I recently acquired this Rare NYPD 104th Precinct Detective Squad Houdini’s Final Rest Challenge Coin.

And it made me reflect on the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks of 2001 that caused more law enforcement line of duty deaths than any single incident in American history.

It also got me thinking about Houdini’s Connection with the Police.

Bob Loomis new book, Houdini’s Final Incredible Secret (which I highly recommend) has a section titled, Using the Police, that references a number of sources that document Houdini’s Connection with the Police.  Below are a couple of the sources:

• In their book, Ernst and Carrington tell us that Harry always worked hand-in-glove with the police, and they availed themselves of his expert knowledge on more than one occasion.  Houdini’s police connection was confirmed in a July 4, 1925 letter he wrote to fellow psychic researcher Harry Price.  The letter (from the files of The Harry Price Library at The Univerisity of London) states:

“You know I am instructor here to the Police Academy to about hundred and fifty detectives.

 

• Silverman said Houdini cultivated lawmen and stayed abreast of their affairs. He bought tickets to the Policeman’s Ball; and, as President of the Society of American Magicians, he arranged a benefit dinner for the widows and orphans of slain policeman. The Commissioner of Police attended that meal.  Houdini even owned a New York City Police Department pass that authorized him to cross “all police lines”.  My favorite quote from Silverman is the statement: “He of course knew his way around police and other law enforcement agencies and was able to enlist their help.”

Image courtesy of Library of Congress

Our friend, David Saltman at Houdinifile.com did a nice post that also references a number of sources that document Houdini’s Connection with the Police.

• HOUDINI, DETECTIVE

In the 1920’s, Houdini wanted to write three books of magic for beginners. Each book would be dedicated to clearly demonstrating simple magic tricks that the reader could do. Magician Walter Gibson collaborated on the project.

Gibson had just done research on such tricks for Howard Thurston for the ghost-written book 200 Tricks You Can Do and had literally hundreds of extra tricks as a result of his research: thus there would be no duplication in Houdini’s books.

The first book was to be composed of simple card tricks that could be done with an ordinary pack. The second book was to contain tricks with special packs of cards.  The third book was to cover simple tricks of various types. By early October, Gibson had the first book complete and was ready to deliver it when news came of Houdini’s sudden death in Detroit, on October 31, 1926.

Later, the book was published by the E.I. Company under Gibson’s own name, with the title Popular Card Tricks. This forty-eight page book included 91 various card tricks with suggestion on presentation.

The material for the second was all outlined and twenty years later, Gibson wrote up many of the tricks for a series of articles in a revival of Houdini’s old Conjurer’s Magazine, which he edited, with Hardeen as Emeritus.

The third was published in 1927 by Houdini’s wife who found the manuscript among his papers. It was titled, Houdini’s Book of Magic And Party Pastimes.

Later, another publisher, Whitman obtained rights to the manuscript in 1933 and arranged to print it in the Big Little Book (BLB) format but the material proved insufficient to fill the required number of pages. So, the first 114 pages are from the Houdini manuscript.  The added tricks and puzzles are from other magicians.  The BLB title page retains the original 1927 copyright date.

UPDATE:

Published during the “Houdini renaissance” of 1976, there is also the paperback edition of Houdini’s Book of Magic with a great cover (above) and intro by Gibson in which he tells the story of how the book came to be.  It also carries the 1927 copyright.

Source:

• eBay listing for Houdini Big Little Book of Magic
• The Great Houdini’s Book of Magic with Introduction by Walter B. Gibson [1976]
• Walter B. Gibson and the Shadow by Thomas J. Shimeld

To answer that, we first need to know when Houdini legally changed his name from Ehrich Weiss to Harry Houdini.

He petitioned the courts for a name change, which would go into effect during his Atlantic crossing.

July 5, 1913 The Billboard page 13

On July 8^th, 1913, he departed NYC on the Kronprinzessin Cecilie (after giving his mother a farewell kiss) and landed in Hamburg about a week later, where he and Bess took a midnight train to Copenhagen.

Now, we just need evidence of his first performance. According to a number of sources, Houdini opened at the Cirkus Beketow in Copenhagen.

16 July 1913 Ad promoting Houdini (Copenhagen newspaper Ekstrabladet)

At 8 pm (CET), Jul 16^th, 1913 Houdini performed in Danish, before a circus audience at the Circus Beketow in Copenhagen that included the princes of the royal family.

