Michael Prescott's Blog

A picture is worth a thousand words

Supporters of Scottish materialization medium Helen Duncan continue to insist that she was genuine, and have mounted an ongoing campaign to posthumously clear her name of a conviction for fraud. And it is true that Duncan did correctly reveal the sinking of the HMS Barham at a time when the ship's loss was a closely guarded state secret. Still, any claim that she had legitimate paranormal abilities must take into account the remarkably damning photographs taken by Harry Price in his 1931 investigation of the medium. Conveniently enough, all the photos are available online at one Web site.

Beginning with Plate 3, we see material extruding from Duncan's nose. This material was claimed to be ectoplasm or, as Price called it, "teleplasm." It looks indistinguishable from the lightweight, gauzy material known as cheesecloth. Plate 7 gives us a particularly clear view of the small tears in the material, which very strongly resemble tears in cheap cloth. (Sadly, I have some socks that look like this.)

We are sometimes told that it is not possible to swallow and regurgitate fine fabrics like cheesecloth and chiffon in sufficient quantities to produce a ghostly costume. Plate 9 puts the lie to this objection, showing a woman (not Helen Duncan) demonstrating how a six-foot length of cheesecloth, thirty inches wide, can be rolled up and hidden in the mouth. This amount of material weighs only 1.5 ounces.

Photo 11 is the first of a series showing what appears to be a rubber glove attached to a length of cheesecloth. The captions state that safety pins are visible, but I cannot make them out. Still, a photo of an undervest (on this page; scroll down) seized at a Duncan seance clearly shows a large number of pinholes; the shirt was apparently used to impersonate a "teleplasmic" form.

Plates 19 and 20 show Duncan producing "teleplasm" partly in the form of a girl's head. The head looks like a paper cutout, perhaps attached with another safety pin. It is reminiscent of images produced by an earlier materialization medium, Eva C.

Plates 21 and 22 give an even better view of the tears in the cheesecloth, as well as the selvedge - i.e., a hem that has been sewn up to prevent unraveling.

Plate 26 shows some "teleplasm" taken from the medium. Plate 27 (same page) shows that under a microscope the alleged "teleplasm" is virtually indistinguishable from ordinary paper.

Harry Price's firsthand account of the experiments and their aftermath is found here. Included on this page are photos of two obviously phony "spirits" who appeared at a Duncan seance, though apparently not one that Price oversaw. Although Price has a somewhat unsavory reputation for bending the truth, his account of l'affaire Duncan seems well corrobrated by the photos listed above. He includes a brief but impressive explanation of Duncan's regurgitation method, and presents the evidence for it.

Overall, I find it hard to see why, more than fifty years after her death, Helen Duncan remains a revered figure to some spiritualists. Maybe the explanation is found in the old Groucho Marx quip: "Who ya gonna believe - me or your lying eyes?"

And now for something completely different

For some reason I was thinking of an old Saturday Night Live commercial parody today. Google allowed me to find the text online. The voiceover was done by the late, great Phil Hartman.

The commercial is for a product called Happy Fun Ball, an ordinary-looking rubber ball.

Update: Wikipedia has an entry on Happy Fun Ball!

YouTube has the actual clip!

A Google search for "Happy Fun Ball" produces 113,000 hits!

And I thought I was the only one who remembered this thing.

Elevated from comments

I thought this exchange from the comments thread of the post that precedes this one was worth a post of its own.

I wrote,

... when I talk about society going downhill, I'm mainly comparing present times to the 1940s and '50s. Although there were obvious social problems back then, most notably racism, the overall social picture was considerably brighter than it is today. Compare statistics on violent crime, divorce, drug abuse, or pretty much any other measure of societal well-being.

Larry Boy responded,

But that seems to be a self-contradictory statement to me, because if you're talking about the 1940's and 50's, our worldview was *much more* materialistic back then. I don't remember the source, but I'm quite certain, for instance, that I read somewhere that belief in the paranormal was almost half as low back then (or something). Also, the prevailing psychology was behaviourism.

So where does spirituality vs. atheism enter the picture, really? All of this seems to be a cultural trend, if you ask me, not a matter of metaphysical views. Again, I ask you to consider the fact that Japan, a very materialistic and "western" society (make no mistake about it), has extremely low crime rates compared to most Western countries.

