The phenomenon of spiritistic photography as a form of mediumship has been the subject of bitter controversy since the very moment that a Boston-based engraver named William H. Mumler was the first to photograph a "spirit" in 1862. The skepticism of observers is more than justified: not a single type of mediumship gives such scope to fraudsters as the art of photographic manifestation, when a so-called "extra" detail suddenly appears on the plate - most often, the "spirit" of the deceased (mainly to the delight of relatives who thirst receive confirmation of the posthumous existence of a loved one).
I have never done any special research in this area, [6] but in the darkened rooms for seances I communicated with almost all the masters of this genre of our time. The “spirits” that appeared in my photographs did not have the slightest relation to me, my friends or relatives, so I did not have any personal reasons to feel in the phenomenon. On the other hand, there were plenty of grounds for the initial prejudice.
First of all, I was quite impressed by the revelatory demonstrations of the engineering student P. McCarthy (first the secretary of the Sheffield Society for Psychical Research, then my assistant at the London O. P. I.), who convincingly proved that pseudo-spiritual photography is not so difficult get even in perfectly controlled conditions.
McCarthy's trick was as follows. He asked the audience members to choose one of several books, and in it - to find and memorize a certain phrase, which he promised to reproduce on a photographic plate, regardless of even what language it was written in. The audience usually chose the Bible.
McCarthy would open the book “at random” -preparing it so that it flipped open to the desired page - and asked viewers to select a paragraph, providing a well-disguised suggestion to provide the desired choice. Having obtained the desired result, he invited the audience to indicate the language in which the phrase should be written, almost certainly knowing that the choice would fall on Chinese or Greek. The audience, under the influence of the methods already mentioned, almost always preferred Chinese. [7] The researcher detailed the four fallbacks he had in the October 1935 issue of Psychic Science.
Each time, the members of the commission carefully examined the false medium and even handcuffed him in the hope of excluding the possibility of fraud. No hidden devices were found in his clothes. However, the commission could not deny him at least one thing: we are talking about the notorious "darkened office", which, according to tradition, are required to provide themselves with all mediums without exception. The fact is that on the index finger of McCarthy was fixed the so-called "psycho-printer" - a cunning homemade device, cleverly disguised as skin color. To print on the photographic plate the text that the audience was waiting for, he just had to point his finger at the plate.
The success of these demonstrations exceeded all expectations: when the magician explained the essence of what was happening, the audience flatly refused to believe that they were the victims of a deliberate prank. Even McCarthy's father had no doubt that his son was a talented medium. Realizing the futility of oral self-disclosures, McCarthy gave a lengthy interview to the Armchair Science magazine (edited by my late friend AN Lowe), describing his method in great detail, using diagrams and drawings.
“The body of the“psycho printer,”as Mr. McCarthy calls his device,” we read, “is a metal cylinder about five centimeters long and about one centimeter in diameter. The tube contains three tightly fitting compartments: a filter and lenses, a tiny slide with a light bulb, and a battery. The basis of the two-chamber battery, which feeds the light bulb by means of a contact spring, is zinc and carbon in a weak solution of sulfuric acid with the addition of potassium biochromate as a depolarizer. Since the electromagnetic force of each camera is about two volts, a voltage of almost 4 volts is applied to the bulb: it burns very brightly and provides an almost point beam of light. The slide is fixed in front of the lamp with elastic stops and a small hook. A filter is installed in front of the focusing lens,cutting off the visible part of the spectrum and transmitting only violet and ultraviolet rays. This clever flesh-colored device attaches with two rings to the index finger, so you just need to point it at the plate in the dark to get a "message from the afterlife" in the picture. The battery is capable of supporting the light in the bulb for several minutes, but this is not necessary: it takes no more than two and a half seconds to obtain five “extra” prints.”[8]but this is not necessary: it takes a total of no more than two and a half seconds to obtain five “extra” prints.”[8]but this is not necessary: it takes a total of no more than two and a half seconds to obtain five “extra” prints.”[8]
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Is it any wonder that McCarthy's demonstrations made me skeptical about the phenomenon of spiritistic photography? In addition, as far as I knew, there were other very effective methods of manifestation, which made it possible to achieve very impressive results without any interference of the "dead" and "spirits." So, when the star of John Myers, immediately hailed as the "genius of spiritual photography of all time," rose, I naturally didn’t get awe-inspiring.
