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Smile for the Dead: An Examination of Spirit Photography
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00:00In 1862, an engraver in Boston, an amateur photographer, William H. Mumler, took a self-portrait in the
00:18studios of Helen F. Stewart. But what made this self-portrait so remarkable for the time is that
00:25it showed something else besides the jolly bearded photographer himself. It showed a spirit, an extra,
00:32someone that the photographer would later claim was the ghost of his deceased cousin.
00:37This would set off a wild storm of involvement, as this was the first documented photograph of a
00:43ghost. When news spread that Mumler could take photographs of ghosts, people would line up
00:48outside of Stewart's studio. Mumler would take people's photographs, and sure enough, their
00:53deceased loved one would be standing right next to them. This turned into a booming business for
00:58Mumler, Stewart, and the receptionist at the time, Hannah Green. As a photographer myself, what's so
01:06remarkable to me about Mumler and the spirit photography images that he created was just
01:11how he did them. You know, we look at them now and we're like, oh, you know, they're just a double
01:15exposure. You know, we have ideas about how they were made, and they even had ideas back then about
01:21how they were made. But they couldn't prove it. No one was able to prove just how Mumler was making
01:27these images. He would have the leading photographers of the day come to his studio and watch him
01:32throughout the entire process. They would watch him do every single step, and they couldn't figure it
01:37out. There was one person who actually backed up from the camera to make sure that Mumler wasn't
01:42touching anything. It's so wild to me that these photographers couldn't figure out what a novice
01:48photographer like Mumler was doing. And yet he somehow is able to capture one of the first spirit
01:53photographs ever. And that to me is the great mystery here. And that's what is kind of driving
01:58me to figure out what he was doing. I want to look at these processes. I want to look at what people
02:04are saying, how he could have done these images, and I want to try them out. And to do this right,
02:08I want to try and find people who can help me, experts in their fields from photography to paranormal
02:13research. What do they have to say about these images? Was it even Mumler who was the genius behind
02:17them? And who were the women he worked with to create these? And as wild as it sounds, what if
02:22some of these images were actual spirit photographs? What if these images were photographs of people's
02:27deceased relatives? That's something that I don't think people will consider enough when investigating
02:32spirit photography. Was he able to capture real ghosts? And so that's really what's kind of brought
02:38me to make this film, is finding out how Mumler made these images.
02:42And to make a ghost image, the easiest thing to do is just take a picture of someone sitting
02:48there, have somebody walk in dressed in white, and walk right out again. And in a 30-second
02:55exposure, two or three seconds of that person standing there and then walking out, you're
03:00going to have a great ghost. But it's not what Mumler did. Again, what we were doing was
03:07to produce what could have been done in a room full of skeptics. And that's very different
03:14than just making a ghost. Making a ghost image is very easy.
03:22Was he is a question that has haunted me for a long time, trying to find out who is this
03:28man. Was he a fake? Was he real? Did he really believe what he was doing? Mumler had one of the
03:36most, one of the reasons I say that he's such a child of the 19th century is because he was also
03:43an inventor. He had a really curious mind. For someone who left school when he was 14 years old, he was
03:49applying for all kinds of different patents. He was a really, really clever man. So something like
03:57photography would certainly capture his interest.
03:59Well, as I've always been far more interested in the woman who was around him, I kind of think of him
04:08as being a little bit perhaps of an opportunist. I get a bit frustrated at the fact that he's
04:16continually credited with this development in the history of photography because I really think that
04:24this woman who was in his proximity and is always mentioned in footnotes whenever anybody's talking
04:30about Mumler, she continues to kind of be in the background. And maybe that's what she wanted,
04:34but for me it's a bit frustrating to not see her always mentioned when his name comes up.
04:40In terms of spirit photography, he was probably not the first, but he's the first documented spirit
04:48photographer. And he occupied a really interesting space because of his trial, because he was eventually
04:58arrested for trickery. And his trial really dominated the headlines in both the United States and Europe
05:11while it was going. And it really represented the modern spiritualist movement on trial. It represented
05:18religion on trial. It represented all the fears of Americans and the culture clashes that were taking place
05:27and gave voice to a lot of anger, a lot of fears, a lot of frustration, a lot of hope.
05:35It was an interesting time. And he was a very, very small figure who found himself on a very large stage.
05:43My initial gut check of Mumler's work, I would say they're faked because they're too good. They are
05:54very, very detailed. And they also fall into the idea of what we think a spirit should be. And we don't
06:03really know if that's the case or not. So without, you know, obviously talking to him
06:09or being around during that time period, I would say they're just too good to be true.
