Narratively published this story I wrote about the Fox Sisters, who invented American Spiritualism in 1848. While researching, I spent some time in Rochester, where I visited the old foundation of the family’s home, now a holy site for Spiritualists, and met super-helpful historian Chris Davis of the Newark-Arcadia Historical Society. There’s going to be a Fox Sisters movie based on a 1936 New Yorker story. Meanwhile, below is a Fox Sisters bibliography I put together. Go here to read the full story.
Abbott, Karen. “The Fox Sisters and the Rap on Spiritualism,” Smithsonian, October 30, 2012.
Aventi, Anthony. “Chapter 16: Rochester Rap: The First Haunted House,” in Behind the Crystal Ball: Magic, Science, and the Occult from Antiquity Through the New Age. New York: Times Books, 1996.
Ballou, Adin. An Exposition of Views Respecting the Principal Facts, Causes and Peculiarities Involved in Spirit Manifestations. Boston: Bela Marsh, 1853.
Braude, Ann. Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women’s Rights in Nineteenth Century America. Boston: Beacon University Press, 1989.
Cadwallader, Mary. Hydesville in History. Chicago: Progressive Thinking Publishing House, 1917.
Capron, Eliab W. Modern Spiritualism: Its Facts and Fanaticisms, Its Consistencies and Contradictions. Boston: Bela Marsh, 1855.
Chapin, David. Exploring Other Worlds: Margaret Fox, Elisha Kent Kane, and the Antebellum Culture of Curiosity. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2004.
Cramer, Carl, “Voices Through the Trumpet,” New Yorker, May 16, 1936.
Davenport, Reuben Briggs. The Death-Blow to Spiritualism. New York: G.W. Dillingham, 1888.
Davis, Andrew Jackson. The Principles of Nature, Her Divine Revelations, and a Voice to Mankind. New York: S.S. Lyon and William Fishbough, 1847.
DiMeo, Nate. “The Sisters Fox,” Episode 27, The Memory Palace Podcast, March 12, 2010.
Doyle, Arthur Conan. The History of Spiritualism. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 1926.
Hoeltzel, Bob. “Chapter 12: Arcadia Earns a Place on ‘The Map,’” Hometown History, Newark-Arcadia Historical Society, 2000.
Houdini, Harry, “Houdini on Spiritualism,” New York Times, June 22, 1922.
The Elisha Kent Kane Papers, The American Philosophical Society. Online here.
Kane, Elisha Kent, and Margaret Fox. The Love-Life of Dr. Kane: Containing the Correspondence, and a History of the Acquaintance, Engagement, and Secret Marriage Between Elisha K. Kane and Margaret Fox. New York: Carleton, 1865.
Kane, Margaret Fox. “Signed Confession of Margaret Fox Kane,” New York World, October 21, 1888.
Lewis, E.E. A Report of the Mysterious Noises Heard in the House of Mr. John D. Fox, in Hydesville, Arcadia, Wayne County. Rochester, NY: Shepard & Reed, 1848.
Leonard, Maurice. People From the Other Side: The Enigmatic Fox Sisters and the History of Victorian Spiritualism. Stroud, Gloucestershire: The History Press, 2008.
McCabe, Joseph. Spiritualism: A Popular History from 1847. New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1920.
Nickell, Joe. “A Skeleton’s Tale: The Origins of Modern Spiritualism,” Skeptical Inquirer, Volume 32.4, July/August 2008.
Page, Charles Grafton. Psychomancy: Spirit-Rappings and Table-Tippings Exposed. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1853.
Pond, Mariam Buckner. Time Is Kind: The Story of the Unfortunate Fox Family. Clinton, CT: Centennial Press, 1947.
Stuart, Nancy Rubin. The Reluctant Spiritualist: The Life of Maggie Fox. Orlando: Harcourt, 2005.
Todd, Thomas Olman. Hydesville: The Story of the Rochester Knockings, Which Proclaimed the Advent of Modern Spiritualism. Sunderland, England: The Keystone Press, 1905. [Incorporates Emma Hardinge Britten’s Modern American Spiritualism (1870) and Robert Dale Owen’s Footfalls on the Boundary of Another World (1860).]
Underhill, A. Leah (Fox). The Missing Link in Modern Spiritualism. New York; Thomas R. Knox & Co., 1885.
Washington, Peter. Madame Blavatsky’s Baboon. New York: Schocken Books, 1995.
Weisberg, Barbara. Talking to the Dead: Kate and Maggie Fox and the Rose of Spiritualism. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2004
