Rosemarie Pilkington Sources:

Rosemarie Pilkington

Rosemarie Pilkington is an independent scholar whose PhD in Psychology (Consciousness Studies) was earned at Saybrook Graduate Institute under Stanley Krippner, with a dissertation on children’s ESP.[1] Her principal contribution to parapsychology is as a historian and editor: she compiled the oral-history anthology series that gathered first-person accounts from working parapsychologists about why they entered the field and what they considered most important.[1] She has also published book reviews and articles in FATE magazine, the Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, and the Journal of Scientific Exploration.[1]

Career affiliations: Independent scholar; Saybrook Graduate Institute (doctoral study under Stanley Krippner).[1]

Deeper dives — Pilkington:

Recurrent Spontaneous Psychokinesis Biographical Interviews and Oral History 📖  Spirit of Dr. Bindelof

Overview

Rosemarie Pilkington works primarily as a historian and editor within parapsychology rather than as a laboratory researcher. Her career has centered on two complementary projects: preserving the oral history of the field through edited anthologies, and reconstructing historical cases of séance phenomena through archival and interview-based research.[1]

The anthology series she compiled, spanning from 1987 through 2013, asked leading parapsychologists to reflect in their own words on what drew them to the field and what they found most significant in their work. These volumes have been cited in major reference works on parapsychology as a resource for understanding the field’s human and intellectual history.[3][11]

Her 2006 book The Spirit of Dr. Bindelof[4] reconstructs an early-twentieth-century New York séance circle through retrospective interviews with surviving participants and archival sources. That book has been cited in scholarly treatments of physical mediumship and psychokinesis.[3][11]

Pilkington’s Place in the Field’s Reference Literature

Pilkington’s name and works appear in the index and reference lists of Parapsychology: A Handbook for the 21st Century (edited by Etzel Cardeña and colleagues), a major scholarly reference volume. Her anthology volumes are cited there as primary sources for the field’s intellectual history, and The Spirit of Dr. Bindelof appears in the chapter on physical mediumship and psychokinesis.[3] Her 1984 dissertation on children’s ESP is also cited in James Carpenter‘s First Sight as a reference in the field’s literature on ESP and fantasy.[2]

Life and career

Pilkington completed her doctoral work in Psychology with a concentration in Consciousness Studies at Saybrook Graduate Institute, where Stanley Krippner served as her mentor. Her dissertation examined children’s ESP.[1][2]

Her editorial career has been independent. She compiled the first anthology in the Men and Women of Parapsychology series in 1987, gathering personal reflections from prominent researchers in the field. The series was later reissued and expanded: Esprit: Men and Women of Parapsychology, Personal Reflections, Volume 1 appeared in 2010 from Anomalist Books, and a second volume followed in 2013.[1][3]

Alongside the anthology work, Pilkington has contributed book reviews and articles to FATE magazine, the Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, and the Journal of Scientific Exploration. Her reviews in the Journal of Scientific Exploration have covered a range of topics including poltergeist research, physical mediumship, and consciousness studies.[1][5][6][7][8][9][10]

The Esprit Anthology Series, Scope and Contributors

The Esprit series title uses the French word for spirit or wit. The 2013 second volume included a chapter by Walter von Lucadou titled “The paranormal is normal but quite different,” which appeared as pages 409–422 of that collection.[3] The series is cited in Parapsychology: A Handbook for the 21st Century as a reference for the field’s intellectual and personal history.[3][11]

Research

Pilkington’s research interests span three areas: the oral and editorial history of parapsychology, children’s ESP (her dissertation topic), and the historical study of séance phenomena, particularly the 1930s Bindelof sittings.[1]

Children’s ESP

Pilkington’s doctoral dissertation, completed at Saybrook Institute, examined the use of fantasy in a children’s ESP experiment. The work is cited in the parapsychological literature as a contribution to research on ESP in younger populations.[2]

Dissertation Citation Details

The dissertation is cited in James Carpenter’s First Sight as: Pilkington, R. (1984). “The use of fantasy in a children’s ESP experiment.” Doctoral dissertation, Saybrook Institute. Dissertation Abstracts International, 45(3-B), 1049.[2]

Historical séance research

In The Spirit of Dr. Bindelof (2006), Pilkington reconstructed the history of a group of teenage séance experimenters who gathered in the 1930s, centered on her friend Gilbert Roller. The book placed this case within a broader historical survey of physical mediumship, covering figures and episodes from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.[4] The book has been cited in scholarly literature on physical mediumship and psychokinesis.[3][11]

Structure and Scope of The Spirit of Dr. Bindelof

The book is organized in three parts. Part One reconstructs the Bindelof case itself through chapters covering the participants, the séance sessions, and the phenomena reported. Part Two surveys the broader history of physical mediumship phenomena, with chapters on D. D. Home, William Crookes, Eusapia Palladino, ectoplasm, and Indridi Indridason of Iceland. Part Three covers twentieth-century mediumship, including chapters on Russian psychics, metal-bending, thoughtography, and the influence of Kenneth Batcheldor. An appendix addresses how readers might explore séance phenomena themselves.[4] The book was published by Anomalist Books (San Antonio) in 2006 with ISBN 1933665637.[4]

Book reviews in the Journal of Scientific Exploration

Pilkington has written reviews for the Journal of Scientific Exploration covering a range of topics in parapsychology and consciousness research. These include reviews of works on poltergeist cases, physical mediumship, and consciousness philosophy.[5][6][7][8][9][10]

Selected JSE Book Reviews, Topics and Positions

Pilkington’s JSE reviews include:

