Mollie Fancher , known as "The Brooklyn Enigma" was the most famous of the Victorian "fasting girls." After a life already filled with sadness and trauma, including the death of her mother in a horse-riding accident, she was herself thrown and then dragged from a horse-drawn trolley at the age of 18. She was carried to her Brooklyn home that she never left again. She lay in her bed in with what now be likely considered a hysterical paralysis, blindness and deafness, and reportedly took almost no water or food for decades. She was also said to have developed psychic powers.
She became a celebrity, wrote a best-selling biography, and sold wax flowers and embroideries that she was said to have made using her nearly totally paralyzed hands. One of her huge embroideries is at the spiritualist village of Lily Dale New York. She is the subject of a modern biography "The Fasting Girl" by Michelle Stacey.
How much of her condition was hysterical, how much real, how much factitious, or how much she felt trapped in the role she had created is not knowable now. The reality remains, however, that she lost most of her chance for education, love, family, friendship and travel at the age of 18 after having been thrown from that trolley.
Despite illness, she was determined to celebrate the 50 year "Golden Jubilee" of her condition, and did so. She died a few days later at the age of 68. She is buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn New York.
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Her father was James Edwin Fancher (1820-1894) . Her mother was Elizabeth Crosby (1825-1855). Her parents had 5 children: Mollie, William, Georgina, Elizabeth and James. After her mother died in an accident, her father remarried and had 7 more children, her half-siblings, Elinor, Lucy, Thomas , Gilbert, Alice, Martha, and Anna.
Contributor: E. (46782320)
She became a celebrity, wrote a best-selling biography, and sold wax flowers and embroideries that she was said to have made using her nearly totally paralyzed hands. One of her huge embroideries is at the spiritualist village of Lily Dale New York. She is the subject of a modern biography "The Fasting Girl" by Michelle Stacey.
How much of her condition was hysterical, how much real, how much factitious, or how much she felt trapped in the role she had created is not knowable now. The reality remains, however, that she lost most of her chance for education, love, family, friendship and travel at the age of 18 after having been thrown from that trolley.
Despite illness, she was determined to celebrate the 50 year "Golden Jubilee" of her condition, and did so. She died a few days later at the age of 68. She is buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn New York.
~~~~~~~~~~
Her father was James Edwin Fancher (1820-1894) . Her mother was Elizabeth Crosby (1825-1855). Her parents had 5 children: Mollie, William, Georgina, Elizabeth and James. After her mother died in an accident, her father remarried and had 7 more children, her half-siblings, Elinor, Lucy, Thomas , Gilbert, Alice, Martha, and Anna.
Contributor: E. (46782320)
Mollie Fancher , known as "The Brooklyn Enigma" was the most famous of the Victorian "fasting girls." After a life already filled with sadness and trauma, including the death of her mother in a horse-riding accident, she was herself thrown and then dragged from a horse-drawn trolley at the age of 18. She was carried to her Brooklyn home that she never left again. She lay in her bed in with what now be likely considered a hysterical paralysis, blindness and deafness, and reportedly took almost no water or food for decades. She was also said to have developed psychic powers.
She became a celebrity, wrote a best-selling biography, and sold wax flowers and embroideries that she was said to have made using her nearly totally paralyzed hands. One of her huge embroideries is at the spiritualist village of Lily Dale New York. She is the subject of a modern biography "The Fasting Girl" by Michelle Stacey.
How much of her condition was hysterical, how much real, how much factitious, or how much she felt trapped in the role she had created is not knowable now. The reality remains, however, that she lost most of her chance for education, love, family, friendship and travel at the age of 18 after having been thrown from that trolley.
Despite illness, she was determined to celebrate the 50 year "Golden Jubilee" of her condition, and did so. She died a few days later at the age of 68. She is buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn New York.
~~~~~~~~~~
Her father was James Edwin Fancher (1820-1894) . Her mother was Elizabeth Crosby (1825-1855). Her parents had 5 children: Mollie, William, Georgina, Elizabeth and James. After her mother died in an accident, her father remarried and had 7 more children, her half-siblings, Elinor, Lucy, Thomas , Gilbert, Alice, Martha, and Anna.
Contributor: E. (46782320)
She became a celebrity, wrote a best-selling biography, and sold wax flowers and embroideries that she was said to have made using her nearly totally paralyzed hands. One of her huge embroideries is at the spiritualist village of Lily Dale New York. She is the subject of a modern biography "The Fasting Girl" by Michelle Stacey.
How much of her condition was hysterical, how much real, how much factitious, or how much she felt trapped in the role she had created is not knowable now. The reality remains, however, that she lost most of her chance for education, love, family, friendship and travel at the age of 18 after having been thrown from that trolley.
Despite illness, she was determined to celebrate the 50 year "Golden Jubilee" of her condition, and did so. She died a few days later at the age of 68. She is buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn New York.
~~~~~~~~~~
Her father was James Edwin Fancher (1820-1894) . Her mother was Elizabeth Crosby (1825-1855). Her parents had 5 children: Mollie, William, Georgina, Elizabeth and James. After her mother died in an accident, her father remarried and had 7 more children, her half-siblings, Elinor, Lucy, Thomas , Gilbert, Alice, Martha, and Anna.
Contributor: E. (46782320)
Bio by: E.
Inscription
"Mollie Fancher knew the secret of life. Half a century in her bed. Her dauntless spirit, cheerful patience and unfailing sympathy inspired many with courage to meet lifes problems. Forgetful of her own suffering, she carried the burdens of hosts of friends. Thru a life of industry, God granted her prayer, "Let me not lie with folded hands."
Gravesite Details
d/o James E. & Elizabeth (Crosby) Fancher
