As the film Fairytale - A True Story goes on nationwide release today Sarah Walsh catches up with the Bradford Theosophical Society, which played a crucial part in the saga.

The infamous photographs of frolicking fairies, 'snapped' by Elsie Wright and Frances Griffiths in 1917, are now among the most recognisable images in the world.

They were finally exposed as fakes in 1983 - but the story's enduring appeal has led to a major Hollywood film being made of the saga, which had its British premiere in Bradford last weekend and opens at cinemas nationwide today.

The film depicts how some of the first people to see the photographs - and certainly the first to be taken in by them - were members of the Bradford Theosophical Society.

Without the involvement of this obscure group, there would arguably have been no Cottingley Fairies saga.

It was the Theosophists who brought the beguiling photographs to the attention of Edward L Gardner, a leading theosophist who published a book about the affair.

Gardner in turn showed them to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, one of the leading writers of his day, and his espousal of the cause ensured national and international headlines.

The film shows a somewhat dour local meeting of the Bradford Theosophical Society in 1917. Extremely serious men and women sat stiffly in their best coats and hats on uncomfortable wooden chairs to listen to a lecture.

The society was one of scores of similar well-meaning groups that flourished in Bradford among the self-improving Victorian and Edwardian middle classes. The surprising thing is that the Bradford Theosophical Society is still going strong - and its members still believe in fairies.

And they are now backing a Telegraph & Argus appeal to bring the famous photographs, the cameras used to take them, and other memorabilia back to Bradford.

Founded in 1891, members proudly point out the society is now one of the city's oldest. "Its founders wouldn't have dreamt that the society would one day find a place in a big-budget movie," said secretary Atma Trasi, 60, a retired computer scientist who lives in Shipley.

"Attendance at meetings peaked at the end of the First World War when people were desperately seeking answers to life's unresolved questions," he added. Meetings then drew crowds of 300 or more - they are now down to 20.

"The difference now is that we are more informal - we joke and laugh, and don't take ourselves too seriously," Mr Trasi said. But the group's aims and beliefs have not changed.

Theosophy is not a religion or a sect - you can be a Jew, a Christian or a Muslim and a Theosophist too.

Members believe in an all-pervading Spirit (recognised by major religions under the name of God). They are open minded about mysticism and the occult - and although they now have to admit the photos were a hoax, they still believe in 'fairies'.

Albert Sutcliffe, 80, president of the Bradford Theosophical Society, says he has sensed fairies or 'divas' during woodland walks, although he has never seen them.

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