- 186 - 5. 1 The medium Kluski in Warsaw. Journal for Parapsychology, 1926, pp. 5-22 F. W. Pawlowski, professor of anatomy at the University of Michigan, U.S.A., gives an exhaustive account of his observations of the medium Kluski in Warsaw, writing: “The phenomena I witnessed with Kluski were most extraordinary and surpassed everything I had previously read and heard of such matters. The usual preliminaries that preceded a séance with the medium Kluski consisted of a minute examination of the room in which the experiment was to be held, and of all the articles contained therein. Windows and doors were locked and sealed, and strips of waxed paper bearing the participants’ secret marks and signatures were pasted over them. If it was desired and when no ladies were present, the medium sat there completely naked. As soon as all the participants had taken their seats at the table and formed a chain, the medium immediately went into a deep trance. The phenomena usually made themselves evident at once. The chain was formed by hooking the little finger of each hand into those of one’s neighbours. This allowed the observers to move the rest of their hand freely, as for writing, or for feeling or touching objects, without breaking contact. The séances were held either in complete darkness or by the light of a red lamp. In either case, luminous plates lay ready on the table. The plates are about one square foot in size and are made of light wood, with handles something like those of hand mirrors. They are painted on one face with a luminous substance. It is often unnecessary for the participants to turn off the white light in the room, for as soon as the medium begins to fall into a trance, the white light goes out of its own accord and the red light is turned on. Habitual séance attendees relate that the lights’ fading and coming on proceeds slowly and by stages. (I did not see this myself.) “From personal experience and from firsthand testimony given by perfectly trustworthy observers, I can state it as a fact that the medium Kluski produces the following phenomena: • Raps or knocks that are very typical and at the same time quite unusual. I heard them often and noted their peculiarity at once, without having my attention called to it by anyone else. I could distinctly hear, or rather feel, that they were not produced on the surface of the table or of the wall, but within them. I mention this particularly, because I made several attempts to imitate the raps produced by Kluski, but failed entirely to reproduce the sound of the raps heard at Kluski’s séances. • Levitations (floating of the human body in the air without support). I did not witness these personally, but heard that they often occur at Kluski’s séances. Not only was the table knocked over and lifted, but the medium himself as well as one or more of the participants were raised several feet above the floor. • Apparitions and phantoms.11 Kluski’s specialty is the production of partial, or, more often, of completely formed apparitions or phantoms. The partial materializations are usually heads. These materializations appear almost instantly either above or behind the medium, but even more often behind or between the séance participants, who are seated at some distance from him. After a few sharp, clearly audible raps on the table or the walls, bright stars or sparks appear, rising above the table and floating upward toward the ceiling… These sparks, which have a bluish light, vary in size from that of a pea to that of a hazelnut, and often as many as a dozen appear. They all move simultaneously and at considerable speed [3-4 feet per second] above the seats of the séance participants, flying in all directions and forming groups or by twos. Some vanish, while others descend in pairs close to the participants. Whenever they came within about 16 inches of me, I could see to my great surprise that they were pairs of human eyes that were looking at me. Within a few [seconds] a perfectly formed human head developed from such a pair of eyes; it was clearly visible by the light of a materialized hand with a luminous palm. The hand was raised above the head in order to illuminate it from all sides and to show it to the observers. All the while the eyes rested steadily upon the séance participants, while the face assumed a friendly, smiling expression. I saw a number of such heads, occasionally two at a time, flying like balloons from one participant to another and, when they were 11 See protocol: “Survival after Death” by Professor Dr. rer. nat. Werner Schiebeler.
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