06:18You know, when we're talking about spirit photography or anomalies in photos that we can't explain,
06:25there's a couple different types. Sometimes you see an apparition or what looks to be a human. Sometimes
06:31you see light anomalies. Other times it's shadows. So there's various different kind of shapes and forms
06:40and all sorts of good stuff that can show up in a photo. Not all of it is supernatural, of course.
06:46Some things are misidentified. And of course, we don't always know the environment in which the photos
06:50are being taken. So they can be hard to decipher. On the other hand, when people want to see spirits,
06:56it's pretty easy for them to accept what they see. The more you see, the less it feels like a spirit.
07:04So the trick is to have something that gives us just enough to hang on to, but not too much.
07:13So photography in general is really hard, I think, to determine if there's a spirit in it or not.
07:20Because number one, we don't really know what a spirit is. We don't know what's making up the phenomena
07:26that people are experiencing that can't be explained at this moment. So our ideas of what
07:32things should look like or what things should be are kind of biased to begin with. But I think the
07:36majority of the time I meet people who are showing me photos and the things that they're getting are
07:42just misidentification. You know, maybe they're not looking at it the same way I or one of my colleagues
07:48will look at it. So one of the most common things we see is some sort of like light anomaly that appears
07:55to have some sort of mass to it. And what it normally is is a spider stuck on a spider web.
08:00And for whatever reason, the camera or the video is reflecting the light in a really weird way
08:07where it looks odd. And I don't blame them for thinking, hey, this is odd. Is this something?
08:12But again, that's kind of where investigators can come in and say, okay, well, we've seen this a
08:16million times. This is what it is.
08:21The story goes, and when I first researched Mumler, I helped to spread this story that
08:30he was alone in the studio with Mrs. Stewart, and it was Mrs. Stewart's gallery. So she was ostensibly
08:37the photographer. And I collect Mrs. Stewart's images. So I'm a huge fan of Mrs. Stewart.
08:44But I've come to find that there was actually a man working in that studio.
08:48And it was a friend of Mumler's. So Mumler would be going to visit him, I believe. And this man was
08:57teaching him about photography. And one day, the man, Mr. Plummer, had to leave the studio. And Mumler,
09:05as he says, deciding to while away an hour, decided to take a self-portrait and see what happened.
09:11And he stood next to a chair, which was an odd choice, because this is a time when exposures are
09:18super long. And usually you sit in a chair that has like two things holding your head in place.
09:23And it was really uncomfortable. But for some reason, he was able to stand still. He's old,
09:29even holding, you know, that black cloth. He's holding that like next to him. It's a very,
09:37it's a very handsome picture. He looks very proud of himself. And when he developed the picture,
09:42there was the image of a young girl sitting in the chair. He would claim that this was his cousin.
09:48He recognized her as his cousin. What is important was that there was a woman in that picture,
09:54and she hadn't been there in real life.
09:56So who exactly was with Mumler when he took this photograph? That's, that's the thing. If we're,
10:12if we're able to figure out who was in the room with him, I think we'll have a good idea of how
10:16this narrative kind of takes place here. Was it Stewart, the owner of the studio? Was it Green,
10:21the receptionist who would later become Mumler's wife? Or was it this man, Mr. Plummer?
10:28It's almost like a weird game of Clue, you know, Stewart, Green, Plummer in the studio with Mumler,
10:34with the ghost. I think if we're able to nail that down, we'll be able to have a better understanding of
10:43what happened here. If you look at the photograph, it's unusual to me. For one thing, as Christa said,
10:50he is standing up. I've had one of these photographs taken of me, and you have to be still
10:55for something like 30 seconds. And so for him to be standing is unusual, and I think that's something
11:02to call out. I also think it's unusual how the photo is framed. Normally when you're taking a
11:07portrait like that, I don't think you would have the chair be empty and in picture, right? Usually
11:13if you're taking that self-portrait, you're going to be sort of center frame and you would be sitting.
11:18So I think he intended for the spirit to be in that chair. It's just framed up too perfectly for me.
11:25And so we can deduce from that that this was intentional. It wasn't just him
11:30whiling away an hour just for a self-portrait. There was an intent behind this because of how
11:35the photograph was framed, at least to me, in my opinion.
11:38Even though I think Mumbler's photos are probably explainable, it doesn't mean that all photos
11:50are explainable. It doesn't mean all video is explainable because I've seen some really weird
11:54stuff. I've experienced it. And there was one show I worked on where the director of photography
12:02changed the sensors on his camera. He was not into ghosts at all. It was purely for cinematic
12:08reasons. And when he did that, we caught five different anomalies on his camera. And our other
12:15cameras never caught those. And those are the cameras that had the standard sensors on them.