To which I said,

>if you're talking about the 1940's and 50's, our worldview was *much more* materialistic back then.

I disagree. Religion was a much bigger part of the cultural landscape in the 1940s and '50s than it is today. Look at Hollywood movies of the period. Religious values were taken for granted by most people, including many intellectuals. Today the trend is away from religion, and among intellectuals the trend is toward outright demonization of religion.

I don't think belief in the paranormal has much to do with anything. The paranormal encompasses many things. Belief in ESP or alien abductions has little to do with religious or spiritual values, or with the search for meaning in life.

I may be wrong, but I'm guessing that Larry Boy may be a little too young to remember the time period in question. I grew up in the early 1960s, just in time to catch the tail end of mid-century American culture. It was a very, very different world from the one that kids grow up in today. There were no sex ed classes for fourth graders, no DARE signs outside schools, no free access to porn for anyone with a modem (there were no modems), no R-rated TV shows, no firecrotch snapshots of teen ingenues, no lesbian kisses at awards shows, no urine-soaked cricifixes in museums, etc. The Sound of Music was a big hit movie. It was probably a more naive and more repressed era, but kids had a chance to be kids, sheltered from the darker side of life.

Now, that world is gone, and we have Columbine, Virginia Tech, millions of drug addicts, urban warfare in the inner cities, street gangs branching out into rural areas, twelve-year-olds being raped by thirteen-year-olds, crack babies, AIDS ...

Something has changed. And the pervasive sense that life has no meaning, no higher purpose, and no ultimate point is, I think, the root cause of much of this change. It's not simply a matter of believing in life after death, but believing that life continues because we have some ultimate destiny that we are meant to fulfill. This sense of personal destiny is what has given meaning to people's lives throughout history, and in its growing absence, there is a bad kind of craziness afoot in the world.

We have met the enemy

Reading Lee Child's thriller The Enemy, I came across a passage in which two brothers are discussing the death of their mother earlier that day. It encapsulates the hopelessness that often (not always) accompanies lack of any spiritual beliefs:

"Life," Joe said. "What a completely weird thing it is. A person live sixty years, does all kinds of things, knows all kinds of things, feels all kinds of things, and then it's over. Like it never happened at all."

"We'll always remember her."

"No, we'll remember parts of her. The parts she chose to share. The tip of the iceberg. The rest, only she knew about. Therefore the rest already doesn't exist. As of now."

Pretty grim, huh?

And even more so when you consider that "We'll always remember her" is a considerable overstatement. After all, "we" will die before too long also. Then who will remember her? Who will remember any of us?

I'm not saying that acceptance of the futility of life is an inevitable consequence of materialistic thinking, but it does seem to be the most common consequence. So common that in this very realistic dialogue exchange, the possibility that their mother's life might have had some higher meaning or purpose does not even come up. It is taken for granted that there is not, cannot, be any higher meaning or purpose.

Since the widespread adoption of this frame of mind in the industrialized world, we have seen the following trends:

1. greatly increased crime rates, and shocking developments in the nature of violent crime (younger and younger criminals, more sadism, serial killers);
2. greatly increased use of drugs, including powerful drugs like crack cocaine and heroin;
3. a rise in teen pregnancy;
4. a rise in sexually transmitted diseases, including AIDS;
5. increasingly violent entertainment products (movies, music, video games);
6. a sharply declining birth rate (mainly in Europe - so far);
7. increasing acceptance of euthanasia;
8. legalization of abortion on demand;
9. growing acceptance of human cloning and the creation of human-animal hybrids for experimental purposes;
10. a noticeable increase in what has been called "angst" or "malaise" or "emptiness," along with the rise of the Me Generation and "the culture of narcissism."

Is it going too far to suggest a causal relationship? Is it possible that, just as nature abhors a vacuum, human nature abhors a vacuum of meaning?

The genuine article

In the unauthorized online version of The Psychic Mafia, the self-styled Anonymous Typist adds various footnotes stating his own (highly skeptical) opinions. When the book's introduction states that there are some genuine mediums, Anonymous Typist contributes this combative comment: Name ONE!

