Gef! The Strange Tale of An Extra Special Talking Mongoose

In 1934, Harry Price, Britain’s premier psychic investigator, undertook what he described as his most bizarre investigation. In the early 1930s, an Isle of Man farmer and his family claimed to have held regular conversations with a small weasel-like animal, an entity which became known as Gef the Talking Mongoose. Gef lived with the family for a number of years, by turns a threatening, mischievous, affectionate, and ultimately enigmatic presence, rarely seen but often heard behind the farmhouse walls. Price was unable to demonstrate the phenomena to be fraudulent, whilst a fellow paranormal investigator, Dr Nandor Fodor of the Society for Psychical Research, remained convinced that Gef did indeed exist.

In addition to the Harry Price archives held at the University of London, Christopher Josiffe has examined those of the SPR at Cambridge, and travelled to the Isle of Man as part of his research. This illustrated talk attempts to assess the evidence - both for and against – of Gef’s existence