"The Hoax of the Spirit Lover"
"The Hoax of the Spirit Lover" by Houdini is the cover story and the lead story in the April 1924 issue of Weird Tales. At just three pages, it's the shortest of Houdini's three stories in "The Unique Magazine" and the one most like a non-fiction article rather than a work of fiction. It reads almost like a transcription of a spoken narrative. Maybe it's the one closest to Houdini's actual and original words.
The story is set in Montana but has a Chicago connection. It involves a séance and all of the trappings of Spiritualism. Approached by three men suspecting a hoax, Houdini exposes a fake medium and his helper. As it turns out, the helper is the fiancé of one of the attendees of the séance. He is supposed to have died. In actuality, it was his twin brother who had died, and the surviving twin had pulled off an insurance fraud to claim his money. As the legal saying goes, Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus.
As in "The Spirit Fakers of Hermannstadt," the theme in "The Hoax of the Spirit Lover" is the exposure of fake and fraudulent mediums, the topic of Houdini's lecture tour during that spring of 1924, one hundred years ago as I write. Part two of "The Spirit Fakers of Hermannstadt" appears later in the April 1924 issue of Weird Tales, as does the first installment of the letters column "Ask Houdini," with letters ostensibly written by readers and answers ostensibly written by Houdini.
If "The Hoax of the Spirit Lover" was actually the work of a ghostwriter, I take that to indicate that the ghostwriter also had a Chicago connection. Otis Adelbert Kline is an obvious candidate for true author of the story. Farnsworth Wright, not yet editor of the magazine, is another. Author John Locke has suggested Harold Ward as the man behind "The Hoax of the Spirit Lover." (1) Kline and Ward, both of whom hailed from the Chicago area, were friends or acquaintances. I suspect that if you were in contact with one, you were in contact with the other, at least when it came to writing jobs or assignments. Both were close at hand for the publisher and editor of Weird Tales. Both were also workhorses. If Baird and Henneberger needed content in a hurry, which would have been the case with the Houdini issues, Kline and Ward (Wright, too) were there, ready and waiting.
Evidence in favor of Ward as the true author of "The Hoax of the Spirit Lover" appears in the "Ask Houdini" letters column published in that same issue of April 1924. There are seven letters and seven replies in the first installment of "Ask Houdini." Letter number three is from an H.W. of Peoria, Illinois, while letter number four is from an H.W. of Springfield, Illinois. I don't think there can be any doubt that one or both letters were written by Harold Ward. In fact, six of the seven letters have the letter H in the initials of the letter writers: H.L. of Terre Haute, Indiana; J.H. of Detroit, Michigan; H.W. of Peoria; H.W. of Springfield; H.M. of Louisville, Kentucky; and K.H. of Buffalo, New York. Only letter number seven, by S.T. of Evanston, Illinois, lacks the H in the initials of its author. Ward's mother was named Sarah. If he was the author, did he use her first initial in letter number seven? On the other hand, the seventh letter is probably least deferential or most challenging towards Houdini. It even defends Arthur Conan Doyle as a "learned and sincere" man. So maybe Ward was not its author after all. In any case, it's clear in that letter that by the spring of 1924, Houdini and Doyle had indeed had a falling out and that the former had taken a "decided stand" against the latter. (Weird Tales, Apr. 1924, p. 92.)
Note
(1) See The Thing's Incredible! The Secret Origins of Weird Tales by John Locke (Off-Trail Publications, 2018), page 142.
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| Weird Tales, April 1924. Cover story" The Hoax of the Spirit Lover" by Houdini. Cover art by R.M. Mally. That appears to be Houdini left of center, in which case this was the second successive cover to show his image. |
Text copyright 2024 Terence E. Hanley
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