The New York herald. [volume] (New York, N.Y.) 1920-1924, 1920-11-23
HITCHCOCK GHOSTS
SPURN HIS SALAD
Fail to Appear in Comedians
Home as Guests Sit About
All Night.
DEPLETED MEDIUM HEARD
She Tells a Few Things in
Secret Lives of Host and
His Guests.
DEPLETED MEDIUM HEARD

Ills UueSUS.
Ghosts that are supposed to do one
night stands in Raymond Hitchcock 9
home did not appear at his benefit per-
Torrance even late enough for the last
edition of yesterdays paper, although
the guests sat around until the early
morning hours holding chicken salad IN
their laps TO entice the wraiths. How
ever an abundantly materialistic woman
medium. who looked as If she could
readily turn into n spirit cabinet herself,
held demonstration and oracled these
| highly significant facts:
! Raymond Hitchcock, having spent his
youth perspiring down on the farm and
| also giving short measure in a dry goods
store, would enter upon some other line
! OF work besides musical comedy next
! spring, which caused IIitchy later 70
deny that he would play Hamlet" or
/ go into grand opera.
Frank Crowninshield. who gets the
primal urge from three different sources
his own private stock, so to speak
would take train for somewhere soon.
Harry Houdini makes more money
! than a minister.
! trancine Larrimore has had a tempt
ing offer to act in Austrilla, but has
been saved to the American people by
! the dear old home ties
5. Jay Kaufman is a psychic dynamo.
and has been holding out on the public
about book he's been writing not even
tipping off the readers of his newspaper
column.
Man SpoOIS IL Taboo.
A nice, gentlemanly spook named
"Wilfred' wanted to horn into the party
and establish himself as somebody's
spiritual appendix, but no one would
claim him and he went for a loss
He was in fact. the only ghost that
put In shadow of an appearance per-
haps because Mrs. Raymond Hitchcock,
who Is Flora Isabelle when not enter
| tanning spirits, was i'll upstairs and
the impalpable visitors didn't like TO
disturb their hostess by dumping
| around in the heavy brogans which
ghosts usually affect. The medium
gave her husband a message for Mrs
! Hitchcock which she said would brighten
the actress explaining that the ghosts
always cheered and sustained their
! friends and that her own appearance
which was far from ethereal. was due
to this variety of supernatural deicates-
sen, as she was a small eater.
Her divinations took place in the rear
music room Of the haunted" Hitchcock
menage, a charming old fashioned house
! of red brick in Twenty-fourth street
near Ninth avenue, which Hitchcock
said had been occupied for years by a
family that was terribly rich" 10 was
a strictly prohibition Sunday night gath
ering, so the ghosts couldn't have been
possibly driven off offended by any low
brow jests about spirits.
The atmosphere was certainly made
homelike enough for them. for prior TO
the advent of the medium every one had
/ been psyching furiously while munching
I the bon-bons that are reported 70 be
/ Hitchcock's only st,mulant before a per-
Torrance. Bide Dudley stood silently
receiving astral communique from his
best friend, jeff Mutt Harry Houdini
kept offering 70 bet anybody $500 that
anything was or wasn't so, and that he
could prove 1t with his hands tied be-
hind his back. Frank Crowninshield
was glum because spooks didn't seem 10
want to be where he was. Howard
Shelley was testing every ones phychic
qualities with his watch chain and dis
covered that while Herb Roth might be
/ able to control a cartoonists pencil he
couldn't manage the ouija board be-
cause his ego isn't infinite. The ouija
board itself was discussed until it didn't
have leg left to stand on.
Scnncc on the Level.
No mention was made of the fact that
Hitchcock is starring in "Hitchy-Koo"
at the New Amsterdam Theatre and
/ that this piece has a ghost scene in it.
/ So it's easy to see the seance was
strictly on the level without the shadow
OF a press agent lurking about it. Ray
mond rang up the curtain with a speech,
/ just as he does before every perform
ance of "Hitch"-before every perform
ance.
Three years ago" intoned the
comedian. in his most solemn tones, eve
moved into this house. and ever since
then it's been queer Footsteps have
been heard going up the stairs in the
! dead Of night when I've come home.
myself have laughed aloud. as though
listening to people leaving after a party
and saying Good night, Lizzie Good
night Maggie Had a lawfully good
time. Lulu These things happened
generally about A. NJ. when I came in
feeling rather tired and subconscious
| have even felt my hair being brushed
up in back, as If some one was saying.
What have we here. a--a-a-"
"a nut" supplemented Karl Kitchen.
who interprets Hitchcock for the news
papers.
IT have got out Of bed" went on the
actor. 10 go downstairs and see If a
cat was making the noises | heard-and
7 want TO say I'm not a drinking man
never took a drink in my life. But the
only cat I ever discovered was a large
gentleman tabby who inspected me ono
night from the window of my room.
\ We don't really know anything about
\ what's in our think tanks, and these
/ sounds may be mental reverberations
transmitted like the wireless from some
\ out OF the way place like New Jersey.
/ Perhaps they's the ghosts Of some play
I wrlghts who are still trying to get me
TO look az their plays"
Medium Is Depleted.
Thon the medium. Mrs Margaret
Campbell was introduced by Dr. Here
ward Thcreward Darlington, and said
that OF she had given a seance earlier
In the evening she was "depleted'-
hoiah this on the surface Of II. looked
like an exagRcration. The start took her
upatalra. where are vowed she heard