In the wake of the Civil War, a tsunami of grief that lasted for decades engulfed the country. With roughly 750,000 dead, nearly every family had lost someone. Out of that mass bereavement rose the Spiritualist movement—séances, mediums, and devices that promised contact with departed loved ones. “Talking boards” were in use by 1886; in 1891 a patent was granted for the Ouija after it allegedly spelled out the patent officer’s name. By the next year, some 2,000 boards were selling each week. The board remained a mainstream family game through the 20th century, briefly outselling Monopoly in the 1960s.

The Ouija occupied an ambiguous cultural space—part kooky novelty, part metaphysical tool—until The Exorcist decisively recast it in the popular imagination as a Satanic gateway. Cue the bonfires.

That the board is demonic seems as silly as the notion that a mass-produced plastic toy can speak to the dead. Still—as a society, we’ve lost the certainty of old-time, literal visions of the afterlife. Those stories don’t work for many of us anymore, except as metaphor, and we’re fumbling toward a belief suited to the times. Barren materialist philosophy that reduces us to chemistry leaves our yearning unfulfilled, scoffs at the word “soul.” We wonder: if our bodies are configurations of energy when we’re alive, what becomes of that energy when we die? And we secretly, tenderly hope that there is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of, either in our philosophies or our parlor games.

Subscribe on Substack

Special thanks to Julie Webb for the idea of the Ouija board.

Links:

• “The Ouija board’s mysterious origins: war, spirits, and a strange death,” by Baynard Woods, The Guardian, October 20, 2016

  
  

• “The Ouija Board Can’t Connect Us to Paranormal Forces—but It Can Tell Us a Lot About Psychology, Grief and Uncertainty,” by Linda Rodriguez McRobbie/updated by Ellen Wexler, Smithsonian Magazine, October 2013/October 2024.

  
  

• Gallery of historic images of talking boards - Talking Board Historical Society

  
  

• “Not Dead Yet,” by Ron Casssie, Baltimore, October 2015

  
  

• The Ouija Board - Strong National Museum of Play, Rochester, NY

This post is part of The American 250, a series featuring 250 objects made by Americans, located in America, in honor of the country's 250th anniversary. 250 words on 250 works, from January 1 to December 31, 2026.

Too many emails? To receive a weekly recap instead, please subscribe on my Substack blog. Instructions for turning on the weekly summary can be found here.

Have something you’d like me to consider for inclusion? Please feel free to leave a comment!