Stacy Horn

There are a few movies I watch when I’m having trouble falling asleep. Not because they’re boring, but because they’re comforting. The Portrait of Jennie is one of my favorites. A vaudeville theatre called Hammerstein’s is a key part of the movie and I’d always assumed it was not a real place. But it was. I was just going through my book records and came across the Hammerstein’s flyer below, featuring mystics John T. and Eva Fay and something called thaumaturgy.

Ever since researching Duke University’s Parapsychology Laboratory I’ve developed an interest is parapsychology history. So here I am, 15 years later, looking up John and Eva and thaumaturgy, because I love going down a good rabbit hole.

Why do those rabbit holes so often lead to something sad? Thaumaturgy refers to the ability to produce miracles, to change the physical world in some supernatural way. It has a long history, but I was more curious about John and Eva. The first thing I find is that he shot himself in 1908, when he was around 32. His wife was 25.

According to the New York Times he was a Harvard graduate. But they also said “Mr. Fay was one of the wealthiest men on the American stage, and had a splendid home at Melrose Highlands, near Boston.” His mother, Eva Fay, was a famous medium, who was repeatedly exposed as a fraud, once by Houdini, and I wonder where the money came from, and how he went from Harvard to vaudeville.

But something made him miserable enough to take his life. A few years before he’d tried to stop the production of a play that was going to expose him as a fraud. He took the producer to court and lost, but I didn’t find any evidence that the play was ever performed, or gave him any trouble if it was. He suffered from what was then called nervous dyspepsia, which was not understood in the 19th century, but it can lead to depression, for which there was little effective treatment.

I’ll bet if I started researching former Hammerstein’s acts I’d find a lot of sad stories like this. It’s a sad world, but some worlds within the world are sadder. In addition to a picture of the flyer is a picture of the real Hammerstein’s and John T. Fay’s mother.

If you can’t make my virtual book talk tomorrow, you have options! There is one on Wednesday, the day after, at 6pm! Also virtual.

February 4, 2026, 6:00PM
Book Talk, Untapped Cities New York (Virtual Event)
Details and registration here.

The photograph of East New York was taken by Larry Racioppo. Kids in East New York couldn’t afford basketball hoops. So they cut out the bottom of milk crates and used those for hoops.

February 3, 2026, 6:30PM
Webinar, Gotham Center for New York History (Virtual Event)
Details and registration here.

On 2/7 I’m doing an in-person/livestream event at Tom D’s Big New York Show, & this one involves prizes! Buy tickets before 1/31 to get a discount. Tom Delgado is a certified NYC tour guide and comedian whose shows involve “history, his comedian friends, trivia with prizes, and special guests.” Get tickets here!

When I read about Bob Weir’s death I saw that he was 78, and I immediately flashed back to a pivotal moment in my life involving my friend Chris Hegarty. And Bob Weir.

I was a Deadhead when I was in high school, so this was in the early 1970s (I graduated in 1974). I went to every concert when the Dead were in town (NYC and Long Island) with my closest friends, Chris Hegarty, who just died last August, and Adrienne Turyn. That is Adrienne dead center, and Chris is to her left, leaning back and smiling. More below …

It was at the end of the concert and Chris had written a letter to the Grateful Dead about a plan she had for writing about them. She couldn’t have been more than 16 years old. She threw her letter up towards the stage and Bob Weir caught it. I hadn’t read the letter, but Chris went on to become an accomplished poet, so she could write. I’m sure it was a great letter. But she was only 16, and I didn’t think they would take her seriously.

We were hanging around the stage, and Chris was hoping one of them would come out after having read the letter. I didn’t think there was a chance in hell of that, but I admired her bravery and for taking a shot.

Then we heard someone calling out “Chris! Chris!” It was Weir. He told her that he loved her ideas and gave her the address for John Perry Barlow. He told her to write him and they’d take it from there. I stood there just stunned. My whole world changed. I know how that sounds but it did. For the rest of my life I used this as the model for how I would live my life. I would go for it. No matter how scared or unqualified I felt I would take a shot. Almost all the best things in my life have come from my ability to do this.

But here’s the thing I only just realized when I read that he was 78. If we were 16 when this happened, that means Bob Weir was 25. At the time I was thinking we were just kids, and we were, but I saw Weir as being so much older and he was essentially still a kid himself. I have always liked him, and especially for how he treated my friend, but now I like him even more knowing how young he was. I’m not sure why yet. It has something to do with how it emphasizes his openness to taking a chance. And his kindness.

Chris wrote Barlow, but he never responded. It was disappointing but it didn’t change anything for me. Chris was still the most fearless person I had ever known, and I was going to be just like her. (I should also remind everyone that this was the 1970s, when women were not encouraged to be bold, making her act that much more astonishing.) God I wish she was still alive so we could talk again about that night, and I could thank her for helping me to become a better version of myself. And I wish I could thank Bob Weir for his kindness and for blowing my mind that night when he showed what can happen when you take the long shot.