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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to

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Speaker 1: the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so

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Speaker 1: much for tuning in. Wait, I hear in other worldly

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Speaker 1: knock on that door? Who is that? It's our guest

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Speaker 1: super producer, Dylan the Tennessee pal Fagan.

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Speaker 2: The ghostly apparition of Dylan Rapp tap tappin the very same,

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Speaker 2: very same, But that is a quote.

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Speaker 1: You are, Noel Brown. I am Ben Bollen. We have been, uh,

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Speaker 1: we've been fascinated for a long time about the idea

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Speaker 1: of you know, wija boards and mediums and psychics, and

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Speaker 1: the fact that pretty much from the moment humans started

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Speaker 1: human being, everybody has been understandably concerned about what happens

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Speaker 1: after they die.

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Speaker 2: Oh a million percent. I mean it's it's the foundation

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Speaker 2: of so many belief systems and debates as to where

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Speaker 2: you go and how you get there, and who's right

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Speaker 2: and who's wrong. I mean, Ben, it's it often. It

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Speaker 2: gets people pretty heated.

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Speaker 1: It does. People are at the risk of this beat

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Speaker 1: a hot take. People are a little bit sensitive about

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Speaker 1: whether or not an echo of you persist. When your

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Speaker 1: body fails, does your consciousness go somewhere does it simply disappear.

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Speaker 1: And like you said, Nol, there are tons of religions

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Speaker 1: and belief systems that claim to have the answer, but

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Speaker 1: humanity is yet to land on a shared universal explanation

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Speaker 1: that everybody and their mom takes as fact. It's not

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Speaker 1: to say people haven't tried, but in the spirit of

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Speaker 1: this for our series this week, this will be a

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Speaker 1: two parter, we decided to call up our own ghost

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Speaker 1: from years gone. The rumors are true. After we shout

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Speaker 1: this guy out in the credits all the time, we're

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Speaker 1: welcoming back, Jonathan Strickland, aka the Quister. But you're reformed now.

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Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated. I'm

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Speaker 3: merely an elder statesman in podcasting.

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Speaker 2: Exaggerated by me. I'm always throwing around death it all

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Speaker 2: the time.

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Speaker 3: If it's wishful thinking in the case of Noel. But

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Speaker 3: you know, we love each other obviously, obviously, so I'm

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Speaker 3: very flattered to have been asked back, especially on this topic.

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Speaker 3: Quick personal story, when I was a student in elementary

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Speaker 3: school way back when. We'll probably cover some of the

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Speaker 3: time period when we get there, because that's how old

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Speaker 3: I am. But when I was a student in elementary school, I,

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Speaker 3: to the surprise of no one here, would frequent the

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Speaker 3: school library and the section I consistently went to was

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Speaker 3: the quote unquote non fiction books about the paranormal and

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Speaker 3: the supernatural. So I would check out the same books

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Speaker 3: over and over, even like just rereading ones I had

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Speaker 3: read all the way through what.

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Speaker 1: Are we talking here? John? And are we talking?

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Speaker 2: Like manuals on how to summon a specter?

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Speaker 3: There were no Tobin spirit guides in our elementary school library. No,

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Speaker 3: I'm thinking about things like deep Fried Rat I think

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Speaker 3: was one of the names of one. It was all

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Speaker 3: about urban legends and things of that nature.

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Speaker 2: Those were popular, like at the scholastic book fairs, right

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Speaker 2: remember this, Yeah, like, yeah, all kinds of urban legend

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Speaker 2: books and conspiracy type books. Not to mention those kind

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Speaker 2: of There are books for kids that, when you look

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Speaker 2: back on them, were pretty grizzly.

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Speaker 1: And scary stories to tell the dark. It's a banger.

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Speaker 1: It's some of the best folklore out there.

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Speaker 3: My dad wrote some of those. So, but this was

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Speaker 3: when I was a kid, it was before that kind

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Speaker 3: of trend had started taking off. But I would read

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Speaker 3: all the books on things like you know, you know, lockness,

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Speaker 3: monster or ghost stories or things about spiritualism and mediums

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Speaker 3: and such. And one of my favorite stories I wanted

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Speaker 3: to relate to you before we really jump into it.

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Speaker 3: Have you guys heard of a fellow named James Tidwell?

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Speaker 3: Not okay, so mid nineteenth century. This guy he was

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Speaker 3: like he had he had the deck stacked against him.

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Speaker 3: He was really short, like somewhere around four foot two.

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Speaker 3: But he became a prominent spiritualist in Maryland, and the

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Speaker 3: Baltimore Sun even had the great story that I'll talk

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Speaker 3: about in the second. But anyway, he became known as

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Speaker 3: this incredibly charismatic person who, despite his stature, was able

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Speaker 3: to get an enormous following. But he also became known

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Speaker 3: for bilking people out of huge amounts of money in

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Speaker 3: an effort to try and get them connected to their

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Speaker 3: their deceased loved ones.

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Speaker 1: Now that doesn't sound like something one of these folks

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Speaker 1: would do.

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Speaker 3: I know, right, So law enforcement became very interested in him,

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Speaker 3: and at that point he he made tracks which prompted

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Speaker 3: the Baltimore Sun to run the wonderful headline small Medium

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Speaker 3: at Large that.

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Speaker 2: He made this whole story up Dombastard.

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Speaker 1: We stared at this is the ridiculous history of this movement.

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Speaker 2: I was on board with this, Hootale.

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Speaker 1: Thanks, this is the ridiculous history of the spiritualist movement.

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Speaker 1: We have returned. No one really can prove what happens

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Speaker 1: after you die, to everybody else's satisfaction. Hence we have

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Speaker 1: things like spiritualism. How would we describe.

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Speaker 2: That, well, Spiritualism is a movement that started in the

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Speaker 2: nineteenth century in America and Europe, you know, based on

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Speaker 2: the notion that one could communicate with the dearly departed,

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Speaker 2: and that they in some shape or form had the

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Speaker 2: ability to interact with the living. And these you know,

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Speaker 2: kind of self proclaimed spiritualists for better or words, whether

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Speaker 2: they actually believed in these abilities or whether they were

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Speaker 2: just outright you know, hucksters, sought to make contact with

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Speaker 2: the dead, usually through a form of seance. The term

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Speaker 2: medium is often thrown around as in being sort of

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Speaker 2: like a go between, uh, you know, to sort of

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Speaker 2: channel the the the dad, you know, and to crossover

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Speaker 2: from this mortal coil into you know, the the world beyond.

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Speaker 2: And you know, these spiritualists, some of them, I think,

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Speaker 2: actually genuinely did believe that they were able to contact spirits.

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Speaker 1: We could even call them some of the original rappers

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Speaker 1: because they were wrapping knocking in terms of their communication,

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Speaker 1: kind of like clever hauns. Yeah, but that was but

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Speaker 1: but that was a scam. So you know, yeah, I'm

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Speaker 1: playing a seed with.

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Speaker 3: Some good to have some horse sense before you.

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Speaker 2: Little horse, little horse play horsing around guys. My, I

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Speaker 2: think I've maybe mentioned on the show before. My mother

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Speaker 2: was an opera singer and an opera that she often

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Speaker 2: did that I remember very fondly. It's got some pieces

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Speaker 2: in It's more of like a operetta, I guess, but

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Speaker 2: it's I don't know, it doesn't feel like a traditional opera.

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Speaker 2: It's called The Medium by gian Carlo Manati. Folks may

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Speaker 2: know this composer from a very popular piece he did

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Speaker 2: called A Mall and the Night Visitors, which is a

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Speaker 2: tale of the you know, the wise men and all

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Speaker 2: of this stuff. It's often, you know, performed at churches.

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Speaker 2: But The Medium is about this woman who is a medium,

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Speaker 2: who has a mute assistant named Toby, who kind of

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Speaker 2: does all of the light behind the scenes rap tap

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Speaker 2: tapping and stuff and it doesn't get a lot of love,

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Speaker 2: and I really think some of the music in it

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Speaker 2: is utterly gorgeous. So do check out the medium if

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Speaker 2: anyone's interested in, you know, seeing a musical rendition of

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Speaker 2: the kind of stuff we're talking about today.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you'll see it in a lot of film and fiction.

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Speaker 1: This trope is a hard baked, deeply ingrained phenomenon in

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Speaker 1: horror and fantasy and entertainment because from the nineteenth to

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Speaker 1: the twentieth century this was a genuine craze. This was

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Speaker 1: all over the zeitgeist. People from all imaginable demographics and

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Speaker 1: walks of life genuinely seemed to believe that a combination

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Speaker 1: of science and religion could create a new understanding of

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Speaker 1: what happens after you die, could prove and after life existed,

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Speaker 1: and that further, certain very special people were able to

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Speaker 1: bridge the gap between the living and the debt.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you might actually wonder why this even happened, Like,

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Speaker 3: why did this trend.

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Speaker 1: Because you could pay them?

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Speaker 3: Yes, yes, that's the very important part, is the payment part,

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Speaker 3: which stretches into today. But yeah, we'll talk later about

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Speaker 3: some of the elements. But I think it was a

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Speaker 3: convergence of factors that came together that kind of sowed

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Speaker 3: the seeds that would grow into spiritualism. Because it's one

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Speaker 3: thing to say this was a craze, but it's another

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Speaker 3: thing to say, but why that craze at that time?