  • A 2015 interview with Felicia Parise, documenting Parise’s career as a parapsychology research subject across dream telepathy, clairvoyance, psychokinesis, and precognition experiments at Maimonides Hospital and other institutions. The review discusses Parise’s decision to discontinue PK work after years of skeptical pressure.[5]
  • A 2014 review of Haraldsson and Gissurarson’s book on Indridi Indridason, the Icelandic physical medium, examining the controlled séance investigations conducted by skeptical investigator Gudmundur Hannesson and evaluating whether the phenomena support a survival hypothesis or can be explained through living psychic abilities.[6]
  • A 2018 review of Guy Lyon Playfair’s account of the Enfield poltergeist, arguing that the investigators’ commitment to a spirit explanation may have prolonged the outbreak by obscuring underlying psychological and family dynamics as a contributing source.[7]
  • A 2019 review of Terje Simonsen’s popular history of paranormal research, praising its clarity and scope while noting gaps in coverage of macro-PK phenomena and historical physical mediumship figures.[8]
  • A 2021 review of Federico Faggin’s memoir tracing his path from microprocessor invention to consciousness research, engaging with Faggin’s argument that consciousness is an irreducible property of nature.[9]
  • A 2023 review of a case study of Joasia Gajewski, described as one of the best-documented examples of recurrent spontaneous psychokinesis, endorsing the multi-disciplinary investigative approach taken by the Polish researchers involved.[10]

Influence and reception

Pilkington’s anthology series has been cited in major reference works on parapsychology as a resource for the field’s intellectual and personal history. Parapsychology: A Handbook for the 21st Century cites both the Esprit volumes and The Spirit of Dr. Bindelof in its reference lists, and her name appears in the handbook’s index.[3]

Her dissertation on children’s ESP has been cited in subsequent parapsychological literature, including James Carpenter’s theoretical work First Sight.[2]

By gathering first-person accounts from researchers across the field, the Men and Women of Parapsychology series created a record of the motivations and experiences of a generation of parapsychologists that would otherwise exist only in scattered interviews and unpublished recollections. The series has served as a reference for scholars studying the sociology and history of parapsychology as a discipline.[1][3]

Citation Footprint in Reference Literature

Specific citation instances confirmed in the corpus:

  • Pilkington (ed., 2013), Esprit Volume 2, cited in Parapsychology: A Handbook for the 21st Century as the source for Walter von Lucadou’s chapter “The paranormal is normal but quite different” (pp. 409–422).[3]
  • Pilkington (2006), The Spirit of Dr. Bindelof, cited in the physical mediumship and psychokinesis chapter of the same handbook.[3]
  • Pilkington (2010), Esprit Volume 1, cited in James Carpenter’s First Sight reference list alongside her 1984 dissertation.[2]
Sources
  1. About Rosemarie Pilkington [biographical page]. (n.d.). seancescience.com. https://seancescience.com/about/about-rosemarie-pilkington/. R001 [Pilkington bio] ↩︎
  2. Carpenter, J. C. (2012). First Sight: ESP and Parapsychology in Everyday Life. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-1-4422-1390-6. R002 [Carpenter 2012] ↩︎
  3. Jerry Solfvin (2016). The State of the Art of a Tough Place in Science and Psychology, Parapsychology. Parapsychology: A Handbook for the 21st Century edited by Etzel Cardeña, John Palmer, and David Marcusson-Clavertz. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 30(3). R003 [Solfvin 2016] ↩︎
  4. Rosemarie Pilkington (2006). The Spirit of Dr. Bindelof: The Enigma of Séance Phenomena. R004 [Pilkington 2006] ↩︎
  5. Pilkington, R. (2015). Interview with Felicia Parise. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 29(1), 75–108. https://journalofscientificexploration.org/index.php/jse/article/view/825 R005 [Pilkington 2015 Parise] ↩︎
  6. Pilkington, R. (2015). Indridi Indridason: The Icelandic Physical Medium by Erlendur Haraldsson and Loftur R. Gissurarson. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 29(4), 682–686. https://journalofscientificexploration.org/index.php/jse/article/view/984 R006 [Pilkington 2015 Indrídáson] ↩︎
  7. Pilkington, R. (2018). This House is Haunted: The Amazing Inside Story of the Enfield Poltergeist by Guy Lyon Playfair. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 32(4), 781–785. https://journalofscientificexploration.org/index.php/jse/article/view/1372 R007 [Pilkington 2018] ↩︎
  8. Pilkington, R. (2019). Our Secret Powers Telepathy, Clairvoyance and Precognition: A Short History of (Nearly) Everything Paranormal by Terje G. Simonsen. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 33(3), 489–491. https://journalofscientificexploration.org/index.php/jse/article/view/1561 R008 [Pilkington 2019] ↩︎
  9. Pilkington, R. (2021). Silicon: From the Invention of the Microprocessor to the New Science of Consciousness by Federico Faggin. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 35(3), 687–692. https://doi.org/10.31275/20212205 R009 [Pilkington 2021] ↩︎
  10. Pilkington, R. (2023). The Elusive Force: A Remarkable Case of Poltergeist Activity and Psychokinetic Power. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 37(4), 720–721. https://doi.org/10.31275/20233273 R010 [Pilkington 2023] ↩︎
  11. Cardeña, E., Palmer, J., & Marcusson-Clavertz, D. (Eds.). (2015). Parapsychology: A Handbook for the 21st Century. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-7916-0. R011 [Cardeña et al. 2015] ↩︎

Deeper dives — Pilkington:

Recurrent Spontaneous Psychokinesis Biographical Interviews and Oral History 📖  Spirit of Dr. Bindelof

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