A Sinister Revival

SUPERSTITIONS.AUCKLAND STAR, VOLUME LXIV, ISSUE 35, 11 FEBRUARY 1933, PAGE 8 (SUPPLEMENT)

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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/AS19330211.2.183.57?items_per_page=100&query=%22horror%22+%22occult%22&snippet=true

With thanks to the National Library of New Zealand.

 

Weird Woman

POLICE COURT.—THIS DAY.

AUCKLAND STAR, VOLUME IX, ISSUE 2442, 19 JANUARY 1878

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/AS18780119.2.13

With thanks to the National Library of New Zealand

Guy Fawkes Effigy 1919

“Nancy makes the acquaintance of Guy Fawkes”: ‘Our second visit to the Hatuma farm, Oct – Nov 1919’. From the album: Family photograph album; 1917 – 1920; Adkin, Leslie, 5 November 1919, New Zealand, by Leslie Adkin. Gift of Adkin Family, 1997. Te Papa (O.031629)

The closest thing I have come across to an example of a pre-war New Zealand scarecrow.

Glimpses into Spirit Life – a rare book of spiritualist seances

Images from ‘Glimpses into Spirit Life’ (1927), a New Zealand published book of records of spirit communications in the mold of 1909’s ‘Occult Research, Reincarnation, Life in Other Planets & Antiquity Unveiled by Spirit Intelligences’.

Dunedin Cenotaph’s that might have been

A picture of the accepted plan for the cenotaph, featuring frescoes and bronze figures that were not included in the final design due to a lack of funds.

Some notes from the judge of the competition held to pick the winning design.

If anyone has any leads on any publication or archives holding any of the losing competition entries (especially the “more artistic” ones) please leave a message on this post.

Top image from The University of Auckland Library architecture archives. Text from https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/P19210801.2.6 with thanks to the National Library of New Zealand

Two Meloncholy Deaths

SOCIAL AND GENERAL.
OTAGO DAILY TIMES, ISSUE 11419, 10 MAY 1899

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/ODT18990510.2.4

With thanks to the National Library of New Zealand.

The priesthood of Diana in the Waikato Times

Extract from:

THE TRUTH PERCEIVERS.
WAIKATO TIMES, VOLUME 98, ISSUE 15335, 8 SEPTEMBER 1923

A STRANGE PRIESTHOOD.
WAIKATO TIMES, VOLUME 98, ISSUE 15341, 15 SEPTEMBER 1923

THE TRUTH PERCEIVERS.
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/WT19230908.2.94.4?
A STRANGE PRIESTHOOD.
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/WT19230915.2.89.3?

With thanks to the National Library of New Zealand

 

Raising the Devil

AUCKLAND STAR, VOLUME XVII, ISSUE 160, 10 JULY 1886

With thanks to the National Library of New Zealand

“Magic Box” Fortune Telling Wall Game

Spotted for sale within NZ recently, this Wall Game would probably have been in a fish & chip shop or at one of the old Carnival Fairs.

Popular Magic Handbooks Available in New Zealand 1850-1935

Advertisements for various fortune telling handbooks of the kind sold in the UK as chapbooks. The national library of Scotland as well as the internet archive have large collections, readable online, of these books.  Typically they will consist of a body of text dealing with the main subject (i.e. fortune telling by consulting a set of formulaic questions then consulting a set of tables decided by esoteric means for the answers, or an alphabetic list of dream imagery interpretations, then some shorter articles on fortune telling through palmistry, or reading moles on the face, or other very simple “fortune telling” devices, such as what the colour and type of a man’s hair says about his qualities as a husband or a small number of charms or spells for finding a husband or wife).

‘Nile’ fortune cards appear to be regular playing cards with interpretations written on them around the outside and the regular face in the centre.

1852
Dream book
Fortune Teller

1879

Dream Book and Fortune Teller
Wide Wide World and Dream Book, Fortune Teller, Letter Writer and Reciter

1891

Fortune Telling
Everlasting Fortune Teller
Mother Shipton’s Fortune Teller

1906

Royal Fortune Teller
Imperial Fortune Teller
Imperial Dream Book
Napoleon’s Book of Fate

1912

The Fortune Teller

1915

The Imperial Royal Dream Book and Fortune Teller
Hands and How to Read Them
The Dream Book

1920

1924

Napoleon’s Book of Fate
Zadkiel’s Dream Book and Fortune Teller

1932

Everybody’s Fortune Teller Book
The Universal Dream Book
Dreams and Omens and Tea-Cup Fortune Telling
Fortune Telling by Tea Leaves
The Dream Book and Fortune Teller

Paper’s past has hundreds of adverts containing references to this genre, at least one for every decade (save the 1860s, and very few for the 1880s), These tend to be quite repetitious with a single bookseller dominating each decade (though there seems to have been more book sellers advertising this kind of material from 1900-1930) by the mid 30s they had seen their heyday (which mirrors their popularity in the rest of the English speaking world, with, especially American, examples being produced well into the 1920s) though a few stranglers of the genre were being offered  into the 1940s, sold alongside cookbooks and birthday novelties. The decline of the genre overall can be seen in the kinds of books they are advertised along side, from being a part of a large body of literature of all kinds being made available at an affordable price to a mas audience in the 19th century, to finding a home amongst sensationalist popular fiction and aspirational self improvement/vocational handbooks in the early 20th century, to a homeless novelty literature by mid century. Whether this was due to being an outdated format (it’s chapbook contemporaries not surviving the 19th century) or a diminishing audience of more demanding and rational readers, it’s tenuous survival was likely due to promises of power, comfort and control in a financially and presentationally accessible manner that wouldn’t see a format update until the first main-streaming of wicca in the early 1970s.

With thanks to the National Library of New Zealand’s papers past project.