his family. This was met with raucous denials in the committee room, and a "fracas" ensued. The meeting was adjourned. President Coolidge did not officially respond to
2738-409: The brain. Physical mediumship is defined as manipulation of energies and energy systems by spirits. This type of mediumship is said to involve perceptible manifestations, such as loud raps and noises, voices, materialized objects, apports, materialized spirit bodies, or body parts such as hands, legs and feet. The medium is used as a source of power for such spirit manifestations. By some accounts, this
2812-537: The church choir." Watson is credited with originating the saying If you can't lick 'em, jine 'em . Watson died in 1948 in Washington D.C. at the age of 83. Dr. Frederick Brown Harris, the former Senate chaplain, performed the funeral service in Washington. Until the end, Watson remained well liked, if not well respected, by House and Senate members. Perhaps only Hoover and Willkie bore a lasting grudge against him. Indeed, even his harshest critics considered Watson
2886-559: The decision when Indiana's other senator, Benjamin F. Shiveley , died in March. Both Republican candidates ran for Senate seats in the general election. New defeated Kern, and Watson won the remainder of Shively's term. He was reelected twice (1920 and 1926), serving from 1916 to 1933. During his Senate tenure, he was In 1929, he was a defendant in a lawsuit wherein it was alleged by William M. Rogers, an avowed Klansman, that Watson had forced him to sign an affidavit recanting testimony before
2960-489: The exposure of fake mediums has led to a number of resignations by Spiritualist members. On the subject of fraud in mediumship Paul Kurtz wrote: No doubt a great importance in the paranormal field is the problem of fraud. The field of psychic research and spiritualism has been so notoriously full of charlatans, such as the Fox sisters and Eusapia Palladino –individuals who claim to have special power and gifts but who are actually conjurers who have hoodwinked scientists and
3034-513: The first session of the 69th Congress , an anti-fortunetelling law for Washington, D.C. , was put forward on the urging of Houdini. The Copeland - Bloom bill (H.R. 8989) came before a House committee beginning February 26, 1926. Houdini was to testify in its favor. Following the same pattern as during the tour, Mackenberg visited local Washington mediums in the days prior to the hearings. She targeted local mediums, including Jane B. Coates and Madam Grace Marcia, who were scheduled to testify against
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3108-532: The future. In the early 1920s, Mackenberg was working on a case for a banker who had suffered losses after making investments on the advice of a psychic medium. She sought Houdini's help in the case, as he was very publicly engaged in a campaign against false mediums. Impressed with Mackenberg, Houdini educated her on the tricks that mediums use to manipulate their victims. In 1925, Houdini hired her as part of his undercover investigator team. The team included several other women such as Houdini's niece Julia Sawyer and
3182-608: The grave. Mackenberg was among those chosen, and in 1945 she reported "the message has not come through." Because of her investigative work, Mackenberg was considered an expert on the practices of fraudulent psychics. She claimed to have investigated over 1,000 mediums and never found one who was not a fraud. For example, the various mediums had claimed to communicate with over three dozen non-existent deceased husbands, despite Mackenberg being single. According to William Lindsay Gresham , Julien Proskauer credited Mackenberg for "much of his material" in his book The Dead Do Not Talk . In
3256-429: The hypothesis that spirits speak independently of the medium, who facilitates the phenomenon rather than produces it. The role of the medium is to make the connection between the physical and spirit worlds. Trumpets are often utilised to amplify the signal, and directed voice mediums are sometimes known as "trumpet mediums". This form of mediumship also permits the medium to participate in the discourse during séances, since
3330-408: The leadership's authority, party government, and the rights of the majority. A pivotal moment in House history, the speech enabled Cannon to keep his position, but at a great reduction in power. The House adopted a resolution that prevented Cannon and subsequent speakers from serving on or appointing members to the all-important Rules Committee . In the years after the House rebellion, Watson remained
3404-460: The materialization and it was revealed to be a fake, the same as another one found in the suitcase of Eglinton. In 1880 in a séance a spirit named "Yohlande" materialized, a sitter grabbed it and was revealed to be the medium Mme. d'Esperance herself. In September 1878 the British medium Charles Williams and his fellow-medium at the time, A. Rita, were detected in trickery at Amsterdam. During
3478-634: The medium and that there was no evidence for the spirit hypothesis. The idea of mediumship being explained by telepathy was later merged into the " super-ESP " hypothesis of mediumship which is currently advocated by some parapsychologists . In their book How to Think About Weird Things: Critical Thinking for a New Age , authors Theodore Schick and Lewis Vaughn have noted that the spiritualist and ESP hypothesis of mediumship "has yielded no novel predictions, assumes unknown entities or forces, and conflicts with available scientific evidence." Scientists who study anomalistic psychology consider mediumship to be
3552-420: The medium's voice is not required by the spirit to communicate. Leslie Flint was one of the best known exponents of this form of mediumship. Senses used by mental mediums are sometimes defined differently from in other paranormal fields. A medium is said to have psychic abilities but not all psychics function as mediums. The term clairvoyance , for instance, may include seeing spirit and visions instilled by
