Arthur Conan Doyle, SPIRITUALISM and Harry Houdini

"MARGERY"  aka Mrs. LeRoi Goddard Crandon (nee' Mina Stinson)



Mina Stinson was born in Canada, in 1888, and moved to Boston at an early age. In 1918, after one unsuccessful marriage, she married Boston surgeon Dr. Le Roi Goddard Crandon, a man whose family dated back to the Mayflower. They purchased the house at Number 11 Lime Street, on Beacon Hill, and became well established in Boston society. The Crandons were the perfect Beacon Hill couple. Dr. Crandon was a prestigious instructor at Harvard Medical School, and Mina Crandon was piquant, witty, and "too attractive for her own good."

In 1923, Dr. Crandon became seriously interested in Spiritualism and psychic research. In May of that year, the Crandons, along with some friends, decided to sit for a table-tilting seance. The table, apparently controlled by a spirit, indicated that Mina, herself, was a very powerful medium. Within a few months, the spirit communicator identified himself as Walter, Mina's brother who had died in a train crash in 1911. Shortly thereafter, Walter was able to entrance Mina and speak directly through her. Then, having mastered the ability to produce a voice box, he began speaking via the direct voice process.

Walter characteristically was not the most spiritually-minded personality. He often used off-color language and refused to be stumped. During one seance, a sitter asked if his was the language of the "Fourth Dimension." Walter promptly retorted, "No, I am talking in a language for you to understand." Walter felt that his mission was to help demonstrate, through his sister, the creative process of mind, via telekinetic effects, rather than deliver inspirational messages or addresses. In this respect, he excelled.

Despite the abundant production of phenomena, because of Dr. Crandon's position with Harvard and the closed-minded attitude toward psychic matters, attendance to the sittings with Mina Crandon was by invitation only.