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Psychic / Medium Levitation Photos (Colin Evans: London, 1938)

As I have a similar chair to those seen, thought I would try an experiment to see if I could replicate this in the hallway, with lights switched off and using a timer flash on my mobile's camera.

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The Landing


Well, when say, 'thought', that's the one thing I really didn't do, not all the way through.

Which is why I am hopeful the cut on top of my head doesn't require stitches, although thankfully the bleeding seems to have stopped.

What I did learn is that you can indeed jump a fair height from a crouching position on a chair.

This turned out to be much higher than anticipated... a fact which was not lost when my head hit the ceiling with some force.

I had quite overlooked the fact that the hall ceiling is significantly lower than those in the rooms. Because I was attempting to be faithful to our original and using a delayed, self-timer flash in the darkness, the impending impact simply wasn't immediately obvious, as it would have been otherwise.

I think it's no worse than a cut which will self-heal.

Can you imagine having to explain at the hospital A&E, how the accident happened...

"I was trying to take a selfie which looked like I was levitating...".

'Ouch' though and fear it is going to be rather sore in the morning.

Anyway... yes, it does seem easily achievable and intend to pursue this further tomorrow - outdoors though, methinks.
 
I admire your enthusiasm for the cause in undertaking the experiment. Hope your noggin isn't seriously hurt and / or your brain isn't seriously rattled.

A couple of notes ...

Evans seems to have consistently leaped while keeping both feet close together. I therefore suspect he maintained this posture so as to "stick" the landing on closely-gathered feet.

One review of his stunt (I think it's the LIFE magazine item ... ) mentions he untied his shoelaces. I wonder whether this afforded some practical effect or payoff in performing the stunt.
 
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Comfortably Numb said:
As I have a similar chair to those seen, thought I would try an experiment to see if I could replicate this in the hallway, with lights switched off and using a timer flash on my mobile's camera.
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This pandemic thing has kept you inside too long.
 
IbisNibs said:
EnolaGaia, did you really want closure on this thread? Everyone seems to be having such a fun time with it!
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Closure?!? If I'd wanted it closed I'd have left its cold and inert carcass in the depths of the forum archives where I stumbled upon it.

Instead, I dusted it off, salvaged links and set it up for renewed examination. You folks took the bait, and now ...

ItsAlive.jpg

Bwa-hah-hah ... BWA-hah-ha-ha!!!​
 
EnolaGaia said:
I admire your enthusiasm for the cause in undertaking the experiment. Hope your noggin isn't seriously hurt and / or your brain isn't seriously rattled.
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In the proverbial light of morning... the cut on top of my head is actually quite a nasty one.

I couldn't understand how I had misjudged the height so badly. Examining the scene, I know realise why.

In all my years living here, I have never noticed that towards the end of the hallway, there is a large stone beam, seperating part of the ceiling - I presume it's a supporting structure.

IMG_20210701_003028~2_resize_51.jpg


The chair was against that wall, facing it.

Blissfully unaware of its existence and especially with the hall lights switched off, what I have done is lept forward and cracked the top of my skull off the facing edge of the beam...

I am in hindsight, somewhat fortunate this wasn't seriously worse and shall gratefully survive.

If I tell my daughter, she'll put me in a care home for the elderly who have become a self-liabilty.

So, the plan today is to visit the local park with my 9-y-o granddaughter and she can take photos as grampa leaps skywards once more, from one of the various little mounds of grass there.

Interesting observations you have made and let's see if I can convincingly levitate.

Will probably end up with one awkward landing and a sprained ankle.
 
Comfortably Numb said:
In the proverbial light of morning... the cut on top of my head is actually quite a nasty one.

I couldn't understand how I had misjudged the height so badly. Examining the scene, I know realise why.

In all my years living here, I have never noticed that towards the end of the hallway, there is a large stone beam, seperating part of the ceiling - I presume it's a supporting structure.

View attachment 41481

The chair was against that wall, facing it.

Blissfully unaware of its existence and especially with the hall lights switched off, what I have done is lept forward and cracked the top of my skull off the facing edge of the beam...

I am in hindsight, somewhat fortunate this wasn't seriously worse and shall gratefully survive.

If I tell my daughter, she'll put me in a care home for the elderly who have become a self-liabilty.

