Biography:Lady Wonder
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Lady Wonder (1924–1957) was a horse that was purported to have psychic abilities.[1] Over 150 thousand people came to consult the horse at the price of three questions for one dollar. Lady Wonder is said to have helped the Massachusetts police to find the body of a missing boy, to have predicted that Jack Dempsey would defeat Jack Sharkey in 1927 (including two other documented heavyweight bouts), and to have helped discover oil.[2] Lady Wonder's trainer, C.D. Fonda, raised the horse on a bottle. The horse was trained to operate a device consisting of levers that activated alphabet cards.[3]
The psychical researcher J. B. Rhine investigated the horse and concluded that there was evidence for extrasensory perception between human and horse.[2] However, the magician Milbourne Christopher investigated the horse and noticed that the phenomenon was the result of cueing from her trainer, Fonda. He determined that Lady Wonder only answered questions correctly when her trainer was aware of the answer. According to Christopher "Lady was trained to move her head back and forth above the board bearing the letters. When she was over the right lever, a slight movement of Mrs Fonda's stick cued her to lower her head and touch the proper lever."[4] Skeptical investigator Joe Nickell wrote that the Lady was "a well-trained animal, not a telepathic one."[3]
See also
- Clever Hans
- Beautiful Jim Key
- Betsy, a border collie known to understand over 340 words
- Rico, a dog who reportedly understood more than 200 words.
- Koko, a gorilla who learned sign language
- Alex, a grey parrot known for intelligent use of speech
- Animal cognition
References
- ↑ "Lady Wonder; "Mind Reading" Mare Baffles Scientists". Richmond Times-Dispatch. Richmond Then and Now. 1927-07-18. http://richmondthenandnow.com/Newspaper-Articles/Lady-Wonder.html. Retrieved 20 November 2011.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Gardner, Dick. (1962). The Impossible. 1962. Ballantine Books. p. 94
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Nickell, Joe. (2002). "Psychic Pets and Pet Psychics". Csicop.org. Retrieved 2014-10-11.
- ↑ Christopher, Milbourne. (1971). ESP, Seers & Psychics. Crowell. pp. 39-54. ISBN:978-0690268157
External links
- Richmond Then and Now. Articles about Lady Wonder from the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
- Lady Wonder: A Mind-Reading Horse. Essay by Abraham Kovoor
- [1] Segment from the show Mysteries at the Museum
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