Talking to the Dead (33 page)

15.
For information on marriage and divorce, see Nancy Cott,
Public Vows: A History of Marriage and the Nation
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000), 30–40.

16.
On John's alcoholism and subsequent sobriety, see Pond,
Time Is Kind,
7–8. See also W. G. Langworthy Taylor,
Katie Fox, Epochmaking Medium and the Making of the Fox-Taylor Record
(New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1933), 98.

17.
Kate and Maggie's birth dates are found in a letter from Titus Merritt to Mrs. Mary T. Longley, National Spiritualist Association Secretary, February 14, 1903, Archives of the National Spiritualist Association of Churches, Lily Dale, New York. As mentioned earlier, there is controversy surrounding the girls' birth dates. Margaret's earliest mention refers to Kate as “about twelve” and Maggie as “in her fifteenth year.” Merritt's dates, which are the dates inscribed on the sisters' gravestone, would mean that Kate had just turned eleven on March 31, 1848. Other estimates, including one put forth by Maggie in 1888, make the girls as young as six and eight in 1848. Merritt's figures at least have the virtue of some specificity, and they roughly coincide with some of the earliest existing descriptions of the girls.

18.
On where Kate and Maggie were raised, see Pond,
Time Is Kind,
8. Their father's having a farm in Prince Edward County is confirmed in a letter from John Moodie to Professor Gregory, June 22, 1857, in Susanna Moodie,
Letters of Love and Duty: The Correspondence of Susanna and John Moodie,
ed. Carl Ballstadt, Elizabeth Hopkins, and Michael
Peterman (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), 228. The area is described by Nick and Helma Mika,
The Settlement of Prince Edward County
(Belleville, Ontario: Mika, 1984), 154. For information on Canadian life at the time, see J. M. Bumsted, ed.,
Interpreting Canada's Past,
vol. 1,
Preconfederation,
2nd ed. (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1993).

19.
This and the next quote by Susanna Moodie are from
Roughing It in the Bush, or Life in Canada,
with a new introduction by Margaret Atwood (1852; repr., Boston: Beacon Press, 1987), 515, 501.

20.
John's purchase of a burial plot is recorded in
Mt. Hope Cemetery, Internment Index,
Vol. 1,
1837–1860
(Rochester: Rochester Genealogical Society, 1996). John J. Smith's land deed appears in Land Records, Wayne County Clerk's Office, Lyons, New York, bk. 30, p. 414.

21.
On Rochester street directories, see Jackson,
Spirit Rappers,
23. For the deaths of Maria and Jacob Smith, see
Mt. Hope Cemetery Internment Index.

22.
For Charles Finney's impact on Rochester, see Paul E. Johnson,
A Shopkeeper's Millennium: Society and Revivals in Rochester, New York, 1815–1837
(New York: Hill and Wang, 1978).

23.
For information on Rochester, along with Johnson,
Shopkeeper's Millennium,
see Blake McKelvey,
Rochester: The Water-Power City, 1812–1854
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1945), and Nancy A. Hewitt,
Women's Activism and Social Change: Rochester, New York, 1822–1872
(Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1984), which provide illuminating descriptions of Rochester in the first half of the nineteenth century. Additional material may also be found in the journal
Rochester History,
published by the Rochester Public Library: see Martha Montague Ash, “The Social and Domestic Scene in Rochester, 1840–1860” (April 1956), 1–17; W. Stephen Thomas and Ruth Rosenberg-Naparsteck, “Sleepers' City: The Sesquicentennial History of Mt. Hope Cemetery” (October 1988), 2–23; Dorothy S. Truesdale, “The Younger Generation: Their Opinions, Pastimes, and Enterprises 1830–1850” (April 1939), 1–21.

24.
Laborers' wages are from Harriet Sigerman, “An Unfinished Battle,” in
No Small Courage: A History of Women in the United States,
ed. Nancy Cott (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 270.

25.
For a vivid portrait of the Post family and an analysis of their beliefs in relationship to the rise of Spiritualism, see Ann Braude,
Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women's Rights in Nineteenth-Century America
(Boston: Beacon Press, 1989). Her book also pointed me in the direction of the Isaac and Amy Post Family Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester.

CHAPTER 3: “VISIBLE AND INVISIBLE WORLDS”

1.
On attitudes about teaching music, see Asa Fitz, introduction to
American School Songbook Improved
(Boston: William B. Fowle and N. Capen, 1844); Maxmilian Hall, introduction to
The American Preceptor for the Piano Forte, Containing the Elementary Principles of Music,
and an Introduction to the Art of Playing on the Above Instrument
(Boston: Henry Prentiss, 1839); William B. Bradbury, introduction to
Musical Gems for School and Home: A Rich Collection of Music for the Young, Original and Arranged; with Choice Selections from the Schools of Germany and Switzerland, Together with a New, Easy, and Progressive Course of Elementary Instructions and Exercises, Constituting a Complete Musical Manual for Teachers and Students
(New York: Newman and Ivison, 1849).

2.
Fitz,
American School Songbook,
11.

3.
Leah told of her reaction to the news and her trip to Hydesville in A. Leah Underhill,
The Missing Link in Modern Spiritualism
(New York: Thomas R. Knox, 1885), 31–33.

4.
The spirits' mobility compared to the preferences of the homebody ghosts of the old world is an insight I owe to Susannah Black.

5.
Leah's account of the first visits of the spirits in Rochester are found in Underhill,
Missing Link,
33–43.

6.
The Reverend Clark's accounts of seances and the title of this chapter are found in Robert Sieber, Kathy Peterson, and Marjorie Searle, eds., “Fox Sisters in Action,”
New York History,
July 1974, 304–18, and Wheaton Phillips Webb, “The Peddler's Protest,”
New York History,
April 1943, 242–47.