This got me thinking. Who are some mediums I would name as genuine? The following is a partial, by no means complete, list. I am listing "mental" mediums only. I'm also listing some of the work that impresses me about each of these women (and they are all women, for some reason).

• Leonora Piper (research with Richard Hodgson, William James, and others)
• Gladys Osborn Leonard (the book and newspaper tests with Charles Drayton Thomas; the Bobby Newlove case, also with Thomas; much other research)
• Geraldine Cummins (Swan on a Black Sea)
• Margaret Verrall, Helen Verrall, Alice Kipling Fleming, Winifred Coombe-Tennant a.k.a. Winifred Willett (the cross correspondences)
• Eileen Garrett (the R-101 case)

There are others, of course. I tend to focus on those who have been the most thoroughly studied (Piper was studied continuously for twenty years!), or those who produced extraordinarily evidential material (Cummins, Garrett, the Verralls et al). None of these cases are recent; there has not been much sustained, high-quality investigation of mediums in the last few decades.

Some famous names didn't make the cut. Arthur Ford was found to have done research on his sitters. Edgar Cayce got many of his medical diagnoses uncannily right, but seems to have been way off base in his readings on history and archaeology. Emanuel Swedenborg was probably a genuine medium, but a case from the 18th century is a little too musty, even though it was well investigated at the time.

I think Pearl Curran ("Patience Worth") had genuine psi abilities, but since the earthly existence of Patience Worth was never established, it's hard to insist that she was a medium per se. Some of Jane Roberts' writings have the ring of truth to me, but again, there is no evidence for the earthly life of her principal communicator, Seth, and even Roberts herself was unsure who or what Seth was.

Any other names come to mind?

The Psychic Mafia online

Vitor Moura points out to me that, contrary to what I assumed, The Psychic Mafia is online.  It really shouldn't be; the fact that the book is out of print does not mean the copyright has lapsed. But since it's out there, I'm linking to it.

The heart of the book is Chapter 5, "Secrets of the Seance." (This link takes to you to end of Ch. 4; scroll down a few paragraphs for Ch.5.) But read the whole book for an eye-opening look at the cynicism and chicanery of far too many self-styled mediums. The bibliography is very good also.

The footnotes were added by the online version's anonymous typist. The typist is a James Randi fan and gung-ho superskeptic whose opinions are mostly irrelevant and sometimes irritating, but since these are not part of the original book, they can be easily ignored.

Gullible's travels

From Revelations of a Spirit Medium, a tell-all book by a phony 19th century medium, comes this amusing and pathetic story of an ardent Spiritualist who journeyed from the East Coast to San Francisco, where he left his bachelorhood behind:

The writer agreed to give the details of the courtship and marriage of a mortal and spirit, and this is a fitting place to give it. The real name of the gentleman will not be given, but the name of the spirit was supposed to be Isis, and she an inhabitant of the planet Jupiter....

The bridegroom, whom we will call Mr. Brown, began an investigation of Spiritualism in one of the Eastern cities. He was a man of wealth and traveled much as a means of pleasantly passing away the time. He was educated, a bachelor, and held that all the planets were inhabited by races of human beings similar to ourselves, though much in advance of us in everything. He believed that the inhabitants of Jupiter were once the people of this earth, but that since death they may have lived on several of the different planets, and as they progressed were placed on planets that contained everything and every condition that their state of development entitled them to.

How much of this strange belief was obtained through the "medium" the writer cannot say. However, when the 'Frisco "medium" learned these views he at once set to work to make them pay him. He, Mr. Brown, was first convinced that the "medium" was genuine. His own views were then made to appear as correct, thus he was certain to continue his investigations with this "medium."

At one of the "materializing seances" one of the female "spooks" was made as handsome as a new robe trimmed with satin and other things, a Rhinestone necklace, ear-drops, hair-pins, bracelets and brooch, along with plenty of powder and pencil-work would make her, and she "came" for Mr. Brown.

It was no one Mr. Brown remembered, and he was told that it was a spirit from Jupiter and was his spirit guide or guard, and his "affinity." He was also told that he had just begun to attain a Spiritual "condition" that would permit her to communicate with him.

