Harris, Susannah (ca. 1920)
Harris, Susannah (ca. 1920)
American direct voice medium (later known as Mrs. Harris Kay), pastor of a Spiritualist church in Columbus, Ohio, whose control was a child, "Harmony." The last years of her life were spent in England. After accusations of fraud against Harris, Abraham Wallace applied the water test, filling her mouth with water, which changed color according to the length of time it was affected by saliva. Wallace claimed to have established the independence of the medium's voices.
In 1913 and 1914 the Spiritualist journal Light contained many testimonies in favor of Harris's mediumship. In 1919 at Steinway Hall, London, while blindfolded, she executed a painting in oils upside down and nearly completed another in about two hours. However, in 1920 the Norwegian Society for Psychical Research published a very unfavorable report on 25 sittings held in Christiania. Proof was adduced that the German voice of "Rittmeister Hermann" was a fraud to which "Harmony" was an accomplice (Light, May 1, 1920). Harris was also accused of fraud at séances in Holland in 1914. She was defended by James Coates in Is Spiritualism Based on Facts or Fancy? (1920).
Sources:
Jong, K. H. "The Trumpet Medium Mrs. Harris." Journal of the Society for Psychical Research 16 (1914).