12:20So it does kind of beg the question, you know, are we not looking at things the right way? Are we not
12:27taking into consideration all the things we need to think about when we're talking about trying to
12:32capture this type of activity on camera? So this is what he said, that he would just show it to people
12:38as a lark. And then people kind of got sick of it. And then he decided to let it go. But one day,
12:43Dr. Gardner came in to see him. And Dr. Gardner was a big spirit. He was really big in the spiritual
12:51movement. And Mumbler knew this. And Mumbler, you know, very mysteriously showed him this
12:56photograph and said, and it's my cousin. And Dr. Gardner was, of course, like, entranced by this.
13:02What is this? And he made Mumbler sign something to this effect. I think he even took the photo,
13:08asked Mumbler if he could have the picture. Mumbler signed it and said, this is my cousin. He dated it
13:14and thought, oh, I'll just let the fool have his toy, is what he said. And Dr. Gardner then took it
13:20to the papers, the newspapers, which Mumbler did not count on. And that's how things
13:26started to really take off where people showed up at the studio demanding spirit photographs.
13:40So the important thing to note about this first photo and why I think everything kind of boils
13:45down to this first photo is just how different the ghost looks compared to the ghosts that come later
13:51on. If you look at the the body of this ghost, right, you can see shadowing, you can see detail
13:58in the dress that she's wearing. The ghosts that come later on in Mumbler's work, they're almost blob
14:03like, you know, they don't have any detail. There's not really any shadowing. It's just like this spectral
14:08entity of a body. In this first one, there is definition. Later on, the most important thing becomes
14:14the face, right? Because you want the sitter to recognize the deceased loved ones. The face becomes
14:18the most important thing later on. Now, this one almost looks like a typical double exposure.
14:26And I think that speaks to the process that develops between now and then, right? Later on,
14:34he's under the scrutiny of people watching him. And so I think he has to be quick and he has to do
14:40something where he can't get that definition in the body. Whereas now he's either alone, which I don't
14:46think he's alone, or someone is in the room with him, whether it's Stuart, Green, or Plummer. And so
14:52he has time to get that definition in the body. We can learn a lot from this first photograph.
14:57What I think is interesting about Mumbler in his day and what we see today is that during times of
15:04extreme stress and sorrow and kind of chaos in the world, right? So in Mumbler's time, we're talking civil
15:10war. In our time, we just got out of a pandemic. And you know, a lot of people lost people. When you
15:17see things like that, there's an interest in the supernatural. And whenever there's an interest,
15:23you're going to have people who want to take advantage of that.
15:28Grief is, it's a natural human emotion to the loss of an important object or person in your life.
15:37Human beings experience grief at the loss of anything that's important to them.
15:43The problem in our culture is that we deny death. We act as if people don't die. And therefore,
15:52grief is very hard for Americans because if you don't believe people die, then you don't know how
15:58to respond when they do die. People are afraid of grief. And that's one of the reasons I work in
16:04hospitals to teach ministers about how to do grief ministry because they don't know because our
16:09culture doesn't acknowledge grief and teach us how to grieve. But also the pictures of people who are
16:18dead, there are stages of grief. I mean, you go in and out. But one of the things, the second stage,
16:26first is sort of a psychic numbness. You know, you cannot believe that the person is gone. It's just
16:32shock. And then after that is a sort of a yearning, longing for the person. And I think that's more
16:40the stage that you're talking about, like looking for the person, that yearning, longing, thinking
16:46you've seen them. And, you know, there are cultures before, earlier than ours, where they had mourning
16:55rings and anything that reminds them strongly of the person that they've lost, including photographs
17:03of that person that are done. So what does that say about, you know, just the need to kind of visualize
17:12what is felt, you know? So the bereaved feel the kind of like lingering presence of the deceased. And
17:21it's helpful to kind of have a place to focus that grief and to visualize what is felt. You know,
17:30I think it can be really therapeutic. And I'm glad that you're considering that aspect of it,
17:36because I think it's, uh, so often overlooked, uh, in favor of like this, like, you know, like,
17:44like, you know, every year around Halloween, somebody gets in touch with me about this,
17:47you know, and, uh, and it seems to be kind of like the extent of, uh, people's interest in it,
17:54you know, is like, how could people fall for this? You know? And it's like, well, because
17:58they wanted it. It wasn't, you know, they wanted some, uh, something that kind of, um,
18:02um, proved the, the existence of what they felt, I think. But, uh, lots of times in grief groups,
18:10I've had people talk to me about bereavement support groups. I've had people talking to me about,
18:16um, I felt like she was in the room with me, talking to me. Um, and that's part of the whole
18:22process of, you know, we lose the person in person, the physical reality, but we keep them alive,
18:29uh, in the memories. And early on in the grief process, there is a sense that they're still with
18:35you. Um, and then later on and talk to you, hearing people talk to you, maybe in the middle of the night,
18:43you know, wake up and be sure that you've heard their voice. That's all a normal part of grief.