So, the plan today is to visit the local park with my 9-y-o granddaughter and she can take photos as grampa leaps skywards once more, from one of the various little mounds of grass there.

Interesting observations you have made and let's see if I can convincingly levitate.

Will probably end up with one awkward landing and a sprained ankle.
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Get the cut looked at. It's a head injury. I'd be more concerned about a fracture or a bleed than the cut. You might be sent for an X-ray.

Tell the staff how it happened, they've heard worse. They need to know how much force you did it with.
 
Comfortably Numb said:
In the proverbial light of morning... the cut on top of my head is actually quite a nasty one.

I couldn't understand how I had misjudged the height so badly. Examining the scene, I know realise why.

In all my years living here, I have never noticed that towards the end of the hallway, there is a large stone beam, seperating part of the ceiling - I presume it's a supporting structure.

View attachment 41481

The chair was against that wall, facing it.

Blissfully unaware of its existence and especially with the hall lights switched off, what I have done is lept forward and cracked the top of my skull off the facing edge of the beam...

I am in hindsight, somewhat fortunate this wasn't seriously worse and shall gratefully survive.

If I tell my daughter, she'll put me in a care home for the elderly who have become a self-liabilty.

So, the plan today is to visit the local park with my 9-y-o granddaughter and she can take photos as grampa leaps skywards once more, from one of the various little mounds of grass there.

Interesting observations you have made and let's see if I can convincingly levitate.

Will probably end up with one awkward landing and a sprained ankle.
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And of course in a good few years time you can wind granddaughter up by telling boyfriend about the day you conned her into taking photos of grandad leaping about in the park. But seriously CN, don't you think that you've done 1 leap too far already? :hahazebs:
 
For the purposes of the test, you didn’t actually need to have the lights off. Just produce a still of your levitation. We all know what the dark looks like.
 
Have we inadvertently started a new craze - like planking. Will hundreds of pics emerge of people "levitating" in all manner of odd places? (I hope so).
 
EnolaGaia said:
It would be wise to have the cut examined. Better safe than sorry ...
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It just happens there was a local radio news item this morning, reporting that my district hospital was asking people not to turn up at A&E unless it was absolutely unavoidable, as they were being overwhelmed due to a massive spike in COVID-19 related cases.

Thankfully, I managed to have the wound cleaned and dressed by a neighbour of my daughter's, who is a nurse.

Technically, I apparently suffered a nasty 'dunt' and she was satisfied I wasn't experiencing any other concerning symptoms. I'm actually fine now and in hindsight maybe rode my luck a wee bit.

My daughter was far from impressed, reminding that whilst I may be young in spirit, I'm too old to be leaping off chairs in the pitch darkness.

I think she might have a point.

Eventually decided to try an experiment in my son's back garden, using a kitchen bench, which seemed about the appropriate height.

That was astonishingly insightful.

I tried first to jump both high and forward at the same time and discovered I simply couldn't jump at all.

It was weird, there was just no 'momentum' to 'kick-start' the manoeuvre. This required several abortive attempts before there was enough 'determination' to 'go for it'.

The result was a leap of... only about 3 or 4 inches, if even that.

One other notable factor was that the landing, even on grass from a relatively small height was anything other than soft and even managed to 'jar' my knee on the final attempt.

This resulted in rolling around in agony and took a minute or so before the excruciating pain subsided.

However, whilst I am hardly fit at my age of 63 and only 5ft 8in tall, son is 6ft 3in and works out at a local gym 3 days a week.

He trains on an indoor rowing machine there regularly, so would surely have the leg power to improve significantly on my feeble efforts.

No... exactly the same outcome. He also found it a struggle to 'take off' from either a standing or crouched start, only managed to jump about a couple of inches and had some hard landings.

Consequently, although doubtless this could be improved upon with repeated practice, it was a revelation just how difficult we found this to be.

Thus endeth my personal wear and tear on aging body parts.

Really surprised to see my son unable to find that 'leg spring' I would have expected - he's also an avid cyclist.

