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In the houses of their dead : the Lincolns, the Booths, and the spirits

Alford, Terry (author.).

Summary: "The story of Abraham Lincoln as it has never been told before: through the strange, even otherworldly, points of contact between his family and that of the man who killed him, John Wilkes Booth. In the 1820s, two families, unknown to each other, worked on farms in the American wilderness. It seemed unlikely that the families would ever meet-and yet, they did. The son of one family, the famed actor John Wilkes Booth, killed the son of the other, President Abraham Lincoln, in the most significant assassination in American history. The murder, however, did not come without warning-in fact, it had been foretold. In the Houses of Their Dead is the first book of the many thousands written about Lincoln to focus on the president's fascination with Spiritualism, and to demonstrate how it linked him, uncannily, to the man who would kill him. Abraham Lincoln is usually seen as a rational, empirically-minded man, yet as acclaimed scholar and biographer Terry Alford reveals, he was also deeply superstitious and drawn to the irrational. Like millions of other Americans, including the Booths, Lincoln and his wife, Mary, suffered repeated personal tragedies, and turned for solace to Spiritualism, a new practice sweeping the nation that held that the dead were nearby and could be contacted by the living. Remarkably, the Lincolns and the Booths even used the same mediums, including Charles Colchester, a specialist in "blood writing" whom Mary first brought to her husband, and who warned the president after listening to the ravings of another of his clients, John Wilkes Booth. Alford's expansive, richly-textured chronicle follows the two families across the nineteenth century, uncovering new facts and stories about Abraham and Mary while drawing indelible portraits of the Booths-from patriarch Julius, a famous actor in his own right, to brother Edwin, the most talented member of the family and a man who feared peacock feathers, to their confidant Adam Badeau, who would become, strangely, the ghostwriter for President Ulysses S. Grant. At every turn, Alford shows that despite the progress of the age-the glass hypodermic syringe, electromagnetic induction, and much more-death remained ever-present, thus that it was only rational for millions of Americans, from the president on down, to cling to beliefs that seem anything but. A novelistic narrative of two exceptional American families set against the convulsions their times, In the Houses of Their Dead ultimately leads us to consider how ghost stories helped shape the nation"--

Record details

  • ISBN: 1631495607
  • ISBN: 9781631495601
  • Physical Description: xvii, 298 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
    print
  • Edition: First edition.
  • Publisher: New York : Liveright Publishing Corporation, A Division of W. W. Norton & Company, [2022]

Content descriptions

Bibliography, etc. Note: Includes bibliographical references (pages 251-285) and index.
Formatted Contents Note: If the Fates Allow -- His Imperfect Self -- So Old When He Was Young -- God's Most Precious Truth -- Love's Sacred Circle -- Ghost Kisses -- Why Wake Me? -- Fatal Vision -- Are We So Soon Forgot? -- Death Came as a Friend.
Subject: Lincoln, Abraham 1809-1865 Religion
Lincoln, Mary Todd 1818-1882 Religion
Spiritualism United States History 19th century
Parapsychology United States History 19th century
Presidents United States Biography
Lincoln family
Booth family
Booth, Junius Brutus 1796-1852 Family
Lincoln, Abraham 1809-1865 Assassination
Genre: Biographies.

Available copies

  • 13 of 15 copies available at SPARK Libraries.

Holds

  • 1 current hold with 15 total copies.
Show Only Available Copies
Location Call Number / Copy Notes Barcode Shelving Location Status Due Date
Albright Memorial Library 973.7 ALFORD (Text) 50686016183944 Adult Nonfiction Available -
Altoona Area Public Library 973.7092 ALF (Text) 33240005145753 Adult Nonfiction Available -
Carbondale Public Library 973.7 ALFORD (Text) 50688010819580 Adult Nonfiction Available -
Exeter Community Library 973.7 ALF (Text) 33249025338439 Non-fiction Available -
Gettysburg Library 973.7092 ALFORD (Text)
Endowment: Edwin S. Longanecker Named Endowment, 2022
35740635851181 Nonfiction Checked Out 04/01/2024
Green Free Library (Wellsboro) 973.7092 ALF (Text) 92525563 GFWM Main Room Available -
Lower Macungie Library 973.7092 ALF (Text) 33400001571341 Adult Nonfiction Checked Out 04/16/2024
Martinsburg Community Library 973.709 Alf (Text) 1OMAR00089919Y Adult Nonfiction Available -
Mason-Dixon Public Library Adults 973.7 ALF Nonfiction (Text) 34262000777678 Main Room Available -
Nanty Glo Public Library 973.7092 Alf (Text) 31815190061576 NGLM Non-Fiction Available -

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