Wee Gee Wee Gee Tell Me Do

Great new find!

The Craze of the Country, The Great Ouija Board Song

WEEGEE WEEGEE TELL ME DO

Lyrics by William Jerome 

Music by Harry Von Tilzer 

1920

(Right at the beginning of the craze! Even though it had been patented, at least an early form, for 30 years)

The lyrics are fantastic, and really indicative of the feelings toward the device at the time! 

There is a game played by nearly every family

Seems to be the thing

Rich folks and poor folks play this little game to see what future days may bring

Right across the hall from me there lives a girlie dear

And when her girlfriends call each night – Why this is what I hear

Wee Gee Wee Gee tell me do

Tell me if my loving baby loves me true

Tell me quick and tell me fast is our love too pure and good to really last

Oh, Wee Gee Wee Gee you know me

I will never tell him don't you see?

Once he used to bring me candy by the box

Now he only calls to have me darn his socks

Is he true, the sly old fox, Tell me Wee Gee do.



This little board is the ruler of the nation now

Some game talk of fun right in your own home settles any little row

Most every home has one

Old maids love it most to death and play it night and day

And one made laughed and lost her breath when she heard one girl say

Wee Gee Wee Gee tell me do

Are the men who marry girlies always true?

Should the supper table wait for the ones who really love to come home late

Oh, Wee Gee Wee Gee should I swear if up on his coat I found a hair?

If your husband talking in his sleep says "Pearl"

Does it mean a present or some other girl?

Is it girl or is it pearl, Tell me Wee Gee do.

Let's take a picture of the baby...

Awhile back I was invited to be a Visiting Artist Indiana University SE. It was a super interesting time and I got to meet great students and faculty!

During some down time I popped into the Joe Ley antique store in Louisville. Very cool place, and I found one of my prized possessions there.

An early 1900's William Fuld Ouija board and original Planchette.

(I framed it for preservation.)

As unique and great of a find this was, it was the back of the board that intrigued me the most. 

The instructions had been scratched off:

The text should read:


Place the board upon the knees of two persons, lady and gentleman preferred, with the small table upon the board. Place the fingers lightly but firmly, without pressure, upon the table so as to allow it to move easily and freely. In from one to five minutes the tablet will commence to move, at first slowly, then faster, and will be then able to talk or answer questions, which it will do rapidly by touching the printed words or the letters necessary to form words and sentences with the foreleg or pointer.

2nd - Care should be taken that one person only should ask questions at a time, so as to avoid confusion, and the questions should be put plainly and accurately.

3rd - To obtain the best results it is important that the persons present should concentrate their minds upon the matter in question and avoid other topics. Have no one at the table who will not sit seriously and respectfully. If you use it in a frivolous spirit, asking ridiculous questions, laughing over it, you naturally get undeveloped influences around you.

4th - The Ouija is a great mystery, and we do not claim to give exact directions for its management, neither do we claim that at all times and under all circumstances it will work equally well. But we do claim and guarantee that with reasonable patience and judgment it will more than satisfy your greatest expectation."

5th - In putting the table together wet the tops of the legs, and drive them firmly into the table. Care should be taken that they are firm and tight.


6th - The board should be kept smooth and free from dust and moisture, as all depends upon the ease with which the feet of the table can glide over the surface of the board. Rubbing with a dry silk handkerchief just before use is advised.

Strangely the most innocuous part of the instructions were removed, 5 and 6. Still, it spoke to me of frustration or a parent trying to obscure something they didn't agree with. If anything, I liked that the board had a history!

The original instructions would've looked similar to this:

Even better, there was a clear description on the board:

It's hard to read, but you can see Age 13, a name, address, and date: April 8, 1900.

The other inscription is fainter but with the numerous underlined marks, I knew it would be something worth reading.

What a great note!  There are so many fascinating narratives to draw from this.

Of course the words weren't all legible, so with a bit of googling using multiple combinations of what I thought I could make out, I was not only able to confirm the last name of Mersdorff, but the actual address.

Here is the house the young Mr. John attempted to contact the spirits at:

With a bit more, I found out it is now known as the Weist Home and is on the National Registry of Historic homes:

It is classic Federal structure located on a long and narrow lot, which is typical in Madison. Originally a frame house was built on the lot in the 1830’s and in 1840 Hamilton Hibbs purchased the property. Mr. Hibbs was a carpenter and a staunch supporter of his next door neighbor Senator Jesse Bright who held strong southern sympathies. In the 1850’s, Hibbs attached a double-brick walled two-story front onto the frame house. The new structure had four fireplaces, stone window caps and a front that was flush to the sidewalk. Only its Italianate box gutters (circa 1870) and its 9 foot Victorian front door (circa 1890) pay homage to “modernization” of the home’s exterior prior to 1900. For many years the home was known as the Mersdorff house as that family purchased it in 1896 and owned it for over 90 years.

A 1990’s addition to the back of the home removed the remaining frame structure, replacing it with a kitchen and an upstairs master bedroom and bath. Since purchasing the home, the Wiest’s have added a family room with fireplace on the first floor; an upstairs office; a covered back porch; and a Federal style outbuilding. They also remodeled the 1920’s upstairs bathroom. This year, they have remodeled the kitchen, replacing the cabinets with handmade bead-board cherry cabinets and have attempted to remain true to the house’s 160 year old heritage by ensuring that changes to the home compliments and preserves its Federal style.

The Wiest’s family heirlooms and antiques have been collected for over 40 years. They collect Kitchenalia which is cooking equipment and other items found in a kitchen and enjoy Madison memorabilia. They look forward to your visit. 

It looks like they host historic and community events there. I sent an email to them with the find, here's to hoping they get back!

Check out an image of a couple using a very similar board.  

The image comes from Robert Murch. There is a really great 99% Invisible discussing the history of Ouija board and William Fuld. 

Monster Drawing Rally!

Midway Contemporary Art Gallery  had their Seventh Monster Drawing Rally last night and it was a blast.  The MDR is a live art making event that allows visitors to watch the artists create and purchase anything for $35...an incredible deal considering some of MN's top tier artists. I was lucky enough to be one of the over 80 artists participating.

This year I did Van Dyke prints with internet sources digital negatives that I then cut up and collaged.  They are crude references to early forms of photo-manipulations and spirit photography.

(These aren't the actual ones from the evening, just some extras I did the following the day with the same negatives.)

Here are some of them hanging ready to be bought! 

At their Sixth Monster Drawing Rally I did a similar process of cutting found negatives using the Cyanotype method, but using mostly Post Mortem portraits.  Here are what they looked like pre-processed.

Big thanks to Midway! 

Northern Spark came and went almost 8 months ago now, but I'm still reeling about how successful it was!

Here were some previous posts leading up to it:
Announcement
Artists' Talk Announcement 
Updates
The Day Before

Here is awesome video of the evening, you can see a snippet of us at about 1:30 :



Selected Performances, Northern Spark 2013 from Northern Spark on Vimeo.


Things have been such a whirlwind afterwards that I never got a chance to post awesome photos from the event!

The event got delayed so we hit the Depot ground to promote!:

Some great images by attendees, Julie Abnet, Betsy Catron, Andrea Hoff, Kristilyn Vercruysse, Pork_Chop, and more! 

Our friends at Sendero Flamenco stopped by! 

Thank you so much to everyone who came out! I am immensely proud and thankful for the opportunity!