The fierce battle that unfolded between Myers' opponents (led by Lord Donegall in the Sunday Dispatch) and his supporters led by Maurice Barbonell (Psychic News) was also not very serious. It is hardly worthwhile now to refresh the memory of the reader with all the details of that grandiose discussion; I will go straight to the descriptions of the events that took place during the week (August 17-22) when I, having accepted the challenge of several mediums at once, arrived in Long Dale (New York) to witness the Myers' gala concert.
The "hero of the day" invited two scientists from the Chicago Institute of Technology, physicist Howard Betz and photo expert Norman Bartley, as inspectors. The latter brought three plates from Chicago and loaded them in a darkened room with his own hand. First, a certain young man was photographed, then the entire audience and finally the third plate was not charged at all: it was held in his hands by a physicist standing on the stage. Myers was only giving orders for when to flick the bolt. The experts then went to the darkened office and began manifesting. Some time later, someone knocked on the door: well, what, they say, are there results? A physicist came out. “Unfortunately there is,” he replied quietly.
Then Bartley appeared on the scene. “We developed the plates on standard equipment,” he said, “using the developer we brought with us, and in all three images we found additional details that had appeared inexplicably. Nothing of the kind happened during the trial shootings that had been conducted before.
So the demonstration ended in complete triumph. The Psychic Observer gave the event five columns: “The reality of the supernatural phenomenon has been convincingly proven. The experiments were carried out under ideal conditions."
This post raised several questions from me. Indeed, several audience members recognized their deceased relatives among the ghostly photo-characters. The authors of the article, however, forgot to mention one small detail: John Myers, as happened to him quite often before, suddenly came into extraordinary excitement and burst into a darkened room just at the moment when there was a manifestation, thus breaking one of the main experimental conditions.
Later, the medium claimed that this happened against his will: he simply could not stay in place. That Myers was extremely excited, I had the opportunity to see for myself even before the demonstration began. But I noticed something else. For breakfast, he went out with a bandaged index finger, explaining that he cut himself while shaving. I immediately remembered the McCarthy cylinder. What if Myers acquired a "psycho printer" or a copy while in England? In that case, his appearance in a darkened room explained all the "miracles."
The situation was awkward. I did not take any part in the direct preparation of the session. The two young men from Chicago felt like babies in the woods. They knew everything about the physical processes of photographic manifestation, but were completely unaware of the elementary methods of cheating. There was nothing left but to find out by hook or by crook whether Myers had something hidden under the bandage. And on the stage, after the demonstration had begun, I pretended to stumble, fell on Myers, and as if by chance grabbed his finger! No, John Myers obviously did not use McCarthy's method. Well, maybe his invasion of the office was really the result of a sudden hysteria.
Shortly before the Long Dale incident, I had another meeting with this virtuoso of spiritual photography. He personally invited me to take part in a special session for friends at the St. Moritz Hotel in New York. Taking my wife, I went there as an observer. I absolutely did not want to take any part in the direct preparation of the session.
By that time, mediums with their tricks, true and false, ceased to interest me from the point of view of parapsychology: I began to relate to their work exclusively as a psychoanalyst. I have developed a deep conviction that the consciousness of a medium functions simultaneously on two levels, and any artificial attempt to distinguish between these two functions will inevitably lead to the failure of the experiment. At some point, I even had a thought: what if I persuade John Myers to lie down on the “analytical” couch? What if you manage to find out something about a spirit-mediator named Black Foot (in English - "Black Foot"), about other oddities of his peculiar nature?..
But back to New York. In the dark, a brand new pack of photographic paper was unpacked. A sheet of paper was distributed to those present; each was asked to hold his sheet in a weak light. A photographer named Siegel, who brought the tape, claimed that Myers never touched it at all. Actually, the answer to the question whether the oddities that soon arose on these sheets were of paranormal origin is in direct proportion to the truth of this last statement.
However, I made no effort to authenticate Myers' "psychic" photographs. At that moment, I was only interested in one question: what exactly will appear on the two sheets that my wife and I received. Something strange did happen to them; if it was just a coincidence, it all the more deserves to be told about it. Let me quote from my own interview given to Psychic Observer magazine:
Something has distracted my attention; then they collected the sheets, gave them to my wife for a few minutes, and then sent them to manifestation. A "projectile in flight" appeared on my sheet. On the wife's sheet - "the moon and the sun", or, in any case, two balls, in relative sizes resembling these two luminaries - this is how the medium himself deciphered the "messages" when the developed pictures were given to him for interpretation.
