"PREACHED BY A DEAD MAN "A Blind Girl Acts as the Medium for the Spiritualist Sermon. "Courier-Journal: The funeral of Mr. Alexander R. Cuscaden took place yesterday afternoon at three o'clock from his late home, corner Twelfth and Jefferson streets. The services conducted over the remains were very unusual and were attended by about three hundred friends of the deceased. Mr. Cuscaden was a spiritualist, and he believed firmly that his funeral serman could be preached by someone who had gone before him. A few days before his death he told his family, who are members of the Baptist church, that he had decided to have the sermon over his remains preached by Charles Gale[?] Foster, the poet, whose [death] occurred several years ago. This, he said, would of course have to be done through a medium, and for that office he selected Miss Lou Monahan, a blind young woman who lived at 1517 West Walnut street. Mr. Cuscaden had been a spiritualist for twenty-five years, and Miss Monahan is a convert to his teachings. "Sue [sic] was informed Saturday night of Mr. Cuscaden's request, and yesterday afternoon when the services began the blind girl assumed the duties of a preacher. She sat at the head of the coffin, and when the song service had been completed the friends of the dead man expected to see her begin the sermon. But she did not stir 'until the spirit moved her,' it was said. In a few minutes she arose from her seat, and those who were present, including over a hundred persons who are not spiritualists, said that the sermon was most eloquent, and though she is not ordinarily a fluent talker and is not highly educated, her language was of the highest order. Mr. Cuscaden's children do not believe in spiritualism, but they said that the blind girl preached the most remarkable sermon they had ever heard." (Source: Daily Journal and Tribune, Knoxville, TN, Oct. 18, 1891, p. 16, retrieved from www.genealogybank.com)