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Speaker 3: And I don't think there's a single answer for that,

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Speaker 3: but I do think there's a lot of really interesting

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Speaker 3: different answers that all contribute to it.

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Speaker 2: Well, it's always made me wonder too. I mean, being

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Speaker 2: the United States was still quite a religious place, you know,

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Speaker 2: as so many of these religious leaders, how this stuff

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Speaker 2: wasn't looked upon as heresy or in some way offensive

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Speaker 2: to God, because I mean, this idea that of the

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Speaker 2: ghosts exists kind of implies that, I mean, they didn't

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Speaker 2: go to heaven.

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Speaker 1: Well, they were also this interesting because here we get

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Speaker 1: into something that would be called heresy in the past.

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Speaker 1: And as we'll see, not all of the skeptics were

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Speaker 1: necessarily atheist. A lot of the most famous ones were,

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Speaker 1: but there were some people who were skeptics because this

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Speaker 1: stuff in the spiritualist movement did not jibe with their

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Speaker 1: existing understanding of religion. So like, okay, you're always gonna

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Speaker 1: hear it this way, folks, Our story begins in upstate

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Speaker 1: New York in the eighteen forties. So many things do.

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Speaker 1: But we'll get to that. But I think we can argue,

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Speaker 1: fellow ridiculous historians, the story actually begins way way earlier,

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Speaker 1: when an absolute legend named Emmanuel Swedenborg or Seedenborg starts

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Speaker 1: doing some really weird stuff. Oh my god, he's such

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Speaker 1: a weird dude. He's an episode. We should do an

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Speaker 1: episode on Johnatha.

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Speaker 2: Can you make with the star trek puns for Swedenborg?

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Speaker 2: I could, but I was immediately thinking of Gutenberg. Also

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Speaker 2: true because Gutenberg the musical. The villain consistently mispronounces Gutenberg's

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Speaker 2: name is Gutenborg. Ah, let's not forget about Steve Gutenborg

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Speaker 2: from the Police Academy movies that Ben's loves so dearly it's.

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Speaker 1: Uh, and also mispronounced someone's name. It's one of those

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Speaker 1: tiny nags right with his little moves. Uh. We likes

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Speaker 1: doing that, sure does. And we also have to know

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Speaker 1: for the record, our buddy Manny, I'll call him Manny.

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Speaker 1: He is cartoonishly Swiss. His name For all of us

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Speaker 1: etymology nerds, his name literally translates to something like sweden Castle,

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Speaker 1: Can we call him sweets? Yeah, of course, yeah he was.

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Speaker 3: He was so sweet Swiss that he always had a knife,

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Speaker 3: a toothpick, a.

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Speaker 2: Saw tweezer song in his heart.

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Speaker 1: He was like, uh, he would uh, he would return

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Speaker 1: cheese if it didn't have holes in it. That's how

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Speaker 1: Swiss this guy is.

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Speaker 2: And if he got a piece of cheese with with

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Speaker 2: no holes in it, he damn well use that Swiss

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Speaker 2: army knife to make some He sure did.

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Speaker 1: And who knows back then, maybe they just called it

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Speaker 1: the army knife. That's true, sort of like the Irish

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Speaker 1: car bomb.

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Speaker 2: Nobody in Ireland wants to hear about the God as

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Speaker 2: a beverage. Come on, as a as a novelty cocktail.

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Speaker 2: Come on, that's like having it's like over here having

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Speaker 2: a cocktail called the nine to eleven.

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Speaker 3: Let's uh, let's let's leave the truck, let's leave the

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Speaker 3: troubles behind us. Do talk about and talk about this guy,

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Speaker 3: because so we're talking about someone who is formative in

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Speaker 3: the foundation of spiritualism, but this is also someone who

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Speaker 3: was a legit smarty pants type of person, right, We're

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Speaker 3: not Yeah, we're not talking about someone who's who just

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Speaker 3: like spontaneously gets this this uh, this hair, this wild

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Speaker 3: hair about about us convening with the dead. This is

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Speaker 3: someone who was a learned man.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, gives it some sand, you know, I mean we

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Speaker 2: I think we're all, especially on stuff they don't want

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Speaker 2: you to know. Often fascinated between the crossover between science

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Speaker 2: and the paranormal. We have an interview with an incredible

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Speaker 2: physicist named Russell targ who was responsible for training CIA

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Speaker 2: agents how to become psychic. The man who is incredibly learned,

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Speaker 2: has a background in all of the foundations of science,

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Speaker 2: and yet truly does believe that these things are possible,

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Speaker 2: which really makes you think twice about, you know, calling

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Speaker 2: someone like that a fraud.

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Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, and our buddy Manny at this time to

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Speaker 1: that beautiful point about science and spirituality converging again. He's

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Speaker 1: born in sixteen eighty eight, he lives until about seventeen

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Speaker 1: seventy two. To your point, Jonathan, he's a scientist, he's

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Speaker 1: an engineer. But wait, there's more. As Billy Bays was

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Speaker 1: wont to say, he's an astronomer, a philosopher, an inventor,

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Speaker 1: a Christian theologian. And then in seventeen forty one, he

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Speaker 1: is fifty three years old, and he starts to have

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Speaker 1: things that rock his lived experience. He has very vivid

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Speaker 1: dreams and he has waking visions. And these are not

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Speaker 1: one offs. They accumulate and escalate over time, all leading

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Speaker 1: to Easter weekend. It's April sixth, seventeen forty four, and

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Speaker 1: Jesus Christ from earlier reaches out to Manny.

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Speaker 2: Directly from earlier? Is they see himself from before?

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Speaker 1: Right?

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Speaker 4: I mean?

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Speaker 3: And he had a lot of stuff to do that weekend.

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Speaker 1: He's a busy guy.

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Speaker 2: What would he do is the question that you often

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Speaker 2: see on people's little wristband. That's right, yeah, tell you

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Speaker 2: what he would do. He would reach out to Swedenborn.

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Speaker 1: And say, hey, you guys humans, great hustle on the

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Speaker 1: whole Christianity thing, humbly named. I need you to write

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Speaker 1: the truth about the world and life and death and

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Speaker 1: heaven and hell. I need you to write something called

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Speaker 1: the Heavenly Doctrine. You're the only guy who can do this.

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Speaker 1: Thanks great call.

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Speaker 2: This is some gold Tablets Joseph Smith type origin story.

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Speaker 2: You know, Emlily made me think of that one hundred percent.

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Speaker 2: But the question then becomes like, is this a person

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Speaker 2: who is mentally unwell, who is having an episode, or

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Speaker 2: is this someone who is divinely contacted uh and compelled

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Speaker 2: to write, you know, a work that could be seen

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Speaker 2: as a sacred.

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Speaker 3: Text, or or possibly someone who sees opportunity. Because I

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Speaker 3: don't think it's I don't think it's either or I

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Speaker 3: think there's a third option.

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Speaker 1: That's very true.

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Speaker 2: There is a secret third thing that you just illuminated

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Speaker 2: so well, so to accomplish this task that he was

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Speaker 2: tasked with. And again we're just we're speaking speculatively here.

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Speaker 2: God gave Swedenborg. Uh, well is it was it Jesus

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Speaker 2: or was it God? I guess they're one and the same,

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Speaker 2: depending on you know.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, there's the Holy Ghost of hanging around somewhere too.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, they franchised.

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Speaker 2: So he gifts Swedenborg with some some abilities.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, he says, Okay, Manny, you can now freely visit

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Speaker 1: heaven and Hell, and you can talk with the angels,

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Speaker 1: you can talk with the demons, you could talk with

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Speaker 1: other spirits. And then this continues for years. By the way,

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Speaker 1: Manny feels that he is in communication with the divine

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Speaker 1: and later God or Jesus Christ if you like, tells manny. Oh,

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Speaker 1: by the way, the last judgment was also a real thing.

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Speaker 1: It already happened in seventeen fifty seven. You're in the aftermath. Okay.

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Speaker 2: I do like the detail here, Ben, because I think

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Speaker 2: the question that I posed earlier about how some of

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Speaker 2: this stuff jibed with you know, more religious outlooks. This

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Speaker 2: guy claimed to be able to dip right on into heaven,

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Speaker 2: you know, whereas I think when we think of ghosts

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Speaker 2: and content them, we think of ones that are sort

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Speaker 2: of still hanging around.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, he has this. Okay, So he writes prolifically.

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Speaker 1: Over the last a little less than thirty years of

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Speaker 1: his life. He has eighteen published theological works we could

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Speaker 1: call him, and even now in twenty twenty six, he

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Speaker 1: has more stuff that was never officially published. The guys

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Speaker 1: on a roll. This is his new mission, and all

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Speaker 1: of his or a lot of his proposed discoveries, like

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Speaker 1: the pivotal ones, are way different from earlier accepted Christian thought.

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Speaker 1: To your question, he describes immediate death as kind of

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Speaker 1: going to a bus station or an airport terminal for

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Speaker 1: the dead.

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Speaker 2: You get the waiting room, beetlejuice.