Need to think on this overall, some more. Did Evans make an impressive leap though, he's never shown to be that far above his chair and was clearly a tall person, possibly adding to our illusion.
 
escargot said:
It occurs to me that the song chosen would be a popular one of the time so everyone'd know it.
I have read that hymns and prayers were also used by Evans.
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The PsyPioneer article (noted earlier) mentions Evans' preferred song selection ...
During the seances of Colin Evans’ circle it is customary to sing secular songs with a quick, brisk rhythm to keep up light vibrations to assist physical phenomena, but a request had been made that songs with a war time association should be avoided.
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http://iapsop.com/psypioneer/psypioneer_v10_n8_aug_2014.pdf (p. 252)
 
I hadn't yet posted a photo that demonstrates climbing onto and standing on one's chair wasn't an unusual maneuver during Evans' seances.

Evans-380312-OnChairs-A.jpg

This photo accompanies the most detailed description (in that document) of any of Evans' levitations - one that was introduced and described as apparently being different from the others performed during that period.
A séance with 200 people is reported at the Rochester Square Temple, London on Saturday March 12th 1938 published in the Two Worlds (March 25th). There is a photograph of a levitation with two ladies standing on a chair, which describes a levitation process:

The two ladies seated one each side of the medium then announced that he was “going up.” He seemed to float upwards from his chair, while they held his hands, until they had to stand on their chairs and stretch their arms upward to retain hold of his hands, which were drawn slowly but irresistibly right out of their reach, so that they had to let go—and a moment or two afterwards, sitters in different parts of the circle at some distance felt his feet drop fairly heavily (Mrs. Jackie Kruze said very heavily—others, not heavily enough to hurt them, but heavily enough and long enough to be distinctly felt and recognised) on to their heads and then float upwards again. The two ladies who occupied seats next to his, and who had been holding his hands till he “floated” up beyond their reach, were then made to take each other’s hands, while still standing on their chairs in order to strengthen the power by completing a circle of linked hands. At this point an infra-red flashlight photograph was taken, which proved to be a picture showing him apparently about to be returned to his chair, but in the meanwhile “suspended” some distance above it in front of the two ladies’ linked hands. Immediately after the flash, the medium was felt separating the ladies’ hands and taking their hands again himself and a moment later falling downwards gently into his chair again.
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http://iapsop.com/psypioneer/psypioneer_v10_n8_aug_2014.pdf (p. 248)
 
EnolaGaia said:
One review of his stunt (I think it's the LIFE magazine item ... ) mentions he untied his shoelaces. I wonder whether this afforded some practical effect or payoff in performing the stunt.
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That's intriguing, although I can't see how it would make a telling difference. One issue noted by son and myself is that if we had both been wearing lighter shoes, this could have helped. However, son pointed out that he weighed just over 14 stone and Evans seemed around 16 stone and it was commendable Evans could jump at all!

I've since had time to look through the daylight photographs and perhaps a couple of interest.

This is the highest either of us, my son, managed to jump from a standing/crouched position:

Screenshot_20210701-191850_resize_85.jpg


Son did capture one moment when a blurred image of myself maybe slightly resembled a photograph of Evans, with particular regard to the feet:

IMG_20210701_162832~2_resize_77.jpg


tumblr_nxnw73HfNq1smej9xo1_500~2.jpg


Essentially though, we were unable to achieve anything close to the Evans images, despite several attempts each and utilising the camera's fastest 'x frames per second' mode.

The timing of Isaac's single-shot photographs had to be absolutely spot on and presumably they must have practised?

Even so, have to admit how impressed we both were with their results when we reconsidered this in context.
 
EnolaGaia said:
This photo accompanies the most detailed description (in that document) of any of Evans' levitations...
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An enlargement from same:

Screenshot_20210702-041200~2.jpg


This perfectly illustrates the quandary - for a big fella, that's some achievement if simply jumping from a standing start and no momentum - not as if he could take a run up to it and then leap.

What a great find as evidence and further adds to the intrigue.

Curiouser and curiouser indeed...
 
Just to note an observation; if you look at the height Evans is from the floor, as opposed to his chair, in our preceding photograph, that's a drop of around, say, a metre/3 ft?
 
Comfortably Numb said:
... This perfectly illustrates the quandary - for a big fella, that's some achievement if simply jumping from a standing start and no momentum - not as if he could take a run up to it and then leap. ...
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I'm not sure Evans was a "big fellow." Photos of him sitting next to women don't indicate his upper body length was much greater than theirs. Other men seated near him seem to have legs of roughly the same length or greater than Evans.