And then at noon (CET), the next day at a Press reception, Houdini received news of his Mother’s Death, who had passed away 15 minutes passed midnight in Asbury Park NJ, which was 6:15 am (CET) in Copenhagen.  The shock of Houdini’s mother death had been followed with an attack of a “chronic kidney disease”  and Houdini was released from his contract and returned to the states.

However, the performance in Copenhagen was not his first appearance with the legal name of Harry Houdini.  You see, he performed at Sea on July 12^th 1913 at 9 pm as evidenced by the following program:

Swann 2006 Catalog Lot 166 – Program for a performance by Houdini onboard the Kronprinzessin Cecilie.

For reference and additional information, please refer to the following sources used in this post:

• Houdini: the Copenhagen Affair by Johan Ahlberg (courtesy of Handcuffs.org)
• Houdini The Career of Ehrich Weiss by Silverman, pages 179-180
• Houdini The Untold Story by Christopher page 132

According to Margery, the Witch of Lime Street:

During the magician’s last visit to Lime Street the two of them sat briefly alone in her son’s room, where she suggested that he, clearly exhausted, could take a nap prior their final Charlesgate séance.  While reclining on John’s bed, Houdini told her about his most wondrous effect.  It had occurred, he recalled, on the Fourth of July at Seacliffe, Long Island – when rain began to fall just as his nephew and other children were preparing to set off fireworks.

See my post from last fourth of July to read about Houdini’s most wondrous effect:

• The so-call miracle of July 4, 1922

H A P P Y  4 T H  O F  J U L Y  !

Source:

• The Witch of Lime Street (page 412), by David Jaher

In July of 2002, the Society celebrated its Centennial Year in New York City and issued a collectible Houdini Card.  The back of the card reads as follows:

The man who would become “Houdini” was born in Budapest, Hungary, and immigrated to Appleton, Wisconsin as an infant.  He later moved to New York. Early on, he was inspired by Robert-Houdin books (he took his stage name from Houdin). He worked his way up as a Vaudeville entertainer.  His accomplishments included: highly successful overseas and American tours; crusades against spiritualists; developed and named the tenth branch of magic–“escapology”; starred as a movie actor and owned a movie company; and wrote many books and articles.  As National President (1917-1926), he promoted the S.A.M. and encouraged local clubs to affiliate.  He was elected to the S.A.M. Hall of Fame.

Also in July of 2002, on the 3^rd, the US Postal Service issued a Houdini Commemorative Stamp during the Centennial Celebration.  The Houdini postage stamp contains a hidden image (4 chains wrapped around Houdini’s body) that can only be seen with a special stamp decoder the United States Postal Service sells.

Above is an amazing framed photo of Harry Houdini’s father that I got to see in person during my special visit with my friends Dorothy Dietrich (foreground) and Dick Brookz (background) at the Houdini Museum in Scranton, PA.

This picture of his father, along with the one of his mother (pictured above) hung on the wall of Houdini’s New York home at 278 West 113^th Street in Harlem.

H A P P Y  F A T H E R ‘ S  D A Y !

In May, I shared an ad for Houdini’s Grand Magical Review that shared 6 effects.  The above ad from 102 years ago today shares the same 6 effects plus two additional effects, Lady Godiva and DeKolta’s Marvelous Cube.

• Lady Godiva – A lady and pony disappear.
• DeKolta’s Marvelous Cube – A large black die, about eight inches square, with white spots painted on it expands in a fraction of a second to a giant die about a cubic yard.

This appearance at the Empire Theatre in Nottingham was most likely the last time Houdini presented his Grand Magical Review.

Some of the other places he presented it were at Tivoli Theatre Barrow-in-Furness, Empire Theatre Leeds, Empire Theatre Bristol, Palace Theatre Oldham, Palace Theatre Hull, and King’s Hall Dover.

