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Gets better and better! Getting closer to the history of retrievals. Below is from
http://www.spiritwritings.com/fodorr.htmlRESCUE CIRCLES of spiritualists, formed for the purpose of "waking up" the dead and freeing them from their earthbound state, are based on the idea that earthbound spirits are too gross to be reached by the influence of higher spirits from the other side. They stand closer to the material plane than to the spiritual. In many cases they do not realize that they are dead at all and live in a state of bewilderment. If they are enlightened on their true condition and prayers are offered for them they will progress to a higher existence.
The beginning of rescue circles may be traced to the Shaker communities of America. The appearance of a tribe of Indian controls aroused the impression that the Shakers were to teach and proselytize them. The first such circles were held by the wife of Col. Danskin of Baltimore and other ladies. The best work was performed by a circle in Buffalo between 1875 and 1900 and by Dr. Carl Wickland and his wife. The medium in the first case was Marcia M. Swain and Leander Fischer, a professor of music in Buffalo. The circle consisted of Daniel E. Bailey and his wife, the mother of the professor and Mrs. Aline M. Eggleston, the stenographer. The identity of the spirit brought to be "waked up" was often verified but as the search after such proofs entailed considerable labor and time it was, after a while, given up. The work of the circle is described in D. E. Bailey's Thoughts from the Inner Life, Boston, 1886. Twelve gripping records of these rescue seances were published in Admiral Moore's Glimpses of the Next State.
Similar mission work was carried on by E. C. Randall, also in Buffalo. The medium was Mrs. Emilie S. French. Randall's Frontiers of the After Life, New York, 1922, describes the results. Dr. Wickland's book, Thirty Years Among the Dead, Los Angeles, 1924, contains hundreds of interesting records. Later he also produced Gateway of Understanding. The work of the Tozer rescue circle in Melbourne is described in Conan Doyle's Wanderings of a Spiritualist. In California Charlotte Dresser's circle encountered similar earthbound spirits described in Spirit World and Spirit Life and Life Here and Hereafter. More recent works include Valley of the Shadow, 1994, by Peter F. Baker and Sixty Years a Spiritualist, 1995, by Alan House.
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