One early “medium” was a man from Wilkes-Barre: For this and the descriptions of other applicants to the Scientific American challenge, see Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 163–67.
“‘Margery’ Passes All Psychic Tests”: Harry Houdini, “Margery” the Medium Exposed (1924); Houdini, Magician Among the Spirits, 159.
“regarded himself as the hub”: Bird, “Margery” the Medium, 405.
“in building up a new stage personality”: Ibid., 408.
“at this moment it looks”: Crandon to Doyle, Ransom Center.
“She’s forced open the cabinet with her shoulders!”: Details and quotations from séance notes, taken August 25, 1924, Ransom Center archive.
CHAPTER ELEVEN: HOUDINI CHEATS … AGAIN
Nearly all of the detail here comes from séance notes, and private letters from Le Roi Crandon and Dr. McDougall, at the Arthur Conan Doyle archive at the Ransom Center.
“In Majesty Death Comes”: Tietze, Margery, 152.
“messiahs to a half million”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 213.
“Oh, this is terrible!”: Tietze, Margery, 52.
“I wish it here recorded”: Ibid., 53.
“Collins smiled wryly”: Ibid.
“He just materialized out of nowhere”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 213.
“Dudley claimed there were no fewer”: Tietze, Margery, 156.
And a new analysis found that the match: Ibid., 161.
One problem with this story: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 215.
“None of the evidence offered”: Houdini, Magician Among the Spirits, 270.
“I am convinced that no snap judgement”: Tietze, Margery, 58.
“My decision is, that everything which took place at the séances”: Ibid., 60.
But how did Walter whistle?: Dr. Crandon’s research is given in full detail in his chapter “The Margery Mediumship,” in Murchison, Case for and Against Psychical Belief, 65–109.
CHAPTER TWELVE: “WE HAVE JUST BEGUN TO FIGHT!”
“the ‘slickest’ ruse I have ever encountered”: Houdini’s pamphlet can be found online at pbs.org, “Margery” the Medium Exposed. The pamphlet goes on to explain, with diagrams, how he believed he’d caught Margery ringing the bell box with her foot.
“regarded a major part of his duties”: Bird, “Margery” the Medium, 405.
“while an ordinary investigator”: Houdini, “Margery” the Medium Exposed.
“abandoned all pretense at judicial consideration”: Bird, “Margery” the Medium, 409.
“Well, gentlemen, I’ve got her”: Ibid., 413.
“I have never on any occasion detected”: Polidoro, Final Séance, 154, 155.
On two occasions, Walter’s voice and Margery’s voice: Bird, “Margery” the Medium, 462.
“I was waiting for you to ask that”: Ibid., 477.
One summer day in 1926: J. B. Rhine and Lousia E. Rhine, “One Evening’s Observation on the Margery Mediumship,” Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 21, no. 4 (Jan.–March 1927).
“Could this man be expected”: Polidoro, Final Séance, 202, 203.
“J. B. Rhine Is an Ass”: Ibid., 203.
“completely won over”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 214.
“will turn out to be the most extraordinary mediumship”: Crandon to Lodge, Ransom Center archive.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: A DEATH FORETOLD
“Do the Spirits Return?”: www.wildabouthoudini.com.
“HOUDINI CHALLENGES LOCAL SOOTHSAYERS!”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 202.
“I am Houdini, and you are a fraud!”: Ibid., 197.
“Men like McDougall and Conan Doyle”: Ibid., 216.
Earlier that year, Houdini had testified: Alicia Puglionesi, “In 1926, Houdini Spent 4 Days Shaming Congress for Being in Thrall to Fortune-Tellers,” Atlas Obscura, Oct. 11, 2016, atlasobscura.com.
“When November comes around”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 207.
“You won’t live ’til Halloween!”: “Mina Crandon & Harry Houdini.”
“many cases where [he had] escaped”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 198.
Later that night, after the performance: Polidoro, Final Séance, 203–8. Other accounts of Houdini’s tragic last days can be found at “The Death of Houdini,” www.thegreatharryhoudini.com; “Harry Houdini,” biography.com; and “Harry Houdini Dies After Operations,” New York Times, Nov. 1, 1926.
