Using proxy sitters to test mediums

When testing mediums who claim to be in touch with the dead we should not allow them to getinformation directly from the living subject because they may use cold reading. If the mediumreally has the communicative power they claim there is no reason why the deceased person can'trelay information through an intermediary.The early psychic investigators called this a 'proxy sitting', where a person knowing nothing about acertain person took that person's place to see a medium. The Reverend Charles Drayton Thomas, apsychic researcher, spent many years as a proxy sitter investigating the mediumship of Mrs. GladysOsborne Leonard, and reporting to the Society for Psychical Research. He would go to a sittingknowing only the name of the deceased and the name of the person who desired communication.During 1936-37 Thomas went to four sittings on behalf of Emma Lewis, a person he did not know.The records of the Society for Psychical Research record that Mrs. Leonard gave him seventypieces of information which Emma later felt confirmed beyond all doubt that it was her father,Frederick William Macaulay, who was communicating. Thomas had over 500 sittings with MrsLeonard over a period of twenty years.The only possible objections in relation to proxy sittings is excessive luck or fraud. There is simplyno other possible or probable explanation for the information coming through the medium aboutsomeone who has passed on and who had no connection whatsoever with any of the sitters whowere with the medium at the time. Many psychic researchers have been impressed by theconspicuous absence of criticism of these particular proxy sittings.If proxy sittings can indeed produce effective results we should be able to set up a live televisedproxy sitting, which would need little equipment and be inexpensive. We would need two membersof the public; one as a `proxy', the other a `subject' who's deceased friends or relatives mediumswould try to contact. A presenter would be sent into a shopping centre or street (though constantlyin touch with the studio) then a member of the audience or leading sceptic in the studio wouldchoose the two members of the public. The two people would be whisked to the studio but keptapart.In the studio both members of the public will be kept in separate rooms. The person selected to bethe `proxy' would be given no information about the other person (subject) except their name. Then