My "projectile", judging by the faint trail that followed it, really flew somewhere. Somewhat strange, however, the prominence looked like a drop of liquid. The indentation in the head of the "projectile" also did not look like a military one. However, the medium "recognized" the shell very confidently, and I did not dare to argue with him.
"The moon and the sun", which had no meaning for my wife, evoked very curious associations in me. To begin with, I accepted the invitation from John Myers, being quite sure that we are talking about Tuesday, when I was free. As soon as I hung up, I realized that the session would take place on Monday, when I was to take the Master's chair in a meeting of a secret "brotherhood." So one of the two invitations had to be turned down. My wife advised me to ignore the “brothers”: there, as a leader, I was not the most obvious figure, and besides, I could count on a second invitation in the future.
All this flashed through my head while I examined a pair of glowing balls that mysteriously appeared on my wife's sheet. The triangle of Masonic symbols is made up of the Moon, the Sun and the Master ("minor luminaries" in their terminology). That evening, having abandoned the Master's chair, I became a luminary not just "small" - I reduced myself to zero. Two other symbols, "detached" from me, appeared on my wife's sheet - in any case, none of the participants in the session received anything that looked like heavenly bodies. Was it a coincidence, or maybe a consequence of telepathic contact? My amazement only increased when my sheet was removed from the developer bath: no matter how hard to believe it, the “shell” turned out to be an exact reproduction of the part of the body that flashed through my head: two balls perfectly complemented the picture.”
This is the note I wrote at the request of John Myers. Unfortunately, editor-in-chief Ralph Pressing gave it an advertising character with his comments, which unpleasantly struck me. "The reality of spiritistic photography is irrefutably proven!" - shouted the title. “The truth of the phenomenon has been established finally,” the editor-in-chief cheerfully said in the afterword. “No one will dare to question the truth of the statements signed by the participants in the session attached to this article. No one dares to question John Myers' supernatural ability anymore."
The article did indeed include signed eyewitness statements. But I did not suspect that by my presence I was helping to establish the truth of the phenomenon, and even "for all time" - this was not at all part of my plans. On the other hand, the note contains nothing that could force me to take up self-denial.
I did not tell John Myers about this until very recently: it seemed to me that he would not be delighted with such revelations. I did this quite recently in response to a letter in which he asked for memories of those spiritualistic demonstrations. “Why don't you have a few psychoanalytic sessions with me? - I suggested to him in May 1943. "You would tell me about your dreams, about your childhood … Thus, we will learn a lot of interesting things about the phenomenon of spiritualist photography, and you will also spend time with considerable benefit for yourself." Later, I managed to hold three conversations with the medium, but he did not want to continue these experiments, so the story of the origin of the spirit-mediator named "Black Leg" remained a mystery. “You know, you yourself look a little like an Indian,” I remarked once.- As a child, weren't you fond of stories about Redskins? I did not receive a clear answer, but to this day I have no doubt that the separation of the "spirit" from the psyche of Myers refers to the very first years of his life.
Most of all, I would like to find out if Black Foot has anything to do with the case described by the medium in his autobiographical notes. Once in childhood, he was locked in a basement boiler and, exhausted from desperate attempts to get out on his own, he eventually fell asleep there. Did his subconscious mind solve the problem? Maybe he got out of the trap unconsciously, like a sleepwalker? Who, then, was the "bearded man in white" who appeared to save him, the prototype of the Wise Old Man, about whom Jung wrote? Perhaps, it was this vision, under the influence of the then spiritualistic fashion for various kinds of exoticism, that was then transformed into a "black-footed spirit"? John Myers claims that many years later the gray-haired old man appeared as another ghostly "guest" on one of his photographic plates. This indicates thatthat at least he did not identify himself with this figure.
From time to time I hear a recurring question: What was Myers trying to prove with his demonstration? I answer it, as I did twenty years ago, with the question: what, any demonstration of paranormal abilities must certainly serve a specific purpose? By discovering on the way something new, unknown and turning away from discovery only because of our inability to understand what exactly it “proves”, are we not thereby demonstrating an anti-scientific approach to business?
In this life, nothing is final. The human brain is full of amazing mysteries that want to be solved. If spiritualism is valuable in any way, it is only by the undeniable contribution of its followers to the great cause of human self-knowledge.
From the book: "Between Two Worlds". Author: Fodor Nandor