3626-427: The modern form of the old mediumship, where the "channel" (or channeller) purportedly receives messages from "teaching-spirit", an " Ascended master ", from God , or from an angelic entity , but essentially through the filter of his own waking consciousness (or " Higher Self "). Attempts to communicate with the dead and other living human beings, aka spirits, have been documented back to early human history, such as
3700-566: The most famous trance mediums in the history of Spiritualism. Trance speakers believed that entering a trance gave them access to the spirits and, through them, to knowledge inaccessible in the waking world. Sometimes an assistant would write down the medium's words, such as in the early 20th century collaboration between the trance medium Mrs. Cecil M. Cook of the William T. Stead Memorial Center in Chicago (a religious body incorporated under
3774-457: The nineteenth century when ouija boards were used as a source of entertainment. Investigations during this period revealed widespread fraud —with some practitioners employing techniques used by stage magicians —and the practice began to lose credibility. Fraud is still rife in the medium or psychic industry, with cases of deception and trickery being discovered to this day. Several different variants of mediumship have been described; arguably
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#17327935511533848-405: The precepts of Prophecy and Healing are Divine attributes proven through Mediumship." "Mental mediumship" is communication of spirits with a medium by telepathy . The medium mentally "hears" (clairaudience), "sees" (clairvoyance), and/or feels (clairsentience) messages from spirits. Directly or with the help of a spirit guide, the medium passes the information on to the message's recipient(s). When
3922-423: The public as well–that we have to be especially cautious about claims made on their behalf. Magicians have a long history of exposing the fraudulent methods of mediumship. Early debunkers included Chung Ling Soo , Henry Evans and Julien Proskauer . Later magicians to reveal fraud were Joseph Dunninger , Harry Houdini and Joseph Rinn . Rose Mackenberg , a private investigator who worked with Houdini during
3996-560: The religion and its beliefs continue in spite of this, with physical mediumship and seances falling out of practice and platform mediumship coming to the fore. In the late 1920s and early 1930s there were around one quarter of a million practising Spiritualists and some two thousand Spiritualist societies in the UK in addition to flourishing microcultures of platform mediumship and 'home circles'. Spiritualism continues to be practised, primarily through various denominational Spiritualist churches in
4070-451: The result of deception and trickery. Ectoplasm, a supposed paranormal substance, was revealed to have been made from cheesecloth, butter, muslin, and cloth. Mediums would also stick cut-out faces from magazines and newspapers onto cloth or on other props and use plastic dolls in their séances to pretend to their audiences spirits were contacting them. Lewis Spence in his book An Encyclopaedia of Occultism (1960) wrote: A very large part
4144-486: The result of fraud and psychological factors. Research from psychology for over a hundred years suggests that where there is not fraud, mediumship and Spiritualist practices can be explained by hypnotism , magical thinking and suggestion . Trance mediumship, which according to Spiritualists is caused by discarnate spirits speaking through the medium, can be explained by dissociative identity disorder . Illusionists, such as Joseph Rinn have staged fake séances in which
4218-560: The sitters have claimed to have observed genuine supernatural phenomena. Albert Moll studied the psychology of séance sitters. According to (Wolffram, 2012) "[Moll] argued that the hypnotic atmosphere of the darkened séance room and the suggestive effect of the experimenters' social and scientific prestige could be used to explain why seemingly rational people vouchsafed occult phenomena." The psychologists Leonard Zusne and Warren Jones in their book Anomalistic Psychology: A Study of Magical Thinking (1989) wrote that spirits controls are
4292-458: The spirit friends who wish to speak with you." A spirit who uses a medium to manipulate psychic "energy" or "energy systems." In old-line Spiritualism, a portion of the services, generally toward the end, is given over to demonstrations of mediumship through purported contact with the spirits of the dead. A typical example of this way of describing a mediumistic church service is found in the 1958 autobiography of C. Dorreen Phillips. She writes of
4366-586: The spirit world. The Parapsychological Association defines "clairvoyance" as information derived directly from an external physical source. Spiritualists believe that phenomena produced by mediums (both mental and physical mediumship) are the result of external spirit agencies. The psychical researcher Thomson Jay Hudson in The Law of Psychic Phenomena (1892) and Théodore Flournoy in his book Spiritism and Psychology (1911) wrote that all kinds of mediumship could be explained by suggestion and telepathy from
4440-550: The statutes of the State of Illinois) and the journalist Lloyd Kenyon Jones . The latter was a non-medium Spiritualist who transcribed Cook's messages in shorthand . He edited them for publication in book and pamphlet form. Castillo (1995) states, Trance phenomena result from the behavior of intense focusing of attention, which is the key psychological mechanism of trance induction. Adaptive responses, including institutionalized forms of trance, are 'tuned' into neural networks in
4514-526: The subject in the mid-19th century. Allan Kardec coined the term Spiritism around 1860. Kardec wrote that conversations with spirits by selected mediums were the basis of his The Spirits' Book and later, his five-book collection, Spiritist Codification . Some scientists of the period who investigated Spiritualism also became converts. They included chemist Robert Hare , physicist William Crookes (1832–1919) and evolutionary biologist Alfred Russel Wallace (1823–1913). Nobel laureate Pierre Curie took