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Speaker 1: It just so yeah, yeah, So he says the real

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Speaker 1: architecture of the afterlife is going to be three heavens

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Speaker 1: and then three hells and this, you know, this airport

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Speaker 1: terminal kind of you get stranded there, and if you

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Speaker 1: love yourself too much, then you end up going to

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Speaker 1: one of the hells, and if you love other people enough,

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Speaker 1: you end up going to one of the heavens.

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Speaker 2: Are these are there degrees of these hells like Delta?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah?

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Speaker 2: Is there a hierarchy?

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Speaker 1: Is there?

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Speaker 3: Like medallion Lewest lowest level of lowest level of heaven

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Speaker 3: is steerage exactly right, you know.

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Speaker 1: But boy do they dance down there?

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Speaker 2: Boy do they just cut a rug, do a jig?

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Speaker 1: Such a can you imagine? What what is economy basic heaven?

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Speaker 3: Well, you're not allowed any carry ons unless you pay extra, okay, right,

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Speaker 3: you don't get to pick your seat, right.

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Speaker 1: And uh, you have to negotiate the arm rest.

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Speaker 3: That's right, if you're in the middle. If you're in

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Speaker 3: the middle, then technically they both should be yours.

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Speaker 2: The medal is like comfort plus, I guess, and then

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Speaker 2: the top one is you know, proper business class, Yes, right,

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Speaker 2: Delta one right, and so you can.

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Speaker 3: Tell we're located in Atlanta with Delta Ta.

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Speaker 1: We're a bit cartoonishally in that sandbox. Yes, so our

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Speaker 1: buddy Manny or Swedenborg, because I'm being a bit too

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Speaker 1: familiar with him. He further said, I pretty much have

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Speaker 1: the world's most the metaphysical version of the best passport ever.

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Speaker 1: I have encountered and spoken with spirits on every possible

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Speaker 1: plane of hell and heaven and that weird waiting room.

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Speaker 1: I'm kind of like, he said Robin Williams character in

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Speaker 1: What Dreams May Come? He loved that movie. He loved

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Speaker 1: it so dear I did it.

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Speaker 3: The thing I like best about that is that it

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Speaker 3: later would get remade in a movie titled Looper.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, oh man, Looper. Have you guys seen no

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Speaker 1: of you seen Looper.

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Speaker 2: I've seen Looper. Yeah, I do like Looper. I don't

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Speaker 2: understand the connection between Looper and What Dreams May Come.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of about the spiritualism movement, really, is what

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Speaker 1: Looper is.

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Speaker 2: It could also think it was about time travel types.

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Speaker 2: It could it could be a very long running, terrible

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Speaker 2: inside joke between me and Ben Bolan.

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Speaker 1: I see, okay, I am out in the cold on

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Speaker 1: this one. Guys.

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Speaker 2: All I remember about What Dreams May Come is that

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Speaker 2: hell was Hella bad cgi. That's all I remember. Max

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Speaker 2: von Seido on it.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he's a psychologist. You really see the glowing

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Speaker 1: edges of the green screen around all of the bodies.

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Speaker 2: I remember.

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Speaker 3: I remember wanting that movie to be better than what

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Speaker 3: it was.

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Speaker 1: Beautiful. I remember watching it and thinking if I didn't

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Speaker 1: speak English, I would love this even more. It also

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Speaker 1: features a good friend of the show, Cuba Gooding Junior

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Speaker 1: uh nol.

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Speaker 2: That's an inside joke between me and Beat. That's not

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Speaker 2: a joke at all, just a harrowing tale being accosted

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Speaker 2: by Kuba. It's true, Jonathan, have we not told you

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Speaker 2: this story? I have not heard it.

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Speaker 3: But I think, boy, unless your listeners have never heard

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Speaker 3: the story, maybe we could move it along and we'll

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Speaker 3: talk about it.

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Speaker 2: He forced me a chicken wing, that's all. He forced

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Speaker 2: bild a chicken.

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Speaker 1: So along with okay, along with clearly What Dreams May

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Speaker 1: Come and Looper fan Swedenborg, there's another guy who influences

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Speaker 1: the spiritualism movement. His name is Franz Mesmer. He's the

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Speaker 1: inventor of the very humbly named mesmerism.

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Speaker 2: I can't say it without wiggling your fingers.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, so let's get some quick background on Franz.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, yeah, why don't you give it to us? Jonathan

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Speaker 2: all right?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So eighteenth the tree, So we're still talking at

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Speaker 3: seventeen hundreds here Australian healer. By the time you get

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Speaker 3: all the way up into early mid century nineteenth century.

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Speaker 3: The idea is that he was talking about we're starting

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Speaker 3: to make their way over to uh, the not so

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Speaker 3: New World at this point, but you know, the United States,

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Speaker 3: and uh we have a great quote from the Smithsonian

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Speaker 3: which is quote mesmer proposed that everything in the universe,

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Speaker 3: including the human body was going.

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Speaker 1: By Jonathan Nold Dylan and I are so sorry. Could

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Speaker 1: you please do it in one of your legendary European accents? Oh?

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Speaker 3: Yes, quote because of the European curators of the Smithsonian.

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Speaker 1: Sure, here we go. Quote.

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Speaker 3: Uh, let's see, I'll do I'll do English because I

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Speaker 3: feel good about that, right, So we'll do nice posh English.

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Speaker 1: I feel great about that. Yeah, here we go.

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Speaker 5: Messmen proposed that everything in the universe, including the human body,

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Speaker 5: was governed by a magnetic fluid that could become imbalanced,

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Speaker 5: causing illness, but wive in his hands over a patient's body,

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Speaker 5: he induced a mesmurized, if not a state that allowed

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Speaker 5: him to manipulate the magnetic force and restore ealth. Amateur

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Speaker 5: mesmerists became a popular attraction at parties and parlors, a

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Speaker 5: few proving skillful enough to attract paying customers. So we

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Speaker 5: awake in from a mesmeric trance claimed to have experienced

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Speaker 5: visions of spirits from another dimension.

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Speaker 1: God, it look like a pocket or two.

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Speaker 3: Thank you. A man's got of heart, hasn't he?

404
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Speaker 4: Uh yeah, I I so little little thing I want

405
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Speaker 4: to throw in here that's interesting to me is you

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Speaker 4: have to keep in mind that this is also around

407
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Speaker 4: the time when uh, the scientific world.

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Speaker 3: Is starting to investigate electromagnetism. Right, magnetism itself had been

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Speaker 3: observed for millennia, but this is a time where electromagnetism

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Speaker 3: is starting to be examined. Not understood yet.

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Speaker 2: But exam It wasn't until the insane clown Posse came

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Speaker 2: along that we fully understood and they really asked, how

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Speaker 2: do magnets work?

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Speaker 1: Uh?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, so you can you know, you're seeing forces that

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Speaker 3: are able to act upon one another without any visible interaction, right,

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Speaker 3: So that I think also helps support these beliefs that

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Speaker 3: something spiritual either is happening there or could also happen.

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Speaker 3: Because if you can have an invisible force in front

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Speaker 3: of you, like you can see that there's something happening,

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Speaker 3: but you can't see what the actual force is, then

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Speaker 3: why not a spiritual force as well?

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Speaker 2: So what was gravity? I mean fully, I mean it

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Speaker 2: would have been under so.

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Speaker 3: That would that didn't come out until the two thousand

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Speaker 3: centri bullet hadn't been born.

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Speaker 1: Yet, right right right? Yeah?

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Speaker 2: No, but I mean the notion of a gravity being

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Speaker 2: an invisible force.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but I gea, you see the effects, right, but

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Speaker 1: you don't see the mechanism at place exactly.

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Speaker 2: It's also a little less sexy than magnets because you

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Speaker 2: can totally use magnets to do all kinds of woo

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Speaker 2: woo looking stuff.

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Speaker 1: Sure, yeah, absolutely people did. Yeah, So we have one

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00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:21,000
Speaker 1: more guy to add to our origin story here, Andrew Jackson.

437
00:26:21,240 --> 00:26:25,920
Speaker 1: Wait for Davis, so not the other Andrew Jackson. Andrew Jackson.

438
00:26:26,080 --> 00:26:32,440
Speaker 1: Davis comes along way after Manny and Mesmer, and this

439
00:26:32,520 --> 00:26:36,359
Speaker 1: guy strikes me as I'm gonna be unfair. Here, he

440
00:26:36,480 --> 00:26:42,119
Speaker 1: strikes me as kind of a a train kid like.

441
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:44,439
Speaker 1: He strikes me as one of those woo woo guys

442
00:26:44,480 --> 00:26:48,720
Speaker 1: you might see in certain areas of different cities. Here

443
00:26:48,760 --> 00:26:49,760
Speaker 1: we have little five.

444
00:26:49,920 --> 00:26:52,480
Speaker 2: Right, he's walking around with a dog with a bandana.

445
00:26:52,600 --> 00:26:54,600
Speaker 2: Maybe maybe reading your cards, you.