In her "make-up" the "spook" was certainly very beautiful. Especially was this true when she was looked upon in the very dim light of the "seance-room." Mr. Brown fell in love with Isis, very much in love. So much so that he was present at every public "seance," and had one and two private "seances" each week. It may not have been so much the physical beauty of the spirit as the supposed exalted sphere of progression she existed in, and the thought that she was his guardian angel.

Besides this, her conversation with him was always of spiritual sciences and matters that were of interest to him. She also gave him to understand that they always had been "affinities," and that some time in the future they would be mated. He was informed that the reason he had never married was because of her "influence," that had she remained on earth they would as certainly have met and married as it was that the sun rose and set that day, also that it would have been infinitely easier for both to have reached the perfect state if it had transpired that way. He was told that these communions together would materially aid him in his progression when he came to that side of life. This was kept before him so constantly that he finally asked if it would not be possible to consummate the marriage between them.

This was rather unexpected and the "medium" and "spook" consulted on the matter and concluded they could get a little extra, perhaps, by getting up a mock marriage ceremony. The "medium" set his wits to work, and when Mr. Brown had his next private "seance" he was told that the marriage could be consummated if it could be arranged so as to not kill or injure the "medium," It was satisfactorily explained to him why there was danger of anything of the kind occurring, and that the "medium" ought to be handsomely rewarded if he could be persuaded to sit for him for that purpose. It was left to her to name the amount and she made it five hundred dollars. She bade him make the arrangements with the "medium" and confer with her again next day. This he did, and the "medium" after much persuasion was induced to accept a check for five hundred dollars, the "seance" to occur at any time named by the spirit Isis.

At the private "seance" the next day Isis informed Mr. Brown that a large amount of fine silks and jewelry would have to be purchased and placed in the "cabinet" so that she and the company would have abundance of material from which to "materialize" their clothing. He was told that the occasion should be honored with a grand supper after the ceremony, and would he see to it that it was arranged for. She said there would be six "materialized" spirits present and twenty who would be invisible. The date for the wedding was named and the number of private "seances" to be had previous to it. He was instructed to give the money to the "medium" to purchase the silks and other material they were to "draw from." These things were to be touched by no hand save the "medium's" else they would receive a "magnetism" that would prevent the purpose for which they were furnished. The "astral magnetism" would control all the proceedings, and none other must be allowed to contaminate it.

The wedding night came around and the "seance" room was decorated with flowers and shrubs, besides a long table being laid for twenty-one persons. It will suffice to say that the wines and viands on the table cost close to three hundred dollars. No one was present save the "medium" and Mr. Brown. The "medium" entered the "cabinet" and went into a trance.

Soon there stepped into the dimly-lighted room a tall and magnificently gowned and crowned person who appeared to be a priest or a high functionary of some sort. He was followed by the "bride'' and she by four other beautifully costumed "spirits," two ladies and two gentleman. The writer will only add that the tall spirit performed the marriage ceremony, after which all sat down at table although nothing was eaten, as Mr. Brown had not yet been brought to a point where he could believe a spirit could eat and digest solids. They were supposed to feast on the aroma or essence or spiritual part of the feast spread for them.

The "medium" had fine wines and high living for several weeks after the wedding. He did not purchase silks and laces with the money furnished but placed in the "cabinet" some bundles of paper. All the properties furnished for the wedding went to the "medium." He made in the entire transaction, including "private sittings," more than four thousand dollars in six months. This from one man, alone. He may have had three or four "suckers" beside Mr. Brown. To be sure, the "sucker" is cautioned to secrecy regarding all these occurrences, for were it to become known by any of his friends it might result disastrously to the "medium."

The recital of Mr. Brown's experience will not be believed by a great many who read this book ; but it is a fact.

Better evidence

With all the brouhaha over David Thompson, it may be easy to lose sight of the fact that his seances are hardly the only evidence offered for life after death. There's a wealth of good research out there, which is worth far more than the highly dubious proceedings in a pitch dark seance room.