18:50When you're talking about spirit photography and the photographs say of, uh, a person,
18:57a son that you've lost, who's behind you in the picture, um, most often you would see that as your
19:04son because number one, you want to believe it's your son and you do believe he's still with you.
19:10And so you would see that image, find a way to make that image into your son.
19:15Mumler claims that he was alone during this whole thing. Um, although later he credits his wife,
19:28Hannah, with helping him develop spirit photography. And he says, quote, including the first time.
19:37So, that might insinuate that she was there. I think Hannah, his wife, certainly played a huge
19:46part in whatever it was that he was doing. Um, Mrs. Stewart knew how to profit from it, certainly.
19:54Um, I believe Hannah's the one who gave him the language for it. Hannah and her mother gave him
20:00the language since they were already spiritualists. So who is Helen F. Stewart and who is, uh, Hannah
20:06Frances Green? Well, we may never know who these women are, but I think that it's one woman and I
20:12think it's Hannah Frances Green. And I think that for, uh, a short period of time, um, she was using
20:20the name Helen F. Stewart as an alias. Um, I think that there might be several reasons why she would
20:25create this persona. Um, she was potentially trying to flee, uh, um, a negative relationship
20:32or maybe had been abandoned and was just trying to recreate herself and find a way to support
20:36herself and her two children at a time when that would have been exceedingly difficult,
20:41I imagine. So I think it was easier for her, uh, as a single woman at that time, for whatever reason,
20:48whether she was fleeing the relationship or had been, um, abandoned with the kids, it would be easier
20:54for her to build herself as a professional photographer, build this business first as a
20:58producer of hair jewelry. She's first listed as a producer of hair jewelry and then as a photographer,
21:04the first to be listed in Boston directories as a woman working as a photographer, which is really
21:11among about almost 70 photographers. So that's really worth noting. It would have been easier for
21:18her to do so as a Mrs. So I built a timeline and because I kept, uh, I kept hearing these women kind
21:27of like noted and in like, kind of like always as, as a footnote, uh, they were never central to the
21:34story. And then the more I tried to map out what their roles might have been, it just became increasingly
21:41clear that they were in all likelihood the same woman. Doing away with the possibility of magic,
21:49which I think is certainly possible. Um, and I always want to leave open that possibility that we
21:55just don't know, but I, I think if we are going to assume some kind of calculated effort here, I think
22:03that it was likely Hannah Frances Green, Helen F. Stewart's idea. She was already working in hair
22:11photography. She, um, uh, had like, there are reports of her having had mesmeric abilities
22:19from a very young age, like Hannah Frances Green. Um, she had already been, and then she had already
22:25been establishing herself in, um, the production of hair jewelry, which is already connected to
22:31bereavement. It's already, you know, like part of, uh, this kind of industry and then photography,
22:37which would often be incorporated into this hair photography, uh, this hair jewelry rather.
22:42Plus by the time this first photograph, uh, had been created, she'd already photographed a lot of
22:48people in the community and she'd likely kept all of the negatives, um, so that people could come back
22:55to her on the case of somebody's passing and get a reprint to have it, uh, worked into the locket,
23:01which she always advertised on the back of her carte de visite. You know, most photographers would say,
23:07uh, reprints available upon request, but she would note that she produced hair jewelry.
23:13And of course, Stewart was an established photographer, you know, and that's kind of
23:18downplayed in these stories too. But like, I have right in front of me right now about 20 of her
23:24carte de visite that I was able to find on eBay and whatnot. And I've seen many more in, um, Boston
23:29Holdings. Um, so she was really prolific. So she would have had a ton of negatives and, um, all accounts
23:38say that this, that they were her studios that, um, that he was working at, uh, at the time of the
23:44discovery. And then she just disappears. Like she just disappears. And we have, we have spirit
23:50photographs that are attributed, uh, to Stewart that are of a higher quality than his that can be
23:56positively dated and attributed before any of his can be different examples of her back stamp.
24:02And as you can see, it always says hair jewelry made to order, which is notable. I haven't encountered
24:09that on any other carte de visite, but she always made sure that people knew that they could order it.
24:15So here's an example of vignetting, which is not unusual at all. Like it's a way of kind of like,
24:20um, isolating the face from a group photo or from like a three quarter length, uh, portrait. If you
24:27wanted to say, put their face in a locket or something like this, um, often after somebody had passed.