446
00:26:54,560 --> 00:26:57,399
Speaker 1: Know, right, yeah, yeah, nailed the dude. He's a self

447
00:26:57,440 --> 00:27:01,880
Speaker 1: described seer and he's and he's a faith healer. And

448
00:27:02,040 --> 00:27:05,760
Speaker 1: he says, Okay, I'm going to take the ideas of

449
00:27:05,880 --> 00:27:09,520
Speaker 1: Mesmer and Swedenborg and I'm going to put them together

450
00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:15,840
Speaker 1: and I'm going to go into Mesmeric trances, and Nanny

451
00:27:15,960 --> 00:27:19,520
Speaker 1: Swedenborg himself is going to speak to me. And I'll

452
00:27:19,560 --> 00:27:25,200
Speaker 1: record these messages and I'll publish them in a huge book,

453
00:27:25,520 --> 00:27:30,200
Speaker 1: actually very long book called The Principles of Nature, Divine

454
00:27:30,280 --> 00:27:36,240
Speaker 1: Revelations and Devoice to Mankind. Hmm, very humble. I'm intrigued.

455
00:27:37,200 --> 00:27:40,800
Speaker 3: This also makes me think of a Joseph Smith kind

456
00:27:40,840 --> 00:27:43,880
Speaker 3: of story. Right, It's somewhere like now a step removed,

457
00:27:44,119 --> 00:27:47,960
Speaker 3: where you're not talking to an angel or to God,

458
00:27:48,040 --> 00:27:52,800
Speaker 3: but rather someone who claims that they commune with God

459
00:27:52,840 --> 00:27:54,480
Speaker 3: and angels and demons as well.

460
00:27:54,920 --> 00:27:57,119
Speaker 2: I know a guy who knows a guy always a

461
00:27:57,160 --> 00:28:00,439
Speaker 2: little sus when someone says they're the only one they

462
00:28:00,440 --> 00:28:02,639
Speaker 2: can do the thing, and that you get, you know,

463
00:28:03,680 --> 00:28:04,480
Speaker 2: speak through them.

464
00:28:04,720 --> 00:28:07,160
Speaker 3: I mean there was a long history of that though,

465
00:28:07,240 --> 00:28:11,119
Speaker 3: right session Exactly, you look at you look at the

466
00:28:11,359 --> 00:28:15,720
Speaker 3: the Catholic Church, and that's the whole foundation of you

467
00:28:15,800 --> 00:28:19,920
Speaker 3: have the designated person who is able to commune directly

468
00:28:20,040 --> 00:28:23,240
Speaker 3: with God, starting with the Pope and then trickling down.

469
00:28:23,760 --> 00:28:26,880
Speaker 2: And forgive me for being suspicious of those folks as well.

470
00:28:27,200 --> 00:28:31,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, but saying that, saying that, uh, you know, they

471
00:28:31,160 --> 00:28:35,320
Speaker 3: were cribbing from well written notes that have been around

472
00:28:35,320 --> 00:28:38,120
Speaker 3: for ages, right, And we.

473
00:28:37,760 --> 00:28:41,800
Speaker 1: Were also going to at this point note that we

474
00:28:41,880 --> 00:28:49,160
Speaker 1: are not casting aspersion on anybody's personal beliefs or short ideology.

475
00:28:49,520 --> 00:28:53,040
Speaker 1: Your path is your own. We might not follow it.

476
00:28:53,400 --> 00:28:56,520
Speaker 1: I think the four of us know each other pretty well,

477
00:28:56,760 --> 00:28:59,760
Speaker 1: and I feel like I'm pretty read up on your

478
00:29:00,120 --> 00:29:05,520
Speaker 1: small spiritual leanings. But we are acting in good faith,

479
00:29:05,720 --> 00:29:09,040
Speaker 1: unlike some mediums when we say there's always a question

480
00:29:09,240 --> 00:29:13,720
Speaker 1: about profit and popularity with these people, uh, p R

481
00:29:13,880 --> 00:29:16,720
Speaker 1: O F I T as well as p R O

482
00:29:17,040 --> 00:29:20,960
Speaker 1: F p R O P H E T. So probably

483
00:29:21,040 --> 00:29:23,320
Speaker 1: got the profit. You got there. I got there eventually,

484
00:29:23,360 --> 00:29:24,560
Speaker 1: it took a long walk for it.

485
00:29:24,680 --> 00:29:26,200
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I think, you know, there's a lot

486
00:29:26,200 --> 00:29:29,400
Speaker 2: of things that are very, very powerful and you know,

487
00:29:30,160 --> 00:29:33,520
Speaker 2: useful in religion, and I think people there are certain

488
00:29:33,560 --> 00:29:38,160
Speaker 2: people that follow it as a way of life that

489
00:29:38,280 --> 00:29:41,480
Speaker 2: allows them to be empathetic and kind to others. And

490
00:29:41,800 --> 00:29:44,200
Speaker 2: you know, your beliefs being your own. But I just

491
00:29:44,280 --> 00:29:47,200
Speaker 2: personally kind of have a problem with someone that says

492
00:29:47,240 --> 00:29:48,320
Speaker 2: I'm the only.

493
00:29:48,720 --> 00:29:52,160
Speaker 1: Way for you to talk to God like that just bugs.

494
00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:59,160
Speaker 3: Me inherent If everyone in religion conducted their way similar

495
00:29:59,160 --> 00:30:02,120
Speaker 3: to how mister Rodgers did, I would be I would

496
00:30:02,160 --> 00:30:05,440
Speaker 3: be beside myself and I would love to see that.

497
00:30:05,720 --> 00:30:08,840
Speaker 3: But I understand exactly where Ben and Nola are coming from. Like,

498
00:30:08,920 --> 00:30:13,000
Speaker 3: I too respect people's beliefs, but I do not respect

499
00:30:13,040 --> 00:30:19,320
Speaker 3: those who would prey upon others and specifically target vulnerabilities

500
00:30:19,360 --> 00:30:25,080
Speaker 3: that their target audience have in an effort to benefit themselves.

501
00:30:25,120 --> 00:30:30,360
Speaker 3: And unfortunately, when we're talking about spiritualism, maybe not even

502
00:30:30,400 --> 00:30:34,920
Speaker 3: a majority, but certainly a significant number of practitioners were

503
00:30:34,920 --> 00:30:35,800
Speaker 3: doing exactly that.

504
00:30:36,640 --> 00:30:40,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it starts with uh, we'll give you the

505
00:30:40,080 --> 00:30:43,400
Speaker 1: straight poop. It starts with a prank that goes out ahead.

506
00:30:43,880 --> 00:30:47,800
Speaker 1: So all right, it's eighteen forty seven. Our guy, Andrew

507
00:30:47,880 --> 00:30:51,760
Speaker 1: Jackson Davis takes the work or the beliefs of these

508
00:30:51,840 --> 00:30:56,720
Speaker 1: other two dudes, mixes it all together and says, bit

509
00:30:56,720 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 1: of a cosmic gumbo. Bit of a cosmic gumbo. We

510
00:30:59,440 --> 00:31:03,960
Speaker 1: used to joke about that on set. And that's eighteen

511
00:31:04,000 --> 00:31:07,080
Speaker 1: forty seven right. One year later, in eighteen forty eight,

512
00:31:07,440 --> 00:31:13,720
Speaker 1: he believes that his prediction about his spiritual understandings is

513
00:31:13,880 --> 00:31:19,400
Speaker 1: proven correct due to the infamous Fox Sisters. This is

514
00:31:19,440 --> 00:31:23,160
Speaker 1: the origin story kicking into high gear. March thirty first,

515
00:31:23,520 --> 00:31:27,440
Speaker 1: eighteen forty eight, Hydesville, New York, upstate. He got a

516
00:31:27,520 --> 00:31:31,440
Speaker 1: teenager name's Maggie Fox. She's fourteen. She's got a younger

517
00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:34,719
Speaker 1: sister named Kate who is eleven. They have an older

518
00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:37,680
Speaker 1: sister named Leah that will get to later. She's living

519
00:31:37,760 --> 00:31:42,480
Speaker 1: somewhere else. But these kids start doing a little pranky prank.

520
00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:46,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, And if you hear the story and you think, wow,

521
00:31:46,920 --> 00:31:49,200
Speaker 3: this sounds kind of similar to other stories I have

522
00:31:49,320 --> 00:31:54,880
Speaker 3: heard largely in the realm of poltergeist activity. You know,

523
00:31:54,920 --> 00:31:58,800
Speaker 3: there's I would say there's some commonalities that exist across

524
00:31:58,840 --> 00:32:03,440
Speaker 3: these stories, not to say that everyone involved in them

525
00:32:03,520 --> 00:32:09,560
Speaker 3: manufactured the situation themselves, but certainly that was the case

526
00:32:09,920 --> 00:32:15,480
Speaker 3: in some of these occurrences. And this is a prime example,

527
00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:17,720
Speaker 3: and it makes me think, like, I don't know about

528
00:32:17,760 --> 00:32:20,120
Speaker 3: you two, I'm sure that this is the case. But

529
00:32:20,640 --> 00:32:24,760
Speaker 3: if you've ever told a little lie thinking this is

530
00:32:24,800 --> 00:32:26,840
Speaker 3: just going to help me smooth this situation over, I

531
00:32:26,880 --> 00:32:29,680
Speaker 3: just want this situation smoothed over, for whatever it may be.

