Reverend Alice Hughes

Born April 26, 1887, in Harrisville, Lewis County, New York, Alice Hughes was the matriarch of spiritualism in Albany, New York. She joined forces with a youthful Reverend Stephen Robinson in the 1980s and together they created the Capital District Spiritualist Church. Both were certified by the National Spiritualist Church Association. This is where I first met Miss Hughes—when she was 100 years old. (she lived to 103!)

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Her path to spiritualism began after her mother’s death while she was still a young girl in upstate New York. At just 12 years old, she saw her first manifestation of her mother while riding in a carriage—or “surrey,” as she described it—owned by her grandparents. As they passed a house, Alice saw her mother standing as if she had stepped down to join them. The surrey kept going, and Alice saw her mother floating—not running—behind, trying to follow. She quickly learned she was the only person who saw it.

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At such a young age, she had not yet heard of spiritualism or mediumship. Eventually, her mother would appear to her several more times.

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In an era when women had few rights and were largely relegated to marriage and service, Hughes carved out a very different path. Her grandmother eventually stepped forward and shared a family history of prophetic dreams that came to pass. She taught Hughes how to interpret symbols and their meanings.

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In her autobiography, she wrote:

“I’ve come to the conclusion that intuition represents the mind of the soul, and that symbolism is its language.”

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Hughes would go on to study at the Morris Pratt Institute at Whitewater, Wisconsin—an institution whose design and mission were unique for its time. In 1888, Morris Pratt invested $4,000 in the property that would house the institute. That year, a $60,000 building was erected as the education arm of the National Spiritualist Association. Hughes began there as a student, later becoming a teacher for 10 years.