The astonishing fraud perpetrated by Evelyn Lyons of Escanaba, Michigan,
who, with the aid of a hot water bottle, fooled the doctors into
believing that she had a fever of 118 degrees, is not without precedent.
She was the victim of an odd mania that often seizes abnormal women who
crave wide notoriety. Doctors and psychologists have long been acquainted
with this strange caprice of neurotic women, but it is rarely that one
maintains the fake illness for as long a time as did Miss Lyons, who set
the nation’s medical fraternity in a tempest of learned discussion before
her sham was discovered.
This erratic desire to be an object of curiosity often takes other forms,
as in the case of Mary Ellen MacDonald of Antigonish, Nova Scotia,
who, in order to attract attention, turned herself into a “spook.” By
starting mysterious fires around her home, walking stealthily through
the farmhouse at night and slapping the faces of sleeping persons,
rapping on the walls and so forth, she contrived to spread a feeling of
dread throughout the countryside. The superstitious country folk were
sure that the house was haunted, and as Miss MacDonald carried her hoax
still further—sending weird radio messages, tying knots in the tails of
cows, attiring herself in ghostly gowns and fleeing across the moonlit
fields—the fear of disembodied spirits spread rapidly, and the uncanny
“manifestations” became a matter of nation-wide discussion.
Spiritualists, mediums, and others journeyed to Antigonish, and, after
watching the unearthly “phenomena,” were unanimously agreed that a
spirit, or spirits, had returned to haunt the community.
Then Dr. Walter Prince of the Psychical Research Society went there,
investigated the “ghost” more thoroughly, and traced all the terrifying
happenings to Mary Ellen MacDonald.
Meanwhile, however, Miss MacDonald—like Miss Lyons, the “fever girl”—had
gratified her craving for notoriety.
_HAMILTON CRAIGIE Spins Another Yarn in His Inimitable Style_