Identifier: abrahamlxxxxxxxxxx00linc (find matches)
Title: Abraham Lincoln and religion. general
Year: 1857 (1850s)
Authors: Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection
Subjects: Spiritualism Spiritualism Spiritualists Spiritualists
Publisher:
Contributing Library: Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection
Digitizing Sponsor: Friends of The Lincoln Collection of Indiana, Inc.

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copies in a fewmonths, were the first of manypublications purporting toexplain the abilities of the Foxsisters/Humbug it very possiblyis,Dewey wrote of the rappings.But it will stand severer teststhan will many things whichpass for sober realities. The sisters spawned notonly an entire industry, but alsoa wave of imitation.Knockingtables,with built-in hammers,became a sideline specialty ofmany industrious cabinetmak-ers; those who couldnt afforda special table would simplyuse their legs (hidden under atablecloth, of course) to tilt thefamily card table and makethe rapping sounds. A decadelater, just about every family inthe country claimed to have amember (usually a youngdaughter) who could speakwith the dead. Congress brieflyconsidered a special commis-sion to act as liaison betweenthis world and the next. Sincemoney was required for suchdiplomacy, however,the requestwas denied. The Fox sisterssupportersincluded Sir Arthur ConanDoyle, Harriet Beecher Stowe,James Fenimore Cooper, D.H.
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21 Lawrence, Robert Owen, QueenVictoria, Governor Talmadgeof Michigan and, perhaps theirmost famous clients, Presidentand Mrs. Abraham Lincoln.Spiritualists eventually evenclaimed that President Lincolnwrote the Gettysburg Addressthrough the guidance of a spiritafter having attended a seance.For awhile, the sisters thrived.Leah married a banker (herthird husband, after having beenabandoned by a first andwidowed by a second), andKatie married an Englishbarrister. Maggies love life wasless successful. Her first andonly love, the Arctic explorerElisha Kent Kane, died beforehe could legalize their union;his family, Philadelphia blue-bloods, despised her. By middleage, Katie and Maggie hadsuccumbed to the familyweakness for alcohol and foundtheir finances strained both by alcoholism and by a decreasein their own popularity. A feudwith Leah progressed into afamily split, and in a bizarre twistof events, Maggie, probablymotivated more by revengeagainst Leah than contrition,rented a big hall

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