Much of the bulk one might attribute to Evans is due to his suit. He seems to always be wearing a relatively thickly woven three-piece suit. His jackets are sufficiently loose to shift off his body with movement. His attire was noted as unusual in the PsyPioneer article (linked earlier):
Being dressed in a three piece suit for his séances is unusual given the heat which would have been generated with so many people in such close proximity.
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Another thing to bear in mind ... "Colin Evans" was a stage name / pseudonym. The PsyPioneer article states this wasn't his real name.

This is undoubtedly a big reason so little is known about him beyond the reports of 1937 and 1938.
 
EnolaGaia said:
I hadn't yet posted a photo that demonstrates climbing onto and standing on one's chair wasn't an unusual maneuver during Evans' seances.


This photo accompanies the most detailed description (in that document) of any of Evans' levitations - one that was introduced and described as apparently being different from the others performed during that period.

http://iapsop.com/psypioneer/psypioneer_v10_n8_aug_2014.pdf (p. 248)
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I think Evans jumping photos are quite spooky in themselves...was he afraid or just mad ?
 
Sabresonic said:
I think Evans jumping photos are quite spooky in themselves...was he afraid or just mad ?
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I'm starting to suspect he wasn't who he was portrayed as being, and not just because he was using a stage name.

There are multiple possible clues in the PsyPioneer article suggesting he was pursuing an agenda to test the limits of seemingly demonstrable powers. The problem becomes figuring out whose agenda he was actually pursuing (e.g.: the true believer's? the scammer's? the skeptic's? the debunker's? the photographer Isaac's? the stage magician's?).

For one thing, his portrait illustrates a face possibly disguised with a healthy beard, an extravagant moustache, and eyeglasses he only rarely wore during his appearances (and never when levitating).

The introductory text seems to treat him as different from other mediums of apparently remarkable ability, describing him as a university graduate with a keen interest in researching psychic / spiritualist phenomena.

He seems to have burst upon the scene in 1937, initially demonstrating the usual array of manifestations and trumpet levitations before moving on to the self-levitations for which he's usually cited.

He seems to have been atypically familiar with photographic technicalities and collaborated with Leon Isaacs in developing the "infra-red" camera techniques used to record his performances. He's the only medium (of which I'm aware) who had control over the camera that photographed him.

Other adherents who write about him seem to know him only from his presentations and performances, as if he kept to himself. Save for describing him as a university grad of unspecified real name, the only mention of his personal life relates to an isolated claim one of the women sitting beside him (on one occasion) was his unnamed wife.

I'm finding it harder and harder to construe him as simply a talented medium who quietly disappeared from the scene after receiving multiple critical reviews. I'm finding it easier and easier to suspect he was really doing something else for other reasons than establishing himself as a popular medium.
 
EnolaGaia said:
I'm starting to suspect he wasn't who he was portrayed as being, and not just because he was using a stage name.

There are multiple possible clues in the PsyPioneer article suggesting he was pursuing an agenda to test the limits of seemingly demonstrable powers. The problem becomes figuring out whose agenda he was actually pursuing (e.g.: the true believer's? the scammer's? the skeptic's? the debunker's? the photographer Isaac's? the stage magician's?).

For one thing, his portrait illustrates a face possibly disguised with a healthy beard, an extravagant moustache, and eyeglasses he only rarely wore during his appearances (and never when levitating).

The introductory text seems to treat him as different from other mediums of apparently remarkable ability, describing him as a university graduate with a keen interest in researching psychic / spiritualist phenomena.

He seems to have burst upon the scene in 1937, initially demonstrating the usual array of manifestations and trumpet levitations before moving on to the self-levitations for which he's usually cited.

He seems to have been atypically familiar with photographic technicalities and collaborated with Leon Isaacs in developing the "infra-red" camera techniques used to record his performances. He's the only medium (of which I'm aware) who had control over the camera that photographed him.

Other adherents who write about him seem to know him only from his presentations and performances, as if he kept to himself. Save for describing him as a university grad of unspecified real name, the only mention of his personal life relates to an isolated claim one of the women sitting beside him (on one occasion) was his unnamed wife.

I'm finding it harder and harder to construe him as simply a talented medium who quietly disappeared from the scene after receiving multiple critical reviews. I'm finding it easier and easier to suspect he was really doing something else for other reasons than establishing himself as a popular medium.
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A German spy maybe? :oops:
 
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