The religion of Spiritualism began on March 31, 1848. That is the date that two young sisters, Kate (11) and Margaret (15) Fox, first claimed to be in contact with the spirit world. The spirits would make rapping sounds in answer to questions. As they explained 40 years later after becoming Spiritualism superstars, they actually were just snapping their toes against the floorboards.
It grew into a worldwide phenomena, and became the first modern religion dominated by women. Most mediums were women, but a few were men. Spirits would appear and manifest in a variety of ways, using more sophisticated techniques than the Fox sisters. It was magicians rather than scientists who were the primary exposers of fraudulent mediums. Scientists tended to be rather easy to fool, as they tended to believe what they saw. Magicians knew better,
Spiritualism camps appeared in places such as Lily Dale in New York and Summerland in California. Thousands would flock there to attend seances. At these camps mediums could exchange information with fellow mediums as people often went to multiple spiritualists. The mediums would steal small items they might not notice went missing, which was easy to do in a darkened room. When the same sitter attended a seance with a different medium, that medium could check the card catalog, get the item from storage, and it would later “materialize” at a seance held by a medium the sitter never met before.
Sex was a part of Spiritualism for some. Believers could attend a seance that involved a spiritual marriage. They were typically older moneyed men, although sometimes they were women if the medium was a man). The medium would be tied down, sometimes after being strip searched, the room was completely dark, and the spirit bride or groom would materialize (although technically invisible in the dark) and have sex with the sitter. The “marriage” ended when the spirit dematerialized, to reveal the medium still secured when the lights went back up (although, perhaps a little flushed and sweaty). For some the experience involved just fondling and teasing.
The practice of having sex with ghosts is known as Spectrophilia. It was far more common in Spiritualism in the late 19th century and early twentieth than you might imagine.
Some mediums, such as Eusapia Palladino, Rudi Schneider, and Mina Crandon (Margery the Medium) would appear to have orgasms during the seance. Other mediums, including famed free love advocate Victoria Claflin Woodhull and her sister Tennie, used their sexual charms to openly seduce believers and keep them in their thrall.
Our room is decorated as a spiritualist seance room. Instead of sitting around a seance table, you get to lie around each other as the floor is completely covered in comfortable mats. This seance is done in the nude.
We have found that if a play room is too scary, no one wants to play there. If you want to set up a seance room without people having sex there, then you might want to check out the Occult Sound Archive which has actual recordings of seances.