24:40But as you can see, she was a pretty, you know, accomplished photographer. Anyways, all that to say
24:45that I feel that it's very unlikely that it was a mistake. And there are a lot of reasons to assume
24:53that she would have recognized, she would have recognized that there would be an interest in this
25:01product. Um, and again, she was already, um, a noted mesmeric. She wasn't a mesmeric physician at this
25:10point, but she already was kind of known to have mediumistic abilities as Hannah Francis Green,
25:16not as Stewart. Stewart was known as a photographer, um, and the one who ran the studios, but of course
25:23they were likely the same person.
25:29We just got some incredible news. Uh, the Eastman Kodak Museum just emailed me back. I've been to talk to
25:36them to view their mummler collection in person and also film it for the film. Uh, they normally
25:43do not allow filming of these pieces and even viewing them, uh, is a rarity. I don't know,
25:49we were just given permission to, to both view the pieces and film it. This will be the first time
25:55that I will see a mummler, uh, piece in person. And I, I'm, I'm through the moon, through the moon,
26:01I'm through the moon, through the roof. I'm over the moon and through the roof. That's it. That's where I'm at.
26:06Um, and it's going to be incredible. I can't wait. It's going to be amazing.
26:21Smaller than I thought. Yeah. Yeah. I've just seen the scans in there. They're absolutely huge. So
26:29see how the hand doesn't look like a hand at all.
26:32Smaller than I thought. Oh, that's gorgeous.
26:43I just got overtaken. That's just, I'm, I've been doing this research, you know, since, I guess, 2015.
26:50So seeing one in person is just, it's really remarkable for me.
26:54It's Boston Mass. He was 40 minutes in New York. So this is an earlier one.
27:04Incredible.
27:04And the, the hands are what's so, so strange. They definitely look like they've been drawn on.
27:14It almost looks like you have them, like, up against the body and there's like a, like a,
27:21a layering effect with the hands over top. It's like they've been adding, I don't know,
27:25you can almost see where it starts.
27:27And even the, like the neck of the person just kind of goes into this form.
27:39The form doesn't have any sort of, sort of detail at all, except for the hands made.
27:46There's no shadowing on the, the spirit form, except for in the face, which would explain,
27:57you know, Hannah's, uh, using Hannah's images that she would use for jewelry.
28:02Like you can almost see right around the neck, where it just kind of goes into this
28:08amorphous blob of a body of her feet on these old ones too.
28:16Yeah. You can immediately tell the difference here in this style.
28:26It's interesting that they would have different spirit photographers in their, in their personal album.
28:34And these, these are what Mumler did later in life.
28:39Male in spirit photography.
28:40Yeah. So I think when we're looking at modern day spirit photography or people who just happen to
28:48capture things on film, um, versus Mumler, if we're thinking or making the case that Mumler was
28:55faking things on purpose, then the parallel I see with that is that it certainly happens today with
29:03people faking things to make money, people faking things for power, for fame, for likes, for clicks.
29:09It's really no different. I don't think.
29:14It's interesting about Mumler and money. He charged $10 a picture at a time when most
29:20people were charging anywhere between 10 cents and 50 cents. So yeah, he made a lot of money. And
29:29certainly when he was in Boston, he, he had, you know, people lining up outside his door.
29:36At first that changed his fortunes fell. He ended up moving to New York after trying a few different
29:43things in Boston that he couldn't seem to get off the ground. So he moved to New York, he picked up
29:48spirit photography again. And, um, in the months, let's see, I think he started photographing in New
29:55York around December 1868. And his trial was, he was arrested in March, April, I think he was arrested in
30:04April 1869. Um, and he had photographed probably 500 people was the guess during that time. So yeah, he,
30:16he did really well. And then they thought that with the, um, publicity from the trial,
30:23that he would really make a lot of money. But in fact, he struggled after that.
30:27Again, fortunes up and down. That's kind of the story of Mumler.
30:30One of the most challenging things in the paranormal field is that this phenomena isn't
30:36proven yet. And because it's not proven, you're always going to have people that will say whatever
30:42they want to make a buck or to be famous or to for power, whatever it is. And they will always
30:49try to prey on others who will believe what they say.
30:53Okay. If spirit photography were fake, if there was some sort of a charlatan that was, you know,
31:00impressing images on photographs so that people would get a picture of their lost loved one and
31:06believe that they were with them, I don't see how that hurts them. Because that's a part of grief is
31:14the experience of feeling like they're with you when you, and you see them from time to time. So I don't,
31:19I don't see how that would hurt them at all, depending on where they are in the grief process.
31:26But early on, if that's comforting to them, I think it's important to have that kind of comfort.