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#17327935511534588-469: The subject. She testified in court cases and before Congress and was interviewed in national magazines and on television. Mackenberg was born July 10, 1892, and lived in Brooklyn , New York City . In her early years she worked as a stenographer in a law office and as an investigator in New York City. She reportedly believed that psychics and fortunetellers were able to communicate with spirits and foretell
4662-473: The séance a materialized spirit was seized and found to be Rita and a bottle of phosphorus oil, muslin and a false beard were found amongst the two mediums. In 1882 C. E. Wood was exposed in a séance in Peterborough. Her Indian spirit control "Pocka" was found to be the medium on her knees, covered in muslin. James Eli Watson James Eli Watson (November 2, 1864 – July 29, 1948)
4736-540: The target of great anger from the spiritualists. It was said he carried a Derringer and he advised Mackenberg to carry a gun as well, but she refused. Mackenberg earned the respect of Houdini and his team and was considered his chief investigator. The other investigators sometimes called her "The Rev" because of the multiple bogus spiritualist diplomas and titles she had acquired during her investigations. Prior to his death, Houdini set up secret codes with more than twenty friends to attempt to communicate with them from beyond
4810-528: The techniques of stage magicians in their attempts to convince people of their clairvoyant powers." The article also notes that "the exposure of widespread fraud within the spiritualist movement severely damaged its reputation and pushed it to the fringes of society in the United States." At a séance in the house of the solicitor John Snaith Rymer in Ealing in July 1855, a sitter Frederick Merrifield observed that
4884-429: The trick. The British medium Francis Ward Monck was investigated by psychical researchers and discovered to be a fraud. On November 3, 1876, during the séance a sitter demanded that Monck be searched. Monck ran from the room, locked himself in another room and escaped out of a window. A pair of stuffed gloves was found in his room, as well as cheesecloth, reaching rods and other fraudulent devices in his luggage. After
4958-471: The tricks she had used. Frank Herne a British medium who formed a partnership with the medium Charles Williams was repeatedly exposed in fraudulent materialization séances. In 1875, he was caught pretending to be a spirit during a séance in Liverpool and was found "clothed in about two yards of stiffened muslin, wound round his head and hanging down as far as his thigh." Florence Cook had been "trained in
5032-408: The way those clients dress or behave. By presenting all of the volunteers involved in the test with all of the readings, they are prevented from attributing meaning to their own reading, and therefore can't identify it from readings made for others. As a result, the type of highly successful hit rate that psychics enjoy on a daily basis comes crashing down and the truth emerges – their success depends on
5106-474: The world of spirit. Mediums say that they can listen to and relay messages from spirits, or that they can allow a spirit to control their body and speak through it directly or by using automatic writing or drawing . Spiritualists classify types of mediumship into two main categories: "mental" and "physical": During seances, mediums are said to go into trances , varying from light to deep, that permit spirits to control their minds. Channeling can be seen as
5180-781: The worship services at the Spiritualist Camp Chesterfield in Chesterfield, Indiana : "Services are held each afternoon, consisting of hymns, a lecture on philosophy, and demonstrations of mediumship." Today "demonstration of mediumship" is part of the church service at all churches affiliated with the National Spiritualist Association of Churches (NSAC) and the Spiritualists' National Union (SNU). Demonstration links to NSAC's Declaration of Principal #9. "We affirm that
5254-515: Was a U.S. Representative and U.S. Senator from Indiana . He was the Senate's second official majority leader . While an article published by the Senate (see References ) gives his year of birth as 1862, this is most probably incorrect. He was born in Winchester, Indiana , one of six children. His father was a lawyer, a Republican state legislator, and owner-editor of the local newspaper,
5328-467: Was achieved by using the energy or ectoplasm released by a medium, see spirit photography . The last physical medium to be tested by a committee from Scientific American was Mina Crandon in 1924. Most physical mediumship is presented in a darkened or dimly lit room. Most physical mediums make use of a traditional array of tools and appurtenances, including spirit trumpets, spirit cabinets, and levitation tables. Direct voice communication refers to
5402-503: Was appealed, however, and overturned by higher courts. In addition to her investigations, Mackenberg attempted to educate the public on psychic fraud. She toured the country giving lectures on psychic fraud to various groups. A typical talk title was “Debunking the Ghost Racket”. These talks would include demonstrations of techniques used by psychics including spirit trumpets , table tipping , billet reading and so on. She wrote
5476-571: Was caught in many fraudulent séances throughout her career. In 1874 during a séance with Edward William Cox a sitter looked into the cabinet and seized the spirit, the headdress fell off and was revealed to be Showers. In a series of experiments in London at the house of William Crookes in February 1875, the medium Anna Eva Fay managed to fool Crookes into believing she had genuine psychic powers. Fay later confessed to her fraud and revealed
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