“I know for a fact that Houdini knew”: Fulton Oursler letter to Arthur Conan Doyle, Harry Ransom Center.
“I greatly admired him”: Polidoro, Final Séance, 205.
“Sweetheart, when you read this”: Ibid., 208.
“I thank you for your kind letter”: Ernst and Carrington, Story of a Strange Friendship, 212.
“If, as you believe, he had psychic power”: Ibid., 214.
“Two days before he went to his beloved mother”: “Breaking the Houdini Code,” Victorzammit.com.
“The most important thing upon earth”: Ernst and Carrington, Story of a Strange Friendship, 227.
“I think the mirror incident shows”: Ibid., 229.
It was pointed out that the “secret” code: “The Day Houdini (Almost) Came Back from the Dead,” Skeptical Inquirer, March/April 2012.
It’s not clear what caused her to change her mind: “Breaking the Houdini Code.”
“Both read the Bible day and night”: William Blake, “The Everlasting Gospel.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN: THE LION IN WINTER
In 1928, he calculated his and Lady Jean’s net worth: Lycett, The Man Who Created Sherlock Holmes, 452.
Though he had lost Kingsley: Doyle, Memories and Adventures, 236.
Doyle sometimes wrote forty or more letters a day: Carr, Life of Arthur Conan Doyle, ix, 276.
“I couldn’t revive him if I would”: This famous comment was made in a letter to an unnamed friend.
“Me? These crowds have nothing to do with me”: Carr, Life of Arthur Conan Doyle, 274.
“Wherever I go, there are two great types”: Ibid.
“Thank God that book is done!”: Doyle to Smith, in ibid., 276.
“I wish I could do as you wish”: Carr, Life of Arthur Conan Doyle, 277.
“I am in a position to do it”: Quoted in obituary, New York Times, July 8, 1930.
“Why do you go on hammering at proof”: Carr, Life of Arthur Conan Doyle, 278.
“We would beg the most orthodox reader”: Doyle, Pheneas Speaks, 4.
“A great light shall shine”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 151.
“a period of terrific natural convulsions”: Personal correspondence, Ransom Center archive.
In March 1927, Doyle sent a confidential memo: Doyle to Lodge, Ransom Center.
“I have moments of doubt”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 221.
But the hope of glory was heady: This long account of the last flight of Captain Hinchliffe was based on several sources, including Fuller, Airmen Who Would Not Die; Jayne Baldwin, West over the Waves: The Final Flight of Elsie Mackay (Wigtown: GC Books, 2008); croydonairportcalling.blogspot.com; and “Loss of Hinchcliffe [sic] and Miss Elsie Mackay: A Spiritualist Message,” Sunday Express, July 8, 1928, found at trove.nla.gov.au.
“CAN YOU HELP A MAN WHO WAS DROWNED”: Fuller, Airmen Who Would Not Die, 49–53.
He described the interior of their house perfectly: Ibid., 104.
“MY BODY HAS WASHED NEAR JAMAICA”: Ibid., 98.
“When I talk about this subject”: “Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1930,” Fox Movietone News Story 6-962.
“I have broken down badly”: Doyle to Ernst in Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 250.
“creator of Sherlock Holmes”: Obituary, New York Times, July 8, 1930.
“There are vast numbers of spirits”: Sandford, Houdini and Conan Doyle, 254.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN: SIR ARTHUR, IS THAT YOU?
This account is based on the following sources
.
An account by the journalist Michael Prescott, michaelprescott.freeservers.com/r-101.html, tells the story of Eileen Garrett’s remarkable séance in the “laboratory” of Harry Price. This narrative includes a discussion of the various alternative theories that have been offered to explain away Garrett’s detailed description of the R101 disaster. Additional details were found on the Harry Price Web site, harrypricewebsite.co.uk. This material, under “Eileen Garrett,” is the complete text from chapter 6 of Price’s book Leaves from a Psychist’s Case-Book (London: Gollancz, 1933).
www.harrypriceweb site.co.uk/Séance/Garrett/leaves-r101.htmO.
A more detailed retelling of this story occurs in Fuller, Airmen Who Would Not Die (now out of print). Also, for a richer understanding of Harry Price himself, we used Morris, Harry Price.
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