Who invented the Ouija board?

Ashles

Pith Artist
Ashles
Joined
Apr 28, 2003
Messages
8,694
Location
The '80s
A search on the internet gives somewhat mixed results.

Anyone know which of the many, many different claims are worthy of attention?

It seems they generally agree that
It was in 1891 that a patent was granted to Elijah J Bond on the first modern Ouija Board. The following year the rights were purchased by William Fuld. In 1966 the Parker Brothers purchased the rights to the Ouija Board and shifted its manufacturing facilities to Salem, Massachusetts. The Ouija Board ended up outselling the game of Monopoly in its first full year at Salem. Over two million copies of the Ouija Board were shipped.
Click to expand...
from crystallinks

But is there historical precedence for the Ouija board (obviously, not precedence that it worked, but precedence that there were similar boards before this time - dating back to the egyptians (?) as claimed in several places).

And is the name really as childish as meaning 'Yes-Yes' (Oui - French, Ja - German) or is Skepdic right in passing on the information from the Museum of Talking Boards that says:
Charles Kennard called the new board Ouija (pronounced wE-ja) after the Egyptian word for good luck. Ouija is not Egyptian for good luck, but since the board reportedly told him it was during a session, the name stuck. Or so the story goes. It is more likely that the name came from the fabled Moroccan city Oujda (also spelled Oujida and Oudjda). This makes sense given the period's fondness for Middle Eastern cites and the psychic miracles of the Fakirs.
Click to expand...
And subsequently:
One of William Fuld's first public relations gimmicks, as master of his new company, was to reinvent the history of the talking board. He said that he himself had invented the board and that the name Ouija was a fusion of the French word "oui" for yes, and the German "ja" for yes. He also made other unlikely claims. Whether he took himself seriously is a matter lost to history. He may have thought apocryphal tales a fun way to sell Ouija boards and to poke fun at a gullible press.
Click to expand...

Anyone know anything more?

And how do so many sites get the origin of the name wrong if the story is this clear-cut?
 
From "An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural", by Randi:

Ouija Board

Bearing a name said to be derived from the French and German words for "yes,'' the Ouija board is simply a flat, smooth board bearing the letters of the alphabet, numbers and often the words "Yes,'' "No,'' "Maybe,'' and "Goodbye.'' A hand-sized, heart-shaped device perched upon three short legs, each of which has a pad or wheel to enable the instrument to slide freely across the board, is known as the planchette. This is used as a pointer, the tapered end of the heart-shape indicating letters on the board.

One or more operators sit around the board, each lightly resting fingers upon the top of the planchette. It is said that spirits or other entities cause the planchette to move about the board, spelling out messages and answers to questions posed by the operators. (This process is a form of "dactylomancy,'' or divination by means of finger-motions.)

Actually, the movement is due to the ideomotor effect and this can be shown by the fact that when the operator is properly blindfolded, only gibberish is produced.

The Ouija board was patented in 1892 by a Maryland novelty company.
Click to expand...


Planchette
The heart-shaped pointer device often said to have been invented in 1852 by a man named Planchette, but this seems highly unlikely, given that the French word "planche'' means "board,'' and thus "planchette'' means, "small board.''

This device is usually used with a ouija board, the point of the heart moving over the board to indicate the letters or numbers. It is supported above the board or paper on three short legs equipped with tiny casters or other bearings. If equipped with a pencil at the pointed end as a support, it can be used over a piece of paper, in automatic writing.

The Daily News of London in 1896, describing in an obituary the life and work of a hare-brained socialite of the day, was well aware of the real value of the device:

For nine years, he toyed with the planchette, the turned tables, in short used the familiar, hanky-panky means of communication with the unseen world.
Click to expand...
 
I thought it was Prof. Matsushita Ouija of Osaka University , who used Feng Shui techniques to realign the Chi of a bagatelle board.

Later development by Japanese technologists produced the pachinko parlour and the first, crude pinball machine.

I assume Google let you down. Have you considered asking the spirits?
 
The Danish encyclopedia, "Politikens Bog om det Alternative", sayeth:

We first encounter the ouija-board in the USA in the 1890's. Seven businessmen, all with two things in commom, founded a company, which with great success produced and marketed the board. They were all willing to take a risk, and they were all members of a secret order, The Masons. The men were: Charles Kennard, Elijah Bond, E. C. Reiche, Harry Welles Rusk, Colonel Washington Bowie, William H. A. Maupin and William Fuld.

...

Different stories regarding the origins of the board exist, but it is a fact that Charles Kennard patented the board in 1891, and for the first time referred to it as ouija. He claimed that the name came to him from the board itself, and that it was the Egyptian name for "happiness". This is not correct, but the name sounded sufficiently mystical, and has stuck.
Click to expand...

The entry is written by magician Niels Krøjgaard, who is also with the Danish Skeptics. He usually knows what he is talking about. :)
 
Okay that's a few stories that tally and seem to make sense.

Come to think of it how would an Egyptian equivalent of the Ouija board work? Weren't there over 2,000 hieroglyphs to choose from?

You'd need a Ouja Field!
 
Kanjii!
OMG, never thought of that.
I guess it wasn't Prof Matsushita Ouija , after all.
 
"Actually, the movement is due to the ideomotor effect and this can be shown by the fact that when the operator is properly blindfolded, only gibberish is produced. "

For those who have read my points raised on this subject on another thread, I apologise for repetition.

It is not at all surprising that "gibberish" is observed when the ouija participants are blinfolded.

The "spirit" explanation, one of guiding the hands, has always been wild and dubious speculation whipped up by Spiritualists in the Victorian period.

IMHO, there is a real and unexplained cause of the ouija effect other than fraud or hoax(although no doubt, this has happened in many, if not most examples), that probably emanates from within the brain.

If that is accepted, then the usual motor actions of the limbs, hands and eyes guided by the brain, has to explain the movement, hence the "gibberish" when blinfolded.

I cannot see how any scientific testing and scrutinity can be applied to research the causes of the ouija effect, against the background of fraud, mis-information, and our lack of knowledge of the human brain. We cannot yet even explain fully, the causes of, or the apparent vital need for dreaming.
 
Wow, I thought the ideo-motor explanation was pretty good. So now the real question is "what causes the ideomotor system to work" I guess.

That is a tough question. Those that further a genetic/personality explanation are fighting it out with the social/cognitive people. For whatever reason we can't determine yet, human beings do what they do. And when or if we explain it to our satisfaction, there will be yet further mysteries, I think.

I just read one of P. Breggin's books, and am very much more serious about these things, especially as they pertain to psychiatric drugs.
 
Thread kill

OK, that was a thread killer.

Could be a new topic, "nature/nurture... or ???" which pretty well puts the explanations for human behavior in a nutshell. Those that are more "social" or "social behavior" oriented would say that just about everything we do is the product of reinforcement. Makes sense. If it feels good, do it. When it comes to mutually reinforcing social relations, heck, let's tune the ukeleles.

The "nature" side responds by saying that we might just have a few things in our DNA that make us, say, aggressive or something, just like there are things that make us tall/short, male/female. Find your "chemical imbalance" and take the medicine. I must have a beer imbalance. You correct your serotonin, I'll bring the brewskis.

The ??? side says little that I can grasp, and little that isn't subsumed by other explanations. That's the nub of the biscuit, right there, that "extraordinary claims invite requests for substantial evidence." If there is this sort of evidence, I'm all ears. And I am very willing to sit in a hot tub at Big Sur if I have to.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom