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Alternative title

How Spiritualist Newspapers Constructed and Compromised Their Cause.

Date of Award

Fall 2025

Document Type

Masters Thesis

Department or Program Affiliation

History

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

History

First Advisor

Folk, Holly

Second Advisor

Hardesty, Jared

Third Advisor

Price, Hunter

Abstract

This thesis examines how the Spiritualist press functioned as both the connective tissue that sustained the Spiritualist movement and the destabilizing force that undermined its cohesion. In the absence of a centralized authority or formal church structure, newspapers such as the Banner of Light, Herald of Progress, The Spiritual Telegraph, and others became the de facto institutions of the movement. They connected geographically dispersed believers, provided a shared language of faith, and offered a public arena where mediums, skeptics, and lay participants could debate the meaning and legitimacy of spiritual communication. Yet the same press that enabled this sense of collective identity also thrived on sensationalism and controversy, continually testing the boundaries of belief and eroding the stability it helped create.

The study argues that this paradox, between cohesion and fragmentation, defined both the rise and decline of the early phase of American Spiritualism. Through its expansive reporting on séances, spirit photography, and the lives of prominent mediums, the Spiritualist press created a national conversation that popularized the movement’s central claims. However, its dependence on novelty and spectacle transformed belief into a consumable commodity. Competing editors, eager to expand readership, often exaggerated or contradicted one another, amplifying internal divisions and heightening public skepticism. The press’s pursuit of credibility and profit thus mirrored the very tension at the heart of Spiritualism: a faith grounded in radical individual experience yet yearning for collective validation.

By tracing this dynamic through key case studies, including the press coverage of spirit photography and the editorial policies of major Spiritualist newspapers, this thesis reveals how the media both empowered and destabilized new forms of religious expression in nineteenth-century America. The Spiritualist press became a self-perpetuating machine, feeding on controversy to sustain attention, even as that appetite for sensation accelerated the movement’s fragmentation. Ultimately, this study contends that the Spiritualist press not only chronicled the history of Spiritualism but actively shaped it, offering an early example of how modern media can both construct and consume the movements it brings to life.

Type

Text

Keywords

Spiritualism, Mumler, Photography, print media

Publisher

Western Washington University

OCLC Number

1565076168

Subject – LCSH

Spiritualism--United States--History; Spiritualists; Spirit photography

Geographic Coverage

United States

Format

application/pdf

Genre/Form

masters theses

Language

English

Rights

Copying of this document in whole or in part is allowable only for scholarly purposes. It is understood, however, that any copying or publication of this document for commercial purposes, or for financial gain, shall not be allowed without the author’s written permission.

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