Mina Crandon’s “hand” most likely made from animal liver
Mina Crandon producing ectoplasm at a séance
W
hen people think of the VictorianEra Spiritualist Movement, they often imagine a group of finely dressed men and women surrounding a Ouija board with candles burning all around them. Throw in a few spirit trumpets, a flash of spirit photography, and you’ve got the perfect séance. Of course, it’s a romanticized concept, and Ouija boards and Planchette writing was child’s play when it came to physical mediumship in the Victorian and Edwardian-Eras. In reality, objects were thrown through the air. Women were the ones in charge (many times performing in the nude). Lewd language was used freely—for it was the spirits talking, and not the fair ladies who simply acted as a conduit. And above all else, the proof of a quality physical medium was the slimy presence of ectoplasm.
E
ctoplasm is said to be a seemingly life-like substance that a medium will produce during a séance. It’s been described by different individuals as “luminous spiderwebs” that solidify into various shapes (usually transforming into limbs [pseudopods], faces, or sometimes even entire bodies of a spirit). According to reports (of varying authenticity), the ectoplasm would extrude from the body, usually coming from one of the medium’s orifices such as the mouth, ears, nose,
Amanda at the Fox Sisters Home
12
and eyes. There are also many reports of ectoplasm seeping from the medium’s navel, nipples, rectum, and vagina.
Not what you were expecting from the Victorian-Era? Well, Spiritualism shook the Victorians to their core, many times allowing women to become leaders, financially independent, and have a bit of autonomy. And in many women’s cases, ectoplasm was their ticket to notoriety in the world of mediumship.
W
hile ectoplasm has made it into mainstream pop culture, there isn’t any scientific evidence that it exists. Skeptics and scientists of the day declared that much of the ectoplasm photographed was fabricated from cheesecloth, gauze, and paper pulp. And yet, despite how fake many of the photos from séances appear (especially by today’s standards), people clung to the idea that ectoplasm was an integral part of materialization during a séance. Even Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (author
Eva C. with magazine cutout ectoplasm
HAUNTED MAGAZINE
Mina Crandon with Harry Houdini, 1924
of Sherlock Holmes and Spiritualist advocate) wrote about this spooky substance, saying it was “a viscous, gelatinous substance which appeared to differ from every known form of matter in that it could solidify and be used for material purposes.” Psychical researcher William J. Crawford, who studied physical mediumship, claimed that “ectoplasm was the basis of all psychic phenomena.”
I
n theory, spirits would take the ectoplasm created by their medium and drape it over their nonphysical body to be seen by those at the séance and use it to move objects such as tables. Materialization was seen as the pinnacle of psychic ability in physical mediumship—it took a tremendous amount of concentration and even put the medium in harm’s way. Producing ectoplasm was painful, and while the spirit materialized, it harnessed enormous amounts of energy, leaving the medium extremely vulnerable. Despite this danger, the medium would willingly enter their cabinet in the séance room time and time again to make contact with the other side for those desperate to see a glimpse of the spirit world.
B
ut… were these physical mediums truly in danger? Many psychical researchers (and even the staunch antiSpiritualist, Harry Houdini) believed that the séance— even the supposed ectoplasm and vulnerability—was an elaborate performance.
Kathleen Goligher, 1921