Source:

• The Repro 71 Harry Houdini Portfolio
• Hiding The Elephant by Jim Steinmeyer
• The Illustrated Houdini Research Diary Part 4: 1911 to 1915 by Frank Koval
• Houdini The British Tours by Derek Tait, 2011

Image courtesy of David Saltman at HoudiniFile.com

Below are snippets from a 2010 article on Milwaukee published by Pete Ehrmann that said Harry Houdini was better at magic tricks than bicycle racing:

Draped in chains and locked in a trunk that was tossed overboard, Harry Houdini would be free and swimming to the surface before the trunk sank to the bottom. No jail cell or straitjacket could hold him. But 117 [122] years ago, the great escape artist was just another guy who cried uncle riding a bicycle from Waukesha to Milwaukee in the most grueling race in the country.

A shade longer than 16 miles, the Waukesha Road Race [WRR] started at the Waukesha County Courthouse in what was then a resort village accessible from Milwaukee only by train or horse, and proceeded east along the Waukesha Road (now Highway 18, or West Blue Mound Road) to Brookfield, then east along Watertown Plank Road through Wauwatosa and finished at North 28th Street and West Wisconsin Avenue in Milwaukee.

…

Nineteen-year-old Houdini — then still known as Erich Weiss, an avid bike racer, swimmer and boxer — started the race in ‘93. “But he was faster with his hands than with his feet,” Milwaukee cyclist Ed Aldridge recalled in a 1928 interview, and couldn’t overcome the hazardous course.

“For the first mile from the starting point — the Courthouse in Waukesha — the road is level and quite smooth and hard until the first hill is reached,” reported The Milwaukee Journal in 1892. “Though generally hard to climb, owing to the cinders and dust, wheelmen will find it a much more difficult task this year, as the road has been recently covered with about three inches of soft, loose gravel.”

Except for the choking dust, it was relatively smooth sailing until the riders pedaled out of Wauwatosa on Stone Quarry Hill, “about 100 feet long and very steep, besides being very rough.”

Click the link below to read the article in its entirety:

• LINK: Houdini was better at magic than cycling

Was he even in Milwaukee on July 4th,1893 when the WRR was held that year?

• One would think that 1883 [to 1886] when he was living in Milwaukee would make more sense, except the first WRR started August 9th, 1890.
• According to The Metamorphosis by Bruce MacNab, Houdini was in Chicago in May 1893 and then spent the rest of the year playing third-rate theatres throughout the northern states.
• According to Entertainment in Early Milwaukee by Larry Widen, Houdini performed at all of Milwaukee’s dime museums between 1892 and 1898.

Thoughts?

Related:

• Houdini’s Forgotten Years by David Saltman
• Houdini and the Olympics by Joe Notaro

Image of Houdini’s Mother Cecilia courtesy of Harry Ransom Center

H A P P Y  M O T H E R ‘ S   D A Y !

Perhaps most bizarrely, but unsurprisingly, Houdini became a proselytizer for the Mother’s Day holiday, which was formally established in 1914. Following tradition, he sent red carnations to all of the living mothers he knew and white carnations for the graves of mothers who had gone. Presumably, his mother’s grave overflowed with the white flower.

The above is a snippet from the following bio that has a lot of interesting information on Houdini and his mother.

• His Lost Sweetheart: Harry Houdini and His Mother

Enjoy and don’t forget to wish all the Mom’s you know a Happy Mother’s Day!

Houdini premiered his “Grand Magical Revue” in British cities through the spring of 1914.  It probably played a dozen times.  Above is an ad from the Library of Congress for a performance that was presented 102 years ago, today at the Palace Theatre, Hull.

Below are brief descriptions for each effect:

1. The Crystal Casket – Houdini opened the show by picking a number of coins; he seemed to toss them toward the box that was suspended by two ribbons over the stage.
2. Good-Bye Winter – Houdini’s title for Morritt’s disappearance of a person atop a stack of tables.
3. Money for Nothing – Houdini’s version of the classic coin-catching routine, where he would produce five hundred gold sovereigns from a cloth bag, .
4. The Arrival of Summer – Morritt’s production of a lady from a pyramid-shaped box.
5. Calico Conjuring –  Houdini cut and burned and then magically restored a long strip of cloth.
6. Metamorphosis -Houdini closed the show with his popular trunk illusion

Related:

• Playbill March 27, 1914

Source:

• Hiding The Elephant by Jim Steinmeyer
• Houdini!!! The Career of Ehrich Weiss by Kenneth Silverman
• The Illustrated Houdini Research Diary Part 4: 1911 to 1915 by Frank Koval