The Ghosts of My Friends

So, you came across a copy of The Ghosts of My Friends and you have a few questions. So did I. 

In simplest terms, The Ghosts of My Friends was a parlor game book that played off the dwindling popularity of autograph albums and the rise of spiritualism at the turn of the 20th century. You folded the page to create a crease, unfolded the page, signed along the crease with a dip pen, and folded the page once again along the crease. The resulting inkblot looks somewhat like a ghost or a creature. 

Autograph books were very popular in the 19th and early 20th century, and with the high interest in spiritualism and the new fad of inkblots, it was only a matter of time before the three came together. Undoubtedly part of the marketing was that it allowed you some access to the world beyond this one, in the same way Milton Bradley wants you to believe their Ouija board lets you talk to deceased loved ones.

An article in Atlas Obscura is an excellent source of information about these books and the era they came from and, I would argue, probably the most comprehensive collection of information about the books. 

But like all sources out there, it had very little about the person whose name was on the title page. That's where I dug in. My interest and research led me to two fascinating women living on opposite sides of the pond. Two women who, though childless through their lives, were tenacious supporters of child welfare and education. One whose name many people don't know they know and one whose name is not as known as it should be. 

Let me introduce you to the ghosts of my friends, Cecil Henland and Elizabeth Vernon Quinn.