31:31It's like the medicine men, the people that sold patent medicines. There's a great story of a man
31:51who would set up a table and he'd put a candlestick, a Bible, and a length of rope. And he'd go back and
31:58he'd rearrange it. And then he'd go back and rearrange it again. By the time he rearranged it
32:03three or four times, he had an entire crowd of people around. Once he had the crowd of people,
32:07he put the table away and started his pitch selling medicine. So it had nothing to do with
32:13what he was doing. So, you know, maybe the act of putting a hand on a camera was just to
32:19have people think that he had some kind of mesmer effect on the camera. But there's nothing to be gained
32:25by touching the camera. Are these images of ghosts on Mumler's prints? They're ghost-like on Mumler's
32:35prints. They may be spirits, but they're conjured spirits by the photographer. Mumler was using the
32:46process of the day, which was the wet collodion negative. It's a process by which you have to
32:52pour collodion onto a glass plate. It has to be dipped into a silver solution while the coating is wet.
33:14It has to be taken and then developed before it dries. So that's the negative making process.
33:22And then once he had the negative, he would make an albumin print. The albumin process is a,
33:38it's a paper that's coated with egg white that bears a chloride. It was purchased that way. He
33:44didn't have to make that part, but he would have to float the paper on silver nitrate just before he
33:51would use it. And then it was printed in the sun. It was essentially a sun printing process.
33:58And so when you're asking how did he make the images, there are many ways to make ghost images.
34:04But I think what you really mean to ask is how could he have made these images with people watching?
34:10The way he made the photographs was that he made the ghost image, so a separate negative, a ghost image,
34:18before the sitter came in to have the life portrait made.
34:27We have a cabinet card here. And this is a 1870s cabinet card. And what we're going to do is we're
34:34borrowing the head from this image. And we've made a copy of it, but in monotone. We don't want the brown
34:42color for rephotographing. And all we need is the head. And now we're going to decide, I think we want
34:50her facing down. So we're going to decide on a body. They would photograph the photograph and then
34:59make a negative and make a print.
35:17The hands never look right. So I'm trying to follow that tradition. It's kind of like AI hands, you know.
35:24Let me see if that will work.
35:36I'm going to have to photograph her kind of like this, looking down. And most of this, we're going
35:45to have to get rid of chemically on the negative. We're going to actually eat it away on the negative,
35:51to leave room for the person. So we're only going to have kind of this much. He says confidently.
36:00That'll work. So there you go. That's what we're going to shoot.
36:21This is where the ghost is now. It's kind of like looking at the final picture.
36:28Oh my goodness. You've got to hear to see that. That's, that's where I get this.
36:38That's where we're going. Here we go.
36:42Light over in the camera.
36:47Cap on, dark slide out.
36:51I'm going to expose for about 10 seconds.
36:528,001, 1002, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 9.
37:06We develop this light.
37:08There she is.
37:38And so what he would do is make the ghost negative, and then he would take the life image, and the life image was made with, again, the collodion process, but typically the collodion process yields a negative that has a kind of a creamy, coffee with cream color highlight.
37:59So what we have here is a contact printing frame.
38:13It's a wooden frame, and the first thing that would go in is the glass.
38:19Then we'd put a negative into the frame, and the negative goes image side up, so the side that the collodion was poured.
38:28And then the paper would go sensitive side down, so it's essentially sensitive side to sensitive side.
38:35Then the back cover goes on, and these are called split back printing frames, and the reason they're called split back is that the lower end holds the paper and the negative in contact while you tilt this back and inspect the printing.
38:54So you would take the paper and you would inspect the image.
38:59And if it's not enough, you close it up, and then you put it back in the sun again.
39:03Now, if I show it to you this way, with the albumin paper in contact with the negative, you can see that it has a picture.
39:13However, in most cases, and even on this one, there are tack holes all over this one because what they did was to put tracing paper over this side.
39:23And the reason they did that is if you slow down the sun's rays going through this paper, it makes more contrast, so you can get a stronger image that way.
39:33So that's what would have happened in Mumler's era, because he definitely wouldn't want to have people see that.
39:40That would be bad.
39:41So, I'll show you what he would have done.
39:45And there are different ways we could approach this.
39:47The first thing we could do is just hand this around to the audience.
39:50And so, the audience is inspecting us.
39:53Make sure that it's...
39:54You can take the glass off.
39:56There's nothing secretive in there.
39:59There's no bunny inside.
40:01And so, that would go around.
40:04And then, they would take the negative.
40:06Now, the negative just has you on that negative.
40:09There's no ghost.
40:10So, let me hand this to you.
40:13And now, that would go around the audience.
40:16While the plate is passed amongst the audience, the photographer, Mumler, would take the plate with the ghost image.
40:26And just by palming it in his hand.
40:27There's a reason why he only does these as small images.
40:30Palming the plate.
40:32All he has to do is go like that.
40:34Bring the other plate in place.
40:37Lay it on top.
