The Apparitionists: A Tale of Phantoms, Fraud, Photography,

The Apparitionists: A Tale of Phantoms, Fraud, Photography, and the Man Who Captured Lincoln's Ghost

A story of faith and fraud in postâ€“Civil War America, told through the lens of a photographer who claimed he could capture images of the dead

In the early days of photography, in the death-strewn wake of the Civil War, one man seized Americaâ€™s imagination. A â€œspirit photographer,â€ William Mumler took portrait photographs that featured the ghostly presence of a lost loved one alongside the living subject. Mumler was a sensation: The affluent and influential came calling, including Mary Todd Lincoln, who arrived at his studio in disguise amidst rumors of sÃ©ances in the White House.Â Â
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Peter Manseau brilliantly captures a nation wracked with grief and hungry for proof of the existence of ghosts and for contact with their dead husbands and sons. It took a circus-like trial of Mumler on fraud charges, starring P. T. Barnum for the prosecution, to expose a fault line of doubt and manipulation. And even then, the judge sided with the defenseâ€”nobody ever solved the mystery of his spirit photography. This forgotten puzzle offers a vivid snapshot of America at a crossroads in its history, a nation in thrall to new technology while clinging desperately to belief.Â
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Country USA
Manufacturer Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Binding Kindle Edition
ReleaseDate 2020-06-11
Format Kindle eBook

The Apparitionists: A Tale of Phantoms, Fraud, Photography, and the Man Who Captured Lincoln's Ghost