A closer look
Helena Blavatsky co-founded the Theosophical Society in 1875 by claiming she received telepathic messages from secret Mahatmas living in Tibet who were guiding the spiritual evolution of humanity. She produced materializing teacups, ringing bells, and letters dropping from the ceiling to prove her magical abilities to her wealthy aristocratic followers. It was later revealed that she had built trapdoors and secret panels into her shrines to manually drop these supposedly divine letters on her gullible audience. You genuinely have to admire a woman who looked at the burgeoning spiritual vacuum of the Victorian era and decided the best way to achieve ultimate cosmic consciousness was by essentially doing low-budget stage magic tricks in her living room to scam rich people out of their money!