40:39Like so.
40:41You can tilt it up as long as it's against...
40:44As long as it's against something dark.
40:47You don't see the ghost image.
40:49Here it is in the printing frame with the ghost negative.
40:52Which you can't see because it's against the dark background.
40:55But if I put white paper behind, you can see it very easily.
40:59And of course, that would be the worst thing that could possibly happen in front of an audience.
41:04Especially an angry audience.
41:06The photographic paper would go in place.
41:10So the sensitive side down towards the image side.
41:13And the back of the printing frame would go on.
41:18It's a pressure printing frame.
41:21Now, before he prints, he must put a diffusion paper on the facing side.
41:28So I'm going to turn this around.
41:30You can't see the front of this because I have it at an angle where you can't see it.
41:35I'm going to put the diffusion paper on top.
41:38And then he would put this in the sun to print.
41:42And after a certain amount of time, he would bring this back.
41:46Take the diffusion paper off.
41:49Open the back.
41:51And then peel back the image.
41:56And show the actual photograph with the head and the ghost at the same time.
42:03If it's fine to print, then he would take it out completely.
42:07So go like this.
42:10Take out the entire print to show.
42:13Which is something we're going to do next.
42:15We're actually going to do the printing.
42:16Show the entire print.
42:17Again, you can't see the ghost in the printing frame.
42:20But you would see the ghost in this print.
42:23Which would be pretty amazing.
42:26So take this and put it in the sun.
42:38So you take the object.
42:40And then as you grab the object, right?
42:43And you look at where you grabbed it.
42:46Then you bring out the object that you dropped.
42:51It's called the drop.
42:52It's a simple thing.
42:53It's dropping what you have.
42:56And if you're good at it, you can open your hand so that, you know, it doesn't look like you're holding something.
43:03So you go in.
43:06You drop it.
43:07Right?
43:08You know it's in here because that's squeezed.
43:10It can't be in there because, look, the hand's open.
43:13Then gone.
43:15And there it is.
43:18So, you know, here we have the printing frame.
43:27The printing frame has the diffusion paper on the face.
43:31There's the back.
43:32We're going to open up half of the printing frame.
43:36I'm going to tilt it this way so people can't see the negative.
43:41And then as I pull back the printing paper, you'll see the live subject and the ghost on the same print.
43:51Which is baffling to anyone who's seen this demonstration because they saw the negative.
43:58They saw the printing frame was empty.
44:00And yet there is something done in front of them that actually works.
44:06Mark did such a fantastic job of really capturing the essence and beauty of what Mumler was doing.
44:14To me, these are just wonderful and truly works of art that he created here.
44:20So is this the final piece of the puzzle?
44:23Is this the answer to what I've been searching for for the last seven, eight years?
44:30I don't know.
44:31For me, though, there's a few things that I kind of want to call out.
44:35So the first thing is if you look at the face here, the face doesn't have as much detail as some of Mumler's work.
44:44And I think that to me is the biggest kind of call.
44:48It looks more spectral.
44:52You know, it's just it has more of the look of the body than it does the actual faces that Mumler was able to do.
44:59If you remember, the thing that was so remarkable about Mumler's piece is that the detail in the face versus the detail in the body.
45:08So I think there might be a step missing.
45:10I will say that I think the body looks great.
45:12I think Mark is right on track with saying that the body was cut out or drawn on.
45:16I think there is some real validity there.
45:19And so to me, the body looks more similar to Mumler's than the actual face does.
45:23The one thing that kind of doesn't really fit for me, though, is that it wasn't just sort of people off the street looking at how he was doing it.
45:32The leading photographers of the day were in his studio watching his every move.
45:39You know, they were investigating every piece of equipment, every step he was doing.
45:44And so while I do think there was a sleight of hand, I don't think that these photographers would let Mumler keep the negative away from them.
45:54I think they would need to hold the negative in their hand.
45:57So I think there's something missing here. I think there's a step missing that we don't know what it is yet.
46:03I think there definitely could have been a sleight of hand.
46:05And as I mentioned, Stuart, Hannah Green, Stuart would have had a ton of plates to choose from.
46:14So most people who came into the studio, she might be able to find, if not an actual photograph of somebody from their family.
46:24And it was so kind of blurry, you know, so it could have been there's some I forget the name of the author now.
46:31But there was some article that was written where they they talk about, like, the poor mothers coming in and recognizing some foggy dumpling as their, you know, if the if the if the bereaved wanted to see somebody, they were going to they were going to complete that illusion.
46:49You know, they didn't I didn't have to be it didn't have to be an amazing end result because ultimately it's what they wanted to see.
46:59So, yeah, I do think there could be a sleight of hand.