7.
For information on death and mourning, see Ann Braude,
Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women's Rights in Nineteenth-Century America
(Boston: Beacon Press, 1989), and Robert V. Wells,
Facing the “King of Terrors”: Death and Society in an American Community, 1750–1990
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). For English rituals, see Pat Jalland,
Death in the Victorian Family
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), specifically chaps. 14 and 15. For information on cemeteries, see Garry Wills,
Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America
(New York: Touchstone, 1992), 64, 74. Wills's book, with its emphasis on the liminality of childhood, has been extremely influential in shaping my ideas about Kate and Maggie Fox.

8.
Accounts of the mob are drawn from Underhill,
Missing Link,
20–27; see also Webb, “Peddler's Protest,” 248–50.

9.
Underhill,
Missing Link,
46; see also
Wayne County Vital Statistics, 1847–1850,
Wayne County Historian's Office, Lyons, New York.

CHAPTER 4: “IT SEEMS TO SPREAD FAST”

1.
Isaac Post's comments come from a letter by Isaac Post to “brother and sister,” November 23, 1848, Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College.

2.
Published statement by George Willets, quoted by E. W. Capron,
Modern Spiritualism: Its Facts and Fanaticisms, Its Consistencies and Contradictions; with an Appendix
(Boston: Bela Marsh, 1855; repr., New York: Arno Press, 1976), 69–72.

3.
George Willets to Isaac Post, 1848, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library.

4.
Published statement by George Willets, quoted in Capron,
Modern Spiritualism,
72–74.

5.
For the relationship between radical politics and Spiritualism as well as for the background of the Posts as described later in this chapter, see Ann Braude,
Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women's Rights in Nineteenth-Century America
(Boston: Beacon Press, 1989), 11–16, 57–61.

6.
Willets's comments and the title of chapter 4 come from George Willets to Isaac Post, 1848, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library.

7.
Isaac Post to “brother and sister,” November 23, 1848, Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College.

8.
Sarah Fish to Amy Post, September 19, 1848, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library.

9.
Isaac Post to “brother and sister,” November 23, 1848, Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College.

10.
Isaac Post to Amy Post, May 22, 1849, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library.

11.
Isaac Post to “brother and sister,” November 23, 1848, Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College.

12.
Capron,
Modern Spiritualism,
75.

13.
A. Leah Underhill,
The Missing Link in Modern Spiritualism
(New York: Thomas R. Knox, 1885), 54.

14.
Isaac Post to Amy Post, May 15, 1849, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library.

15.
For a discussion of the contributions made by Fishbough and Brittan to the rise of Spiritualism, see R. Laurence Moore,
In Search of White Crows: Spiritualism, Parapsychology, and American Culture
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1977), 10–13.

16.
D. M. Dewey, who soon would produce one of the earliest and best-known pamphlets on spirit communication, also issued a pamphlet on the Hardenbrook trial, with the unwieldy title
Trial of Dr. John K. Hardenbrook: Indicted for the Murder of Thos. Nott, by Administering Strychnine to Him in Sufficient Quantity to Produce Death, on the 5th of February, 1849, at Rochester, N.Y. Tried at the May Term of Oyer and Terminer, 1849, Hon. Judge Marvin, Presiding
(Rochester, NY: D. M. Dewey, 1849).

17.
John S. Clackner to Isaac Post, July 7, 1849, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library.

18.
The cholera epidemic of 1849 is discussed by Robert V. Wells,
Facing the “King of Terrors”: Death and Society in an American Community, 1750–1990
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), and by Joan D. Hendrick,
Harriet Beecher Stowe: A Life
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 189.

19.
Maggie Fox to Amy Post, August 21, 1849, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library.

CHAPTER 5: “A GREAT VARIETY OF SUPERNATURAL SOUNDS”

1.
Description of Auburn seances is from E. W. Capron,
Modern Spiritualism: Its Facts and Fanaticisms, Its Consistencies and Contradictions, with an Appendix
(Boston: Bela Marsh, 1855; repr., New York: Arno Press, 1976), 100–112.

2.
Comments and chapter 5 title are from
Auburn Daily Advertiser,
quoted by Herbert Jackson Jr.,
The Spirit Rappers
(New York: Doubleday, 1972), 45.

3.
Emma Hardinge,
Modern American Spiritualism: A Twenty Years' Record of the Communion Between Earth and the World of Spirits,
with new introduction by E. J. Dingwall (1869; repr., New Hyde Park, NY: University Books, 1970), 41–42; see also Capron,
Modern Spiritualism,
87–91.

4.
R. D. Jones, “The Rochester Rappings”; William F. Peck,
The Semi-Centennial History of the City of Rochester
(Syracuse, NY: D. D. Mason, 1884), 508–18.

5.
Information in this chapter and the next about Corinthian Hall and the cultural and social side of life in Rochester comes from Martha Montague Ash, “The Social and Domestic Scene in Rochester, 1840–1860,”
Rochester History,
April 1956, and also from George Ellwood,
Some Earlier Public Amusements of Rochester, Read Before the Rochester Historical Society, 1894
(Rochester, NY: Democrat and Chronicle, 1894), 44–48.

6.
Western Argus
(Lyons, NY), August 23, 1848.

7.
New York Weekly Tribune,
January 19, 1850.

8.
Quoted by Jackson,
Spirit Rappers,
48.

9.
Jackson,
Spirit Rappers,
48; see also Capron,
Modern Spiritualism,
385.

CHAPTER 6: “THREE DAYS OF THE STRICTEST SCRUTINY”

1.
The description of Corinthian Hall comes from George Ellwood,
Some Earlier Public Amusements of Rochester, Read Before the Rochester Historical Society, 1894
(Rochester, NY: Democrat and Chronicle, 1894), 44–45.