532
00:32:29,720 --> 00:32:31,760
Speaker 3: I'm going to tell this little lie. It'll get me

533
00:32:31,800 --> 00:32:35,120
Speaker 3: through this. I'll be okay. But then people pay more

534
00:32:35,120 --> 00:32:37,280
Speaker 3: attention to that little lie than they would have if

535
00:32:37,280 --> 00:32:39,800
Speaker 3: you had just not said anything, and it would have

536
00:32:39,800 --> 00:32:41,880
Speaker 3: been fine. So then you have to keep committing to

537
00:32:41,920 --> 00:32:45,040
Speaker 3: the little lie, and you keep committing and like your

538
00:32:45,080 --> 00:32:48,680
Speaker 3: life becomes very much entangled with this little lie until

539
00:32:48,720 --> 00:32:51,560
Speaker 3: it's become a huge lie. I feel a lot of

540
00:32:51,600 --> 00:32:55,200
Speaker 3: empathy toward the Fox sisters because I feel like they

541
00:32:55,240 --> 00:32:58,160
Speaker 3: got caught up in that and at a certain point

542
00:32:58,480 --> 00:33:02,320
Speaker 3: they could not extricate themselves because there was just way

543
00:33:02,400 --> 00:33:04,920
Speaker 3: too much pressure to keep the story going.

544
00:33:05,800 --> 00:33:09,280
Speaker 1: Right. Yeah, okay, so again, I love that comparison. These

545
00:33:09,320 --> 00:33:15,520
Speaker 1: are children, To be clear, these are not cynical, you know,

546
00:33:16,440 --> 00:33:21,840
Speaker 1: late middle aged grifters. These are kids who one day

547
00:33:21,880 --> 00:33:26,600
Speaker 1: tell their mom something is talking to us by knocking

548
00:33:26,720 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 1: on the walls or the furniture, and we'll show you, mom.

549
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:36,240
Speaker 1: And the mom asked, how many children do I, mother

550
00:33:36,400 --> 00:33:41,880
Speaker 1: fox have? And the spirit appeared to communicate the correct

551
00:33:41,920 --> 00:33:48,959
Speaker 1: number of children through taps and knocks, and they later

552
00:33:50,320 --> 00:33:54,440
Speaker 1: you'll hear this story describe different ways. But sometimes they'll

553
00:33:54,440 --> 00:34:01,120
Speaker 1: say Maggie and Kate intentionally sought out a neighbor and

554
00:34:01,200 --> 00:34:03,640
Speaker 1: chase them down to tell them the story. But then

555
00:34:03,800 --> 00:34:07,000
Speaker 1: other times it sounds like they just ran into their

556
00:34:07,040 --> 00:34:10,799
Speaker 1: neighbor and they said, hey, every night around bedtime, we

557
00:34:10,840 --> 00:34:14,799
Speaker 1: hear a series of knocks and raps and they're definitely

558
00:34:14,840 --> 00:34:20,200
Speaker 1: coming from some other worldly, intelligent force. And the neighbor says,

559
00:34:22,040 --> 00:34:26,319
Speaker 1: you're like eleven and fourteen. Are you serious? But I

560
00:34:26,400 --> 00:34:29,640
Speaker 1: don't have cable, I don't have television yet, I do

561
00:34:29,800 --> 00:34:33,239
Speaker 1: need to be entertained. I'll go to your house. You

562
00:34:33,440 --> 00:34:37,200
Speaker 1: show me what's happening. And they persuade the neighbor yeah.

563
00:34:37,120 --> 00:34:42,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, and it's it's an effective demonstration because to

564
00:34:42,239 --> 00:34:48,040
Speaker 3: the neighbor's perspective, there's no visual cause of the rapping

565
00:34:48,160 --> 00:34:51,960
Speaker 3: sound like, it's not obvious to the neighbor. And so

566
00:34:52,640 --> 00:34:58,120
Speaker 3: the next conclusion they jump to is that some unseen

567
00:34:58,320 --> 00:35:01,480
Speaker 3: force is making this noise. And again, we're in an

568
00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:05,759
Speaker 3: era where unseen forces are becoming more and more of

569
00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:09,520
Speaker 3: a known quantity. We don't understand them fully yet, but

570
00:35:09,560 --> 00:35:14,799
Speaker 3: we're talking about things like electromagnetic radiation, where again you

571
00:35:14,840 --> 00:35:16,840
Speaker 3: can't see it, but you can see the effects. So

572
00:35:17,160 --> 00:35:17,680
Speaker 3: why not.

573
00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:22,000
Speaker 1: And we've got to give credit here to the Fox family.

574
00:35:23,040 --> 00:35:27,359
Speaker 1: They hear this news word is spreading around they're part

575
00:35:27,400 --> 00:35:32,239
Speaker 1: of town, that something odd is going on at their household,

576
00:35:32,640 --> 00:35:36,680
Speaker 1: and they make the decision that everyone should make at

577
00:35:36,680 --> 00:35:40,279
Speaker 1: the beginning of a horror film. They say, we're going

578
00:35:40,360 --> 00:35:40,799
Speaker 1: to leave.

579
00:35:41,400 --> 00:35:42,760
Speaker 3: Too bad, we can't stay.

580
00:35:43,400 --> 00:35:47,400
Speaker 1: Too bad, we can't stay. And they sent Maggie and

581
00:35:47,440 --> 00:35:51,600
Speaker 1: Kate to live with their older sister, Leah Fox her

582
00:35:52,120 --> 00:35:56,840
Speaker 1: married name was Leah Fox Fish over Rochester. And that's

583
00:35:56,880 --> 00:36:01,560
Speaker 1: where things get interesting, because Rochester has its own sort

584
00:36:01,560 --> 00:36:05,680
Speaker 1: of mil you or folklore or past.

585
00:36:06,480 --> 00:36:12,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, this will become the birthplace of numerous movements, right,

586
00:36:12,200 --> 00:36:16,400
Speaker 3: not just spiritualism, but others as well, which to me

587
00:36:16,560 --> 00:36:19,759
Speaker 3: is just kind of again it's a convergence that I

588
00:36:19,840 --> 00:36:23,520
Speaker 3: find really fascinating, Like I would love to learn more

589
00:36:24,520 --> 00:36:29,160
Speaker 3: about the history and development of Rochester and what were

590
00:36:29,200 --> 00:36:34,239
Speaker 3: the root causes or maybe root elements that kind of

591
00:36:34,320 --> 00:36:39,000
Speaker 3: allowed this to foment, because it is maybe it's just

592
00:36:39,080 --> 00:36:42,839
Speaker 3: coincidence and it has no connective tissue whatsoever. But I

593
00:36:42,880 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 3: did not know any of this before we started putting

594
00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:47,920
Speaker 3: these notes together.

595
00:36:48,680 --> 00:36:52,200
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, it's your earlier point. This is

596
00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:57,040
Speaker 1: the birthplace of Mormonism. The finger links reach it as

597
00:36:57,080 --> 00:37:02,040
Speaker 1: well as Millerism, which eventually becomes Seven Day Adventism. So

598
00:37:02,160 --> 00:37:06,880
Speaker 1: the local population, we could say, is already primed to

599
00:37:07,239 --> 00:37:12,960
Speaker 1: question existing ideology or spiritual belief systems, and they're already

600
00:37:12,960 --> 00:37:18,440
Speaker 1: primed to be open minded to alternate pitches.

601
00:37:18,920 --> 00:37:22,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking after I

602
00:37:22,200 --> 00:37:25,280
Speaker 2: posed that initial question about, like, you know, the religiosity

603
00:37:25,800 --> 00:37:30,360
Speaker 2: of the United States, because it was at this point

604
00:37:30,920 --> 00:37:34,200
Speaker 2: secularism was starting to creep in a little bit more

605
00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:37,800
Speaker 2: and so it was a little more almost in vogue

606
00:37:37,880 --> 00:37:40,319
Speaker 2: to question some of these norms, which is I think

607
00:37:40,400 --> 00:37:50,560
Speaker 2: really the attitude that allowed this stuff to flourish.

608
00:37:50,600 --> 00:37:54,960
Speaker 1: This is where we get to the upper crust of Rochester.

609
00:37:56,000 --> 00:38:00,520
Speaker 1: Isaac and Amy Post. Now they're doing very well for

610
00:38:00,600 --> 00:38:04,080
Speaker 1: their time and their area. They're not having the best

611
00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:08,799
Speaker 1: personal life because they've recently lost a daughter. So they

612
00:38:08,880 --> 00:38:13,440
Speaker 1: are intrigued by the story of the Fox sisters, especially

613
00:38:13,520 --> 00:38:16,960
Speaker 1: this rumor that's been growing that says the spirit they

614
00:38:16,960 --> 00:38:20,440
Speaker 1: spoke to in their original home belonged to a peddler

615
00:38:20,760 --> 00:38:24,319
Speaker 1: who had been murdered five years earlier at the farmhouse.

616
00:38:24,520 --> 00:38:27,759
Speaker 1: No one can prove it. Law in order SVU is

617
00:38:27,800 --> 00:38:31,920
Speaker 1: not really a thing, right, nor is honestly forensic science.