In no particular order, the better evidence includes:

• The cross correspondences.
• The R-101 case.
• Richard Hodgson's work with Leonora Piper.
• Charles Drayton Thomas's work with Gladys Osborn Leonard, especially the book and newspaper tests and the Bobby Newlove case.
• Induced after-death communications.
• Ian Stevenson's reincarnation research.
• The better-investigated accounts of crisis apparitions.
• Veridical deathbed visions, such as those investigated by William Barrett.
• Near-death experiences and out-of-body experiences (reliable researchers into NDEs include Michael Sabom and Kenneth Ring).

In addition, I would suggest that the very large amount of data in support of ESP indicates that consciousness can function outside of materialistic parameters.

The apparently close interconnection between consciousness and physical reality, as seen in quantum physics, also indicates that materialism is unlikely to be correct, and that consciousness is more than an epiphenomenon of matter.

And the large number of "cosmic coincidences" that gave rise to a habitable cosmos, as well as the complexity of even the simplest life form and the crucial role of encoded information in life, strongly suggest (to me) that consciousness in some form underlies and infuses material reality.

Finally, there is a great deal of psychological data indicating that people with spiritual beliefs are, in general (and with certain obvious exceptions), happier and healthier than those who do not have such beliefs.

Secrets of "A. Medium"

Darryn in comments pointed me to the complete online text of the rare old book Revelations of a Spirit Medium, by "A. Medium." The book, written by a phony 19th century medium, goes into detail about tricks in the seance room. Here are a few excerpts.

(In what follows, "A. Medium" is describing the early stages of his own career, but writing in the third person. I have broken up the material into shorter paragraphs for easier reading.)

He procured a flat, two-ounce druggists' bottle and filling it about one-fourth full of water, cut the heads off about one hundred parlor matches and dropped them in. When the composition was dissolved he poured off the water, saving it, and threw away the bits of pine left in the bottle. He now returned the brown fluid to the bottle and corked it. After labelling the bottle "Cough Medicine," he put it in his pocket and sought a dark closet to see how his "cough medicine" would work. Getting into a dark place he took the bottle from his pocket and was not [sic] disappointed to find that it was not at all luminous, and of course a failure. However, he thought he would smell of it and see if it would have passed for a cough mixture in odor as well as appearance. What was his surprise, on admitting a little air, in the effort to extract the cork, to have the bottle become a beautiful yellowish luminous shape. Ha! now he could furnish all the lights they wanted ...

The "medium" had learned a thing or two about this time about stealing some of the slack of the rope for future use, while being tied. By sitting well forward on his chair when the ends of the rope were made fast to the back rung, he could, by sliding back in his seat afterward have the use of as much slack rope as any ordinary, unselfish "medium" could wish. The coat falls close up to the back of the chair, thus hiding a move of that kind. When the wrists have been tied and are being drawn down to the knees, to the chair-legs or together at the back, one twist of the hand, and, consequently the two ends of the rope, and by a reverse twist, when the time arrives, you have all the slack you need, or you should go out of the business ...

As a matter of course, there are very few experts at tying and the gentleman who tied the "medium" on this particular evening was no exception to the rule, and before he had finished his undertaking to his satisfaction, the "medium" was as good as free. Before he reached his seat the tea-bell was violently ringing and the guitar sounding. Now a hand was thrust out at the opening and the fingers snapped. The trumpet was thrust out and an unintelligible sound made through it. One of the gentlemen strangers mistook the sound to be the word William and exclaimed.

"William, is that really you come to see your old father?"

"Yes," replied the horn, and the old gentleman stated it was the first time he had been able to get his son's name through a "medium."

Once more the "medium" made a noise through the horn that could be mistaken for Charles or Clarence or almost any name beginning with C, and again was it recognized as a son, this time of one of the lady strangers. She mistook the sound to be Clarence. The horn was dropped, and a communication written from Clarence to his mother. It proved satisfactory, and the "medium" concluded that was "tests" enough for the initial "seance." An examination was now made of the condition of things in the "cabinet," and the gentleman who did the tying stated that he was positive the ropes were in precisely the shape he had left them.

Mr. King [the purported spirit "control"] now requested that the room be made dark, as they desired to illuminate their hands. The lights were turned down and a screen put between it and the "cabinet." The "medium" brought forth his "cough medicine," and, after wrapping his handkerchief about it to conceal the shape of the bottle, gave it a dash up and down the front of the "cabinet." This light was different from the former ones [produced by matchsticks], being the size of a man's fist, while the first ones had been only small specks. The lights were the hit of the "seance," and drew forth many expressions of wonder and delight. Especially were the regular "sitters" delighted.

