According to many sources[i], the Spiritualist Movement began in upstate, New York, in 1848 when two young girls, Katie and Maggie Fox, “discovered” that they could communicate with a discorporate entity, resulting in a series of rapping noises. The throngs of curiosity seekers who came to see the girls communicate with the ghost/spirit, eventually gravitated to form the new religion. The BBC series on religions (no longer running) summarized the Spiritualist Movement: “The movement rapidly became very fashionable with both men and women and across all social classes and acquired the name Spiritualism in the 1850s. Some writers argue that Spiritualism was one of the first religions to become widespread through the actions of mass media.”[ii] In her dissertation on female mediums, Meredith Reddy outlined the key tenets of the Spiritualist Movement: “that spirits existed, that life continued on after death, and that the unseen spirits of loved ones were physically close by and could reunite with the living through the intercession of mediums.”[iii]The Spiritualists relied heavily on visual evidence of spirit communication including spirit photography, public séances, and newspapers.
The Banner of Light was a weekly newspaper in Boston that ran from April 1857 through January 1907. Though not originally conceived or intended as such, The Banner would become synonymous with the Spiritualist Movement in America, and was an important source for all things Spiritualist.[i] The newspaper printed original essays on topics of spiritualism and reform; book reviews; notices of lectures; letters from leading American spiritualists debating controversial issues; and many other features supporting the Spiritualist Movement. In the attempt to target a more general readership, the newspaper also featured original essays, novelettes, and novels written in serial form. These topics were represented in the logo for the newspaper, which appeared atop the front page of each newspaper.
Séance sessions themselves were an important component of the Spiritualist Movement and occurred on lecture tours, in private homes, and in public meeting halls. Séance mediums ranged from relatively unknown individuals to well-known figures. Perhaps the best-known series of séances conducted at the time were those of Mary Todd Lincoln who, grieving the loss of her son, organized Spiritualist séances in the White House, which were attended by her husband, Abraham Lincoln, and other prominent members of society.
Photography of séances also became very popular. It became a popular subject of photography as believers and skeptics alike attempted to prove or disprove the activity of spirits. Sometimes images were of notable mediums such as the Davenport brothers, who were later proved to be frauds.
Or, as in the example from the Banner, for the first eighteen years of the newspaper’s run, séances were performed through the medium Fanny Conant, pictured below with her brother Charles. H. Cowell as a spirit appearing in the photograph.
Despite the prevalence of fraud, deception, and showmanship in the American séances, many followers of the Spiritualist Movement continued to believe in the ability of spirits to communicate through mediums. Throughout the heyday of the American Spiritualist Movement (1880-1890), séances, spirit photography, and the Banner of Light newspaper were each forms of everyday life in America serving as just one way that Americans learned to make present the absence of their loved ones.
[i] Deveney, Pat. “Summary.” Banner of Light, The. A Weekly Journal of Romance Literature and General Intelligence / An Exponent of the Spiritual Philosophy of the Nineteenth/Twentieth Century, an archive of The Banner of Light on the International Association for the Preservation of Spiritualist and Occult Periodicals website. http://www.iapsop.com/archive/materials/banner_of_light/
[i] See for example, the archived BBC series on religions, “History of Modern Spiritualism.” http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/spiritualism/history/history.shtml; the WikiPedia entry on Spiritualism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritualism; and Todd Leonard’s book Talking to the Other Side: A History of Modern Spiritualism and Mediumship, Lincoln, Nebraska: iUniverse Publishing, 2003.
[ii] BBC, “History of Modern Spiritualism.” http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/spiritualism/history/history.shtml.
[iii] Reddy, Meredith. Artful Mediums: Women, Séance Photography, and Materialization Phenomena, 1880–1930. Unpublished Dissertation. Department of Art, University of Toronto, 2015.