Victorian Spirits Presentation at Healy House Museum

“We begin, as many books end, with a deathbed.”
-Chris Woodyard, The Victorian Book of the Dead

Despite the incredible progress of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, death was an ever-present part of life. Dangerous working conditions, illness, inadequate medical care, and frequent accidents meant that families were intimately familiar with loss, and developed elaborate traditions for mourning the dead and comforting the living.

From prescribed periods of wearing black to rituals surrounding deathbeds, wakes and funerals, Victorian and Edwardian mourning customs shaped how people from all social classes confronted mortality. For some, Spiritualism offered another possibility: the chance to seek signs that their departed loved ones were still near.

Adapted from the Healy House Museum & Dexter Cabin’s exhibit of the same name, Victorian Spirits explores popular Victorian and Edwardian mourning traditions and Leadville’s underground Spiritualist movement, with additional ghost stories and tales of encounters with the dead from the 1860s to 1920s.

**Not recommended for kids under 13. This presentation includes discussions of death, mourning, and funerary practices.**

The presentation will take place in our dining room. Seating will be first come, first served.

Parking is available in front of the museum on East 10th Street; overflow parking will be available on West 10th Street across Harrison Avenue above Ice Palace Park.