618
00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:38,200
Speaker 1: So from there, based off this story, the Post family says, hey,

619
00:38:38,320 --> 00:38:41,799
Speaker 1: Fox kiddos, come to our house. We want to see

620
00:38:41,840 --> 00:38:45,759
Speaker 1: if you can communicate with spirits in a different location.

621
00:38:46,680 --> 00:38:50,400
Speaker 1: Whatever they heard, they were convinced. They said, hey, we

622
00:38:50,480 --> 00:38:53,560
Speaker 1: can hear the Knox the raps. We think the older

623
00:38:53,680 --> 00:38:57,560
Speaker 1: sister Leah is a medium as well. She put us

624
00:38:57,600 --> 00:39:02,040
Speaker 1: in touch with our daughter. Know our daughter has recently died.

625
00:39:03,280 --> 00:39:06,719
Speaker 1: This would prove to be the engine of spiritualism's success.

626
00:39:07,920 --> 00:39:10,360
Speaker 1: To the earlier point, targeting the vulnerable.

627
00:39:11,000 --> 00:39:15,279
Speaker 3: Yeah, grief is a powerful motivator, as we will see

628
00:39:15,320 --> 00:39:18,680
Speaker 3: time and again when we go through these stories that

629
00:39:19,520 --> 00:39:23,040
Speaker 3: it's what allows the opportunity for people who would take

630
00:39:23,080 --> 00:39:25,600
Speaker 3: advantage of others.

631
00:39:25,680 --> 00:39:27,799
Speaker 2: Hope as a hell of a drug, right it is,

632
00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:32,959
Speaker 2: it is truly if you're offered that whatever, however long

633
00:39:33,040 --> 00:39:35,320
Speaker 2: of a shot it might seem. And I've been watching

634
00:39:35,320 --> 00:39:39,160
Speaker 2: this show, The Pit on HBO. It's like a hospital show,

635
00:39:39,400 --> 00:39:44,200
Speaker 2: and there's a plot line where these parents have basically

636
00:39:44,239 --> 00:39:47,360
Speaker 2: their child has potentially become brain dead due to a

637
00:39:47,440 --> 00:39:52,799
Speaker 2: drug overdose, and they keep insisting on further tests and

638
00:39:52,920 --> 00:39:56,480
Speaker 2: further tests and further tests, holding out the hope that

639
00:39:56,520 --> 00:39:58,520
Speaker 2: one of these tests is going to be the one

640
00:39:58,320 --> 00:40:02,399
Speaker 2: that truly allows them to believe that he might come back.

641
00:40:02,800 --> 00:40:03,520
Speaker 1: And it's it's.

642
00:40:03,480 --> 00:40:06,560
Speaker 2: It's heartbreaking to see because the doctor the whole time

643
00:40:06,680 --> 00:40:09,279
Speaker 2: kind of knows that it's futile, but he also sort

644
00:40:09,320 --> 00:40:11,000
Speaker 2: of on the fence because he wants to give them

645
00:40:11,000 --> 00:40:13,520
Speaker 2: a little bit of hope. But some of his colleagues

646
00:40:13,520 --> 00:40:15,960
Speaker 2: are like, it's false hope. But that's a tricky thing.

647
00:40:16,640 --> 00:40:20,000
Speaker 3: This would also be when we'd see it had already

648
00:40:20,000 --> 00:40:22,000
Speaker 3: been a technique for you know, for as long as

649
00:40:22,040 --> 00:40:25,200
Speaker 3: humans have been able to manipulate one another, but sort

650
00:40:25,200 --> 00:40:28,560
Speaker 3: of a codified approach to what we would call cold

651
00:40:28,600 --> 00:40:32,880
Speaker 3: reading or or worm reading. You know, obviously, cold reading

652
00:40:32,960 --> 00:40:36,319
Speaker 3: is where you go very general with your statements and

653
00:40:36,360 --> 00:40:39,239
Speaker 3: then you start to see what's hitting and you gradually

654
00:40:39,360 --> 00:40:40,400
Speaker 3: get more specific.

655
00:40:40,800 --> 00:40:46,840
Speaker 1: I'm hearing you, I'm hearing you know a a person,

656
00:40:48,400 --> 00:40:50,239
Speaker 1: I'm hearing their name is.

657
00:40:58,840 --> 00:41:02,120
Speaker 2: Some people are better added than There's some mentalism involved

658
00:41:02,120 --> 00:41:05,319
Speaker 2: in this idea of sort of reading the room and

659
00:41:05,360 --> 00:41:08,879
Speaker 2: then listening and looking for certain tells, right, And I mean,

660
00:41:09,000 --> 00:41:12,879
Speaker 2: folks that can do this convincingly are employing a lot

661
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:16,080
Speaker 2: of interesting techniques and bits of psychology.

662
00:41:16,400 --> 00:41:19,280
Speaker 3: And of course sometimes it's not totally cold either. Sometimes

663
00:41:19,360 --> 00:41:21,759
Speaker 3: they might go in with a point or two of

664
00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:25,200
Speaker 3: data that they can use to kind of establish a

665
00:41:25,239 --> 00:41:27,799
Speaker 3: foundation and then build upon it. And I'm not even

666
00:41:27,800 --> 00:41:31,399
Speaker 3: suggesting that everyone who does this does so with the

667
00:41:31,480 --> 00:41:34,359
Speaker 3: knowing intent to deceive. It may be that they are

668
00:41:34,440 --> 00:41:38,759
Speaker 3: not really consciously doing this, but that is the same.

669
00:41:38,800 --> 00:41:42,319
Speaker 3: They're essentially following the same roadmap. They just didn't do

670
00:41:42,440 --> 00:41:47,319
Speaker 3: it in a malicious way. But there are plenty who have.

671
00:41:48,080 --> 00:41:54,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, they drink through flavor age. Perhaps they believe. Yeah, okay,

672
00:41:54,600 --> 00:41:56,319
Speaker 1: all right, we're here for the long haul.

673
00:41:56,920 --> 00:42:00,840
Speaker 3: So the troubles, the troubles jonestown. Do we want to

674
00:42:00,880 --> 00:42:02,279
Speaker 3: throw in any others in here?

675
00:42:02,960 --> 00:42:05,200
Speaker 1: Oh gosh, we'll keep going. We'll see where we go.

676
00:42:05,480 --> 00:42:07,600
Speaker 2: I mentioned nine to eleven one you did have a.

677
00:42:07,640 --> 00:42:11,560
Speaker 1: Drink as a cocktail proposition and the okay, so the

678
00:42:11,600 --> 00:42:17,600
Speaker 1: Post family they are impressed. They, for whatever reason, they

679
00:42:17,960 --> 00:42:22,160
Speaker 1: genuinely feel the Fox sisters have connected them to their

680
00:42:22,239 --> 00:42:26,680
Speaker 1: daughter who died too soon. They stage another get together

681
00:42:27,239 --> 00:42:31,160
Speaker 1: in the largest public hall in Rochester. We're talking four

682
00:42:31,239 --> 00:42:36,719
Speaker 1: hundred people coming to watch this show. Afterwards, skeptics examine

683
00:42:36,719 --> 00:42:41,160
Speaker 1: the Fox sisters and they say, we have no idea. Oh,

684
00:42:41,200 --> 00:42:43,839
Speaker 1: they could have faked these noises. They don't have any

685
00:42:43,920 --> 00:42:48,600
Speaker 1: little hammers, clackers, or wood blocks or moroccas, which is

686
00:42:48,600 --> 00:42:51,160
Speaker 1: a thing we don't know exist. At the time, they

687
00:42:51,200 --> 00:42:51,960
Speaker 1: said to each.

688
00:42:51,760 --> 00:42:55,360
Speaker 3: Other, same reason why they were having so much trouble

689
00:42:55,680 --> 00:42:57,200
Speaker 3: with what dreams may come?

690
00:42:57,360 --> 00:43:02,080
Speaker 1: You know? Right? Right? All right there we get to

691
00:43:03,120 --> 00:43:05,839
Speaker 1: we can fast forward a bit. This is where we

692
00:43:05,880 --> 00:43:10,840
Speaker 1: see our buddy Davis. He hears about the Rochester incident

693
00:43:11,239 --> 00:43:13,960
Speaker 1: and he says, oh, Fox sisters come to my home

694
00:43:14,040 --> 00:43:17,440
Speaker 1: in the Big Apple. Let me watch your show for myself.

695
00:43:18,000 --> 00:43:20,399
Speaker 1: I want to figure out if it jibes with what

696
00:43:20,560 --> 00:43:26,840
Speaker 1: I think about the universe and everything involved. And he

697
00:43:27,000 --> 00:43:30,800
Speaker 1: knew this is again that third cynical point. He knew

698
00:43:30,840 --> 00:43:35,040
Speaker 1: that if he co signed these kids and said they

699
00:43:35,080 --> 00:43:40,480
Speaker 1: were legitimate mediums, then this could be good for his

700
00:43:40,600 --> 00:43:44,000
Speaker 1: career as a self professed prophet.

701
00:43:44,480 --> 00:43:47,279
Speaker 3: Yeah, typical agent.

702
00:43:47,719 --> 00:43:52,880
Speaker 2: Right right, looking for the angle and the percentage. Thus

703
00:43:54,080 --> 00:43:58,040
Speaker 2: was the birth of spiritualism, and business was hot, guys.

704
00:43:58,160 --> 00:43:59,759
Speaker 2: It was really taken off.

705
00:44:00,080 --> 00:44:02,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, it turns out at a lot of people are dying,

706
00:44:02,480 --> 00:44:03,800
Speaker 3: so that that kind of helped.

707
00:44:04,040 --> 00:44:06,200
Speaker 2: It is a it is a regular occurrence. It is

708
00:44:06,239 --> 00:44:09,719
Speaker 2: sort of part of life. So spiritualism really really was

709
00:44:09,800 --> 00:44:13,840
Speaker 2: off to the races. To your point, Jonathan, it appealed

710
00:44:13,920 --> 00:44:20,520
Speaker 2: to Americans weary of the kind of more pedantic, kind

711
00:44:20,520 --> 00:44:26,400
Speaker 2: of calvinistic approach to predestination. It allowed people that considered

712
00:44:26,440 --> 00:44:32,680
Speaker 2: themselves to be reform minded open to new ideas of

713
00:44:32,719 --> 00:44:35,799
Speaker 2: the mid nineteenth century. It was a great way of

714
00:44:36,120 --> 00:44:40,480
Speaker 2: you know, kind of bolstering some of the beliefs about oneself.

715
00:44:40,640 --> 00:44:43,200
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, you could feel like you could really manifest

716
00:44:43,239 --> 00:44:43,880
Speaker 3: your destiny.

717
00:44:44,480 --> 00:44:48,120
Speaker 1: Ut. Yeah, it has this new car smell to it.

718
00:44:48,200 --> 00:44:51,640
Speaker 1: Spiritualism a lot of we talked about how a lot

719
00:44:51,680 --> 00:44:56,160
Speaker 1: of Christian denominations, Catholicism in particular, make this big deal

720
00:44:56,160 --> 00:44:59,440
Speaker 1: about the concept of intercession. You've got to have a

721
00:44:59,480 --> 00:45:04,120
Speaker 1: middleman and between you and divinity. Spiritualism takes that old

722
00:45:04,200 --> 00:45:08,360
Speaker 1: chestnut and kind of rolls it across the table. American

723
00:45:08,440 --> 00:45:14,160
Speaker 1: spiritualists in particular are saying, Okay, I can have through

724
00:45:14,200 --> 00:45:18,360
Speaker 1: a medium or through my own training, direct communication with

725
00:45:18,440 --> 00:45:22,000
Speaker 1: those who have passed. They will give me insight into

726
00:45:22,080 --> 00:45:25,160
Speaker 1: the ultimate fate of the soul, which means that I

727
00:45:25,200 --> 00:45:28,719
Speaker 1: can have a direct hand in my own salvation. This

728
00:45:28,840 --> 00:45:32,440
Speaker 1: is the can do American attitude of the time. Forget

729
00:45:32,440 --> 00:45:36,480
Speaker 1: the stuffy books, forget those crotchety, creepy priests. I'm gonna

730
00:45:36,560 --> 00:45:39,560
Speaker 1: roll up my sleeves, I'm gonna hold a seance. I

731
00:45:39,640 --> 00:45:41,440
Speaker 1: will be the person who saves my soul.

732
00:45:41,760 --> 00:45:45,759
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, you can see elements of this to

733
00:45:45,840 --> 00:45:48,880
Speaker 3: this day, right, Like you know, the Parker Brothers Weija

734
00:45:48,960 --> 00:45:53,440
Speaker 3: board is in many ways the descendant of this kind

735
00:45:53,560 --> 00:45:56,120
Speaker 3: of thing where you get a group of friends together

736
00:45:56,200 --> 00:46:00,640
Speaker 3: and you're able to commune with either spirits or other

737
00:46:01,000 --> 00:46:07,200
Speaker 3: ethereal entities that that communicate through you, like everything from

738
00:46:07,239 --> 00:46:11,799
Speaker 3: automatic writing to there was telegraphy, there were spiritual telegraphy

739
00:46:11,840 --> 00:46:14,960
Speaker 3: at this time, Like there were all these different, uh,

740
00:46:15,800 --> 00:46:21,600
Speaker 3: possible conduits of communication that were being explored and exploited

741
00:46:22,000 --> 00:46:24,640
Speaker 3: by mediums of the of the age.

742
00:46:24,800 --> 00:46:29,120
Speaker 1: Oh, and the Fox Sisters go on tour, right, This

743
00:46:29,320 --> 00:46:31,280
Speaker 1: was always interesting to me. Yeah.

744
00:46:31,320 --> 00:46:36,920
Speaker 2: They conducted their sessions in various homes of affluence, you know,

745
00:46:37,239 --> 00:46:41,560
Speaker 2: of community members across the country. One in particular or

746
00:46:41,840 --> 00:46:44,880
Speaker 2: infamous series of sessions took place in the parlor of

747
00:46:44,960 --> 00:46:49,520
Speaker 2: the Barnum Hotel, which was owned by the cousin of

748
00:46:50,520 --> 00:46:54,759
Speaker 2: mister Barnum himself, the greatest, the greatest showman. They were

749
00:46:54,760 --> 00:46:57,440
Speaker 2: born every minute, one hundred percent. I don't think is

750
00:46:57,440 --> 00:47:00,640
Speaker 2: lost on us, the the the irony there. Maybe it's

751
00:47:00,640 --> 00:47:02,400
Speaker 2: I don't know irony is the right word, but it

752
00:47:02,480 --> 00:47:06,440
Speaker 2: is fascinating that the Barnum you know, was such a

753
00:47:06,560 --> 00:47:09,399
Speaker 2: huckster himself, and then this name shows up here as well.

754
00:47:09,600 --> 00:47:13,080
Speaker 2: And they did three shows a day around this giant

755
00:47:13,120 --> 00:47:15,680
Speaker 2: table where they would invite as many as thirty folks

756
00:47:15,719 --> 00:47:18,080
Speaker 2: to attend. They did at ten o'clock, a five o'clock,

757
00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:23,680
Speaker 2: and an eight o'clock, occasionally taking time aside for private

758
00:47:23,800 --> 00:47:25,080
Speaker 2: meetings in between.

759
00:47:25,239 --> 00:47:27,799
Speaker 1: I imagine those were costs a little more.

760
00:47:28,200 --> 00:47:30,279
Speaker 3: I like the fact that you know they did the

761
00:47:30,280 --> 00:47:34,400
Speaker 3: whole stage door thing like this really does feel like

762
00:47:35,320 --> 00:47:38,960
Speaker 3: the equivalent of going to see a Broadway show today.

763
00:47:39,560 --> 00:47:42,880
Speaker 1: Oh, one hundred percent. Yeah. And there were plenty of people,

764
00:47:43,200 --> 00:47:47,800
Speaker 1: to be clear, who denounced the Fox Sisters as fakes.

765
00:47:48,600 --> 00:47:53,200
Speaker 1: And some people did correctly guess that they were just

766
00:47:53,360 --> 00:47:58,399
Speaker 1: cracking their joints their toes in particular, but a lot

767
00:47:58,440 --> 00:48:01,279
Speaker 1: of other people did believe if they were witnessing a

768
00:48:01,480 --> 00:48:06,560
Speaker 1: true paranormal phenomenon. The admission was one dollar at the time.

769
00:48:07,200 --> 00:48:11,560
Speaker 1: The visitors were not your average hey walking into New Yorker.

770
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:15,560
Speaker 1: This show did, to your point, Jonathan, become the thing

771
00:48:15,719 --> 00:48:20,640
Speaker 1: to see, like going to see Hamilton, right, whatever the

772
00:48:20,680 --> 00:48:24,719
Speaker 1: modern Broadway hit is. And so all of the all

773
00:48:24,760 --> 00:48:28,959
Speaker 1: the great minds and the upper crust wanted to hang

774
00:48:28,960 --> 00:48:32,319
Speaker 1: out with the Fox Sisters. You see philanthropists like New

775
00:48:32,400 --> 00:48:36,000
Speaker 1: York Society guys Horace Greeley, the editor of the New

776
00:48:36,080 --> 00:48:41,040
Speaker 1: York Tribune. You see poets like William Colin Bryant. You

777
00:48:41,239 --> 00:48:46,320
Speaker 1: also see abolitionist and social activists like William Lloyd Garrison,

778
00:48:46,360 --> 00:48:49,800
Speaker 1: and each of these people walks away from the show

779
00:48:50,640 --> 00:48:53,239
Speaker 1: most of the time at the beginning, they walk away

780
00:48:53,280 --> 00:49:00,000
Speaker 1: from the show thinking that whatever these spirits said absolutely supports, validates,

781
00:49:00,120 --> 00:49:02,880
Speaker 1: and encourages their pre existing beliefs.

