Levitation & the Amazing D.D. Home

I have an interest in known documented instances of people levitating. I thought I would share this. Sorry its long. Daniel Dunglas Home (pronounced Hoom)was born in Scotland in 1833. His mother was a Highlander of the McNeal clan and supposedly gifted with second sight. At the age of 9 he was brought up by foster parents. He changed his name from Himes to Hume to Home. At age 13 Daniel bagan to reveal various psychic abilities. Daniel and a friend,Edwin,pledged that whomever died first would come and present himself to the other. About a month after Home had moved a few hundered miles away from Edwin, he announced to his aunt that he had a vision of Edwin and that he had died. 2 days later the death was confirmed. When Daniel was 17 he had a vision of his mother in his bedroom saying "Dan,twelve o'clock". He had been ill in bed and called out to his aunt about his vision. Next day word came that his 42 yr old mother had passed at the hour she told her ill son. Also a few days after her passing various rappings began to be heard as the family sat down for breakfast. This was accompanied by movement of furniture. The family felt that Daniel had brought the devil into their household. Even in neighbor's homes the tappings would follow him. At 18 he left and developed his mediumship very rapidly. He gave as many as 6 or 7 seances a day. He did not realize the drain on him and was frequently ill. He became known in well to do spiritualist circles and gained life-time followers of what he could do. Home held his seances in well lit rooms & during the day. The table would move in many directions with considerable force. Male sitters would even sit on the table and it would still rise up easily. He would visit strange peoples homes and their table would rise, never disturbing candles, pencils, etc on the table even tho it was tipped at a 45 degree angle. Experiments were run that it would take 19 pound to lift the table from the floor. Witnesses signed statements on what they saw. Another experiment was 350 pounds of men sat on the table and it levitated and actually rocked until it threw them off. Other abilities? An accordian could play any song requested when he held the side opposite the keys. Even foreign music. He demonstrated remarkable healing powers, but was frequently ill himself. He never charged for his services but accepted offerings of room and board and jewlery. He actually turned down money. He believed and lectured that his power was to 'help draw us nearer to God'. His career as a medium was without fraud. Home once caused a garland of flowers to rise and placed it upon Elizabeth Barrett Browning's head. She had written she could see the hand that moved it it was large and very white. Her husband Robert Browning was very angry about this and banned Home from their house. Many physical mediums have demonstrated abilities to move objects and to cause rappings and materalize spirit hands and faces, Homes could elongate his body and also demonstrate immunity to heat and flame. He could take hot coals and hand them to his sitters who would not be burned, yet afterwards the coals were tested and indeed HOT! Home even placed his head in a bed of coals and flames and not even his hair was singed. All said and done it was his ability to levitate that made him more famous than any medium in the world. He would levitate out of his chair, feet first go out a window and come back thru another window that he first had to unlock 85 ft above the ground. He would even pause outside. A Witnesses asked how he could go out so small an opening, and he demonstrated again. Quote: "I remarked that the window was not raised a foot, and that I could not think how he (Home) had managed to squeeze through. He arose and said Come and see. I went with him; he told me to open the window as it was before. I did and he told me to stand a little distance off; he then went though the open space, head first, quite rapidly, his body being nearly horizontal and apparently rigid. He came in feet foremost, and we returned to the other room together." Hundreds of people, many scientists, witnessed Home in his lifetime. He died in 1886 at 53 years old. Inscription on his gravestone.. Paul (1 Cor 12:10) "To another discerning of Spirits"

I find it interesting that came from a gifted family and he started his abilited during adolesence. Both a common theme with mediums and psychics. The levitation part is fascinating !

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