47:01They would you know, I imagine that these sessions would be kind of emotional, you know, and so there'd be a lot of occasion for distraction.
47:08And certainly if Hannah Green was in the room trying to kind of amp things up, you know, and it was like a kind of a seance kind of like a therapeutic session, you know, like that ultimately is what they wanted and needed.
47:25So who cares? You know, who cares if they were they weren't taking advantage.
47:29They were produced they were producing something that was much wanted and needed and sought out.
47:37It's an interesting it's an interesting thought who was in on it because that assumes again that it was fake.
47:46And I'm not saying it's not it's super, super suspect, but I don't really know if I'm comfortable making that assumption since we can't.
47:57You know, here we are over 100 years later and we're still trying to prove it 150 years and no one could during his lifetime.
48:05Well, if you're going to do this in front of people who are watching, I can see no other way, period. There is no other way.
48:13If you're doing this as a product for people coming to your studio who are longing to see their long lost husband or wife, child, then he doesn't need the sleight of hand.
48:28It's done in the dark room. Also, they would be the ones providing the picture.
48:33So I can't imagine I can't imagine a person coming in with an existing picture, handing it to the photographer.
48:40And then two days later, he gives them a spirit photograph that has the same picture and not have them know that that's from the picture they handed him.
48:51Now, if it's just an amorphous kind of ectoplasm cloud, that's a different story.
48:59But if it's actually from a photograph, you know, they knew, they had to know that it was from that photograph.
49:06Of course, people are gullible when they're in grief.
49:09As I said about grief, what we in our society do is avoid it.
49:15So whether you're talking about spirit photography in my mind or whether you're talking about the idea that someone comes to the foot of your bed and stands and talks to you during a certain part of the grieving process, that's normal.
49:32At some point, it gets to be not normal grief.
49:36But that's like down the road because we try to rush grief in our society like, OK, we'll give you a week off work, maybe two weeks for bereavement.
49:44Grief takes a year at least.
49:47So I think any way that spirit photography or the sense any way that you can feel closer to the one that you've lost.
49:56And one of the things that I do for anniversaries of, say, mother's death is I cook something that was something I love that she cooked.
50:05So you're just talking to spirit photography is just another way to feel close to the person that you've lost.
50:12I think it makes great sense.
50:17And so at the end of the day, I don't think there is a clear answer to how Mumler made these images.
50:25But at the same time, I don't think this was an exercise in futility for the very reason that I hope this film shed a lot of light on the role that his wife played in the creation of these spirit photographs.
50:41She seems to have been this sort of keystone of this whole operation to me.
50:50And the more that I look into her, the more it seems just what a heavy hand she had in this.
50:56And so while history books have always talked about Mumler and, you know, like Felicity said, his wife was always in the footnotes.
51:05I think she needs to be right there with him because you don't have spirit photography without her.
51:14You just you just don't.
51:15Now, whether that's, you know, Hannah or Mrs. Stewart or they weren't the same.
51:20I'm not sure.
51:21I'm kind of leaning that they are the same person.
51:24But I don't think that takes away from the impact that she had on what Mumler did.
51:32So I don't know. I mean, there's there's still a mystery here.
51:36You know, there's still a mystery.
51:38There's still something to find on how he made these images.
51:42I'm sorry, on how they made these images together.
51:45But at the end of the day, I'm I'm really happy because this was such an important journey for me.
51:51I really, you know, stepped out of my comfort zone and went on this journey and traveled up the coast of the United States up into Canada to follow Mumler, to literally chase ghosts.
52:04And it was an incredible experience for me.
52:08And I wouldn't I wouldn't take that away for anything.
52:11So while I don't have a definitive answer, I'm just glad that we could shed a light on to the impact that his wife, Hannah or Mrs. Stewart, had with spirit photography.
52:27I also think that's that's kind of beautiful that they were able to create something so wonderfully magical that it endures today.
52:36And that's I mean, that's wonderful. That's that's what I love.
52:41And that's what keeps drawing me to these images is the mystery.
52:46Yes, but also just the magic of them.
52:49And I hope I've been able to share some of that magic with you all.
52:54So thank you.
52:55Don't you need tonight as I step down for a walk.
53:09In the right light I can turn back the clock.
53:15These streets are filled with ghosts on to crack a smile.
53:22I miss you the most. Stay with me a while.
53:27Trees like memories bend and sway. They echo with your name.
53:34You've gone away. You've gone away. And yet you remain.
53:41These streets are filled with ghosts on to crack a smile.
53:47I miss you the most. Stay with me a while.
53:52Miss you the most. Stay with me a while.
53:57Miss you the most.
53:59Miss you.
54:00And you'll bring the light even now.
54:02Twinking stars.
54:06Miss you the most.