British College of Psychic Science
An institution founded in April 1920 in London by Mr. and
Mrs. Hewat McKenzie to work on lines similar to the Institut
Métapsychique in Paris. They spared neither time nor expense
in their effort to collect evidence for genuine phenomena and
to spread the knowledge by means of the college. After Mr.
McKenzies death in 1929, Mrs. McKenzie took charge, but in
1930 she relinquished her post, and Mrs. Champion de
Crespigny was elected honorary principal.
From 1922 to 1939 the college published Quarterly Transactions,
subsequently titled Psychic Science until 1945, after which
it appeared briefly as Experimental Metaphysics. In December
1938 the college amalgamated with the International Institute
for Psychical Research, becoming the Institute for Experimental
Metaphysics. During World War II, the society languished
and eventually closed in 1947, and its excellent library
and records were dispersed or destroyed.
When McKenzie founded the college, the London Spiritualist
Alliance was already in existence but McKenzies college
had broader aims in providing a center for information, advice,
and guidance, where psychic mediums of good reputation
could be consulted, and where scientific research into psychic
phenomena could take place. After World War II the London
Spiritualist Alliance broadened its own aims on similar lines to
the college, and in 1955 reorganized under the new name of
College of Psychic Studies.