After showing the light three or four times, always in motion, he loosened up the handkerchief, making it stand away from the bottle on all sides, thus producing a light about the size of a human head. This he slowly pushed through the opening in the "cabinet" and allowed it to stop a few seconds and then he drew it back and put it away. The "sitters" now claimed that the last light was a human head and face, the features being distinguishable. It was set down as a case of etherialization, as they declared they could look right through it, and see the curtains behind it. One gentleman, a doctor, declared he could see the whole convolutions of the brain. Thus they helped out the show with their imaginations and made a reputation for the "medium." ...

Since his "sitters" had mistaken his handkerchief for a human face, he had an idea that he could provide something that would not require so much of the imagination to make it appear a face, and to that use was put the dollar received at his first public "seance." Repairing to a toy and novelty house he purchased one of those wire gauze masks, which would permit a light to shine through it. This he trimmed down until it could be put into the breast pocket, and yet enough remained to make quite a good spirit face. By putting this mask in front of the luminous handkerchief a luminous face and head was presented. It was bald of course, until he discovered that with a small piece of black cloth he could put hair on the gentleman.

That wire mask has been recognized by dozens of persons as fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, cousins, sweethearts, wives, husbands and various other relatives and friends. None but the "medium" knew that it was only a fifty-cent wire mask, hence none but the "medium" could enjoy the humor of the occasion. His fame rapidly spread ...

Grabbed from comments

Roslyn Walker, the British escape artist who has said he can duplicate David Thompson's act, left a comment on this thread. Since not everyone may have seen it, I'm posting it here.

It's clear that Roslyn is more skeptical about psi than I am (and as far as spoon-bending is concerned, I don't think magic tricks can account for the hundreds of PK parties hosted by Jack Houck). Be that as it may, I have no reason to doubt that Roslyn can escape from flex-cuffs. That's what the man does, after all.

Roslyn's Web site, which includes contact info, is here.

Also, commenter David Craig has pointed me to a discussion of escaping from flex-cuffs in this forum. (Scroll to "Physical Mediumship" and look for the entry on flex-cuffs. You have to join the forum to see the thread.) Escapologist "Wolflock," who has also said he can duplicate Thompson's feats, makes an appearance on the fifth page of the thread.

Anyway, here's Roslyn:

Hi,

Thought I'd drop by and introduce myself in person.

My name's Roslyn Walker and I'm an escape artist and variety performer.

I've been training in the art of escapes, sideshow and circus for the past 12 years now and I've had an interest in seances, mediums and psychics since I was a kid.

As a child I used to be fascinated mainly by the physical phenomena produced by psychics, and for years I used to rub that spoon wishing it would bend... it never did.

Until I started practicing the art of deception that is. Now I can make that spoon bend anyway I want... but its all just a trick.

Since learning how to bend a spoon using magicians techniques I've tried to discover other possible methods to duplicate what mediums claim they can do by getting in touch with spirits.

I've never publically exposed any medium or psychic in the past as being fake mainly because I never saw the harm in what they do... however, what really got my goat about Thompson is the fact that on his UK tour he's going to be demonstrating psychic surgery.

This I absolutly HATE!

Not only is he taking the gulible for a ride, but he's claiming he can heal them. I strongly believe this to be the most evil thing a person can do to another.

It disgusts me.

So I decided to make it known that I can free myself from zip ties AND resecure myself without the aid of spirits (although I am partial to a G & T now and then), trained assistants, fake chairs, fake zip ties, fake arms... I think you get the message.

Thompson claims to use borrowed chairs and all real stuff to hold him down, so I have done the same and I can still get out.

So, anyway, that's who I am and that's my position with the whole David Thompson thing. If he or anyone who knows him reads this I would be honoured to meet him when he comes to the UK, swap ideas and share escape techniques. In fact, it would be an honour to witness what he does and for him to see what I do.

Let me know, I'm contactable through the site.

Roslyn Walker