782
00:49:03,320 --> 00:49:06,040
Speaker 2: And you know, we talked about this recently with the

783
00:49:06,080 --> 00:49:11,880
Speaker 2: incredible hosts of the podcast Hoaxed about the incident involving

784
00:49:12,360 --> 00:49:16,400
Speaker 2: also two young girls who kind of faked picture a

785
00:49:16,440 --> 00:49:20,560
Speaker 2: picture a photograph of these fairies, and it came up

786
00:49:20,600 --> 00:49:23,759
Speaker 2: that they were pretty easily spotted as fake, but the

787
00:49:23,880 --> 00:49:28,000
Speaker 2: power of belief was so strong that many learned individuals

788
00:49:28,400 --> 00:49:32,200
Speaker 2: were taken in by it, including Sir Arthur Conan Doyle,

789
00:49:32,640 --> 00:49:35,880
Speaker 2: who is like the king of like reasoning and deduction

790
00:49:36,200 --> 00:49:40,360
Speaker 2: through his character. Anyway of Sherlock Holmes.

791
00:49:39,360 --> 00:49:42,960
Speaker 3: His name will come back into play in this conversation

792
00:49:43,040 --> 00:49:47,480
Speaker 3: as well, because he was we'll talk more about the

793
00:49:47,600 --> 00:49:52,719
Speaker 3: reasons why he began to embrace spiritualism. But the yeah,

794
00:49:52,880 --> 00:49:56,000
Speaker 3: actually the calling fairies, like the birth of photography is

795
00:49:56,040 --> 00:49:59,920
Speaker 3: another thing that I think helps contribute to the right

796
00:50:00,200 --> 00:50:02,640
Speaker 3: of spiritualism because again you're able to capture a moment

797
00:50:02,680 --> 00:50:05,400
Speaker 3: in time, and it seems.

798
00:50:05,080 --> 00:50:07,239
Speaker 1: A little woo woo even now, like with that does

799
00:50:07,280 --> 00:50:07,600
Speaker 1: that work?

800
00:50:07,640 --> 00:50:11,120
Speaker 3: It's crazy And it has a connection with death right

801
00:50:11,239 --> 00:50:16,760
Speaker 3: because in Victorian England, one of the big ideas behind

802
00:50:16,840 --> 00:50:21,520
Speaker 3: grief was to take a post mortem photo with your

803
00:50:21,680 --> 00:50:24,160
Speaker 3: recently deceased family member and the rest of the family

804
00:50:24,200 --> 00:50:28,319
Speaker 3: all gathered around them to preserve that memory forever. So

805
00:50:28,800 --> 00:50:34,320
Speaker 3: there is an association between the supernatural and technology because

806
00:50:34,400 --> 00:50:38,240
Speaker 3: to most people photography seemed akin to magic.

807
00:50:38,719 --> 00:50:41,439
Speaker 2: It is, like I said, I mean, I'm not even

808
00:50:41,560 --> 00:50:44,319
Speaker 2: being sarcastic. So many of those things, even to this

809
00:50:44,440 --> 00:50:46,239
Speaker 2: day feel that way to me. I mean, I know

810
00:50:46,280 --> 00:50:48,880
Speaker 2: they can be explained, but it is, for all intents

811
00:50:48,880 --> 00:50:51,640
Speaker 2: and purposes, a certain kind of magic. Not to mention

812
00:50:52,320 --> 00:50:56,440
Speaker 2: versions of what you're talking about, Jonathan, pre photography, where

813
00:50:56,600 --> 00:50:59,960
Speaker 2: things like death masks were created, you know, to preserve

814
00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:03,600
Speaker 2: of a similar way, you know, the image of a

815
00:51:03,640 --> 00:51:04,799
Speaker 2: deceased loved.

816
00:51:04,960 --> 00:51:08,600
Speaker 1: Shout out to everybody who just recited that Arthur C.

817
00:51:08,719 --> 00:51:12,879
Speaker 1: Clark quote in their head. And here we see that

818
00:51:12,960 --> 00:51:20,160
Speaker 1: the Fox sisters continue their they continue their path to stardom.

819
00:51:20,680 --> 00:51:23,560
Speaker 1: Leah will stay in New York for a while, and

820
00:51:23,760 --> 00:51:28,320
Speaker 1: Kate and Maggie go on the road Cleveland, Cincinnati, Columbus, Washington,

821
00:51:28,400 --> 00:51:31,839
Speaker 1: Philadelphia and more. For now, we're going to give the

822
00:51:31,920 --> 00:51:35,800
Speaker 1: Fox clan a break. We're going to learn how spiritualism

823
00:51:35,920 --> 00:51:42,200
Speaker 1: overall skyrocketed in popularity and then why it fell. That's

824
00:51:42,280 --> 00:51:44,280
Speaker 1: our flat twist right there, folks.

825
00:51:44,840 --> 00:51:48,759
Speaker 2: Indeed, I am looking forward to it so huge. Thanks

826
00:51:48,760 --> 00:51:53,680
Speaker 2: to Jonathan Stricklin, the quizzer, who's here to be Thanks

827
00:51:53,680 --> 00:51:56,080
Speaker 2: to his to his face, and thank.

828
00:51:55,800 --> 00:51:59,320
Speaker 1: You for being so well behaved today. Of course, I

829
00:51:59,360 --> 00:52:00,239
Speaker 1: mean like.

830
00:52:00,200 --> 00:52:04,520
Speaker 3: You're you're talking about a subject that has fascinated me

831
00:52:04,640 --> 00:52:08,800
Speaker 3: since literally since childhood. So I was so excited to

832
00:52:08,800 --> 00:52:12,120
Speaker 3: be on here. I hope I did not interject too much.

833
00:52:12,040 --> 00:52:14,239
Speaker 1: Not at all. But it is also clear why you

834
00:52:14,320 --> 00:52:15,160
Speaker 1: are the way you are.

835
00:52:16,760 --> 00:52:18,560
Speaker 3: Wos fair?

836
00:52:18,719 --> 00:52:19,120
Speaker 1: That's fair?

837
00:52:19,160 --> 00:52:20,680
Speaker 3: All right, I'm gonna be quiet. Now, why don't we

838
00:52:20,719 --> 00:52:21,440
Speaker 3: outro the show?

839
00:52:21,600 --> 00:52:24,120
Speaker 1: No? No, come on, you got to co sign us

840
00:52:24,120 --> 00:52:26,399
Speaker 1: on some of this. Uh. I think we can all

841
00:52:26,480 --> 00:52:29,640
Speaker 1: agree that we will a big, big thanks to our

842
00:52:30,160 --> 00:52:34,080
Speaker 1: guest super producer, Dylan the Tennessee pal Fake and Dylan,

843
00:52:34,680 --> 00:52:36,840
Speaker 1: how do we go? How's our wija? Board looking for

844
00:52:36,880 --> 00:52:38,680
Speaker 1: this one. Sorry, what'd you say?

845
00:52:40,760 --> 00:52:43,520
Speaker 2: That's that's the response I always get whenever I talked

846
00:52:43,560 --> 00:52:44,319
Speaker 2: to the Ouigi board.

847
00:52:44,440 --> 00:52:47,000
Speaker 1: It's like, excuse, I'm sorry I didn't catch that. Check

848
00:52:47,080 --> 00:52:52,920
Speaker 1: back later as the Ouiji board might. Yeah, you, guys,

849
00:52:53,000 --> 00:52:58,120
Speaker 1: I am clear. I got years ago for uh for

850
00:52:58,360 --> 00:53:02,040
Speaker 1: my girl, I got a uh Guda Tama version of

851
00:53:02,080 --> 00:53:04,960
Speaker 1: a magic eight ball. Guda Tama is a very lazy

852
00:53:05,080 --> 00:53:10,160
Speaker 1: egg in Japanese culture. It's like a famous character and

853
00:53:10,680 --> 00:53:14,439
Speaker 1: it always says for another time. And that's what we're

854
00:53:14,440 --> 00:53:17,720
Speaker 1: doing today. Join us later in the week. We can't

855
00:53:17,719 --> 00:53:20,120
Speaker 1: wait to come back with part two of the Rise

856
00:53:20,160 --> 00:53:24,200
Speaker 1: and Fall the Spiritualism Movement, featuring none other than our

857
00:53:24,239 --> 00:53:27,400
Speaker 1: own Jonathan Strickland aka the Quister.

858
00:53:28,040 --> 00:53:31,520
Speaker 2: Thanks, guys, huge, thanks to christ Frasiotis names Jeff Coats

859
00:53:31,560 --> 00:53:36,120
Speaker 2: here in Spirit, super producer, Max the Madman Williams and.

860
00:53:35,960 --> 00:53:39,040
Speaker 1: His brother Alex Williams who composed this bang, and Bob

861
00:53:39,520 --> 00:53:42,760
Speaker 1: Big Big thanks to doctor Rachel Big Spinach, Lance aj

862
00:53:42,960 --> 00:53:47,160
Speaker 1: Bahamas Jacobs, and of course the Rude Dude's a Ridiculous crime.

863
00:53:47,320 --> 00:53:51,439
Speaker 1: If you like us, you'll love them. Everybody. Check out

864
00:53:51,480 --> 00:53:57,000
Speaker 1: the old episodes of Tech stuff about similar historical events.

865
00:53:57,400 --> 00:53:58,680
Speaker 1: We'll see you next time, folks.

866
00:54:05,719 --> 00:54:09,560
Speaker 2: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

867
00:54:09,600 --> 00:54:11,760
Speaker 2: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.