The Missing Link in Modern Spiritualism by A. Leah Underhill (of the Fox Family). Thomas R. Knox and Co. 1885. Brown cloth, with bright gilt lettering and decoration on the front cover and spine, and black out-lining on the front cover and some black lettering with black out-lining on the spine. 6" x 8" xiv, 477 page Hardcover with no dust jacket. Moderate cover edge wear with some scuffing, scuffing particularly to the back cover. Old black ink thrift store(?) pricing with an old pencil price crossed out by the same ink as the thrift store(?) price inside the front cover. Otherwise, I see no other previous owner markings. No tears, folds or creases to pages except possibly tissue paper protecting some full page illustrations. Binding is tight with no looseness to pages. Not ex-library, not remaindered and not a facsimile reprint. For sale by Jon Wobber, bookseller since 1978. JC22a

"The Fox sisters were three sisters from Rochester, New York who played an important role in the creation of Spiritualism: Leah (April 8, 1813 – November 1, 1890), Margaretta (also called Maggie), (October 7, 1833 – March 8, 1893) and Catherine Fox (also called Kate) (March 27, 1837 – July 2, 1892).[1] The two younger sisters used "rappings" to convince their older sister and others that they were communicating with spirits. Their older sister then took charge of them and managed their careers for some time. They all enjoyed success as mediums for many years.
In 1888, Margaretta confessed that their rappings had been a hoax and publicly demonstrated their method.[2][3] Despite their confession, the Spiritualism movement continued to grow in popularity.[4]
On 14 November 1849, the Fox sisters demonstrated their spiritualist rapping at the Corinthian Hall in Rochester. This was the first demonstration of spiritualism held before a paying public and inaugurated a long history of public events featured by spiritualist mediums and leaders in the United States and in other countries.[14]
Kate and Margaretta became famous mediums and they held séances for hundreds of people. Many of these early séances were entirely frivolous, where sitters sought insight into "the state of railway stocks or the issue of love affairs."[12]: 89–111 [15]
Horace Greeley, the prominent publisher and politician, became a kind of protector for them, enabling their movement in higher social circles.[12]: 89–111  Their public séances in New York in 1850 attracted notable people, including William Cullen Bryant, George Bancroft, James Fenimore Cooper, Nathaniel Parker Willis, Horace Greeley, Sojourner Truth and William Lloyd Garrison.[15] Although Greeley watched over the sisters, the lack of parental supervision was pernicious, as both of the young women began to drink wine.
Beginning in 1850, some critics concluded that the girls made the rappings themselves, including physician E. P. Longworthy,[16][c] John W. Hurn, Reverend John M. Austin, and Reverend D. Potts.[16][d] In 1851, the Reverend C. Chauncey Burr wrote in the New-York Tribune that by cracking toe joints the sounds were so loud, they could be heard in a large hall.[16] In the same year, investigators from the University at Buffalo concluded that the raps were made by cracking joints of their body and that the raps would not occur if they had cushions under their feet.

The Fox sisters have been widely cited in parapsychology and spiritualist literature. According to psychologists Leonard Zusne and Warren Jones, "many accounts of the Fox sisters leave out their confession of fraud and present the rappings as genuine manifestations of the spirit world."[34] C. E. M. Hansel notes in 1989 that "remarkably, the Fox sisters are still discussed in the parapsychological literature without mention of their trickery."" - wikipedia