Six years ago, I did a post, titled: First Suspended Straitjacket Escape Not 98 Years Ago Today (September 29). The Minneapolis escape was the second public suspended straitjacket escape, after the September 8, 1915 escape from the Kansas City Post building in Kansas City, MO.

At the time of the September 29 post, I didn’t have a photograph for this Minneapolis escape, nor much information, but that changed when I visited the McCord Museum last year. The very first scrapbook, I looked at had a lot of newspaper clippings that included straightjacket escapes, like the one that took place 104 years ago on September 30, 1915. That’s right, the escape actually took place on September 30, 1915, not September 29, 2015 as previously documented by others.

As evidence, I share the photo and text from the following two newspaper ads:

• Star Tribune, Thu, Sep 30, 1915

At 12:05 today, Harry Houdini, to whom padlocks and cells present no more difficulty than that offered to the ordinary person by an open door, will essay to make his escape from a straight-jacket while suspended by his heels from the sign in from of the Tribune. This is a feat similar to one he accomplished upon a previous occasion, and unless Minneapolitans succeed in fastening the straight-jacket more securely that Houdini supposes he promises to extract himself with a few moments. The jacket will be adjusted by entirely disinterested parties so that there is no chance for any suspicion of collusion, and the jacket used is of a regulations type.

Houdini, who is appearing at the Orpheum, is said to enjoy an international reputation for the case with which he escapes from handcuffs, prison cells and other impediments. He has appeared in almost every large city of the civilized world and in each metropolis had baffled the police by his dexterity. He is said to be the only man ever to escape from one of the famous Siberian convict wagons, a conveyance far more dreaded and more formidable than the Black Marias familiar to citizens of American towns.

 

• Minneapolis Journal, Fri Oct 1, 1915

Before a crowd which thronged Fourth street from Nicollet to Marquette avenue, Harry Houdini, the “worlds champion self-liberator,” freed himself from a straitjacket while suspended by the feet—which were bound—from the electric sign in front of The Tribune building at noon yesterday. When the jacket had been adjusted by Minneapolis detectives and policemen and his feet securely bound, Houdini was swung high over the heads of the crowd. The immense throng was unexpectantly quiet as Houdini began his work.

A few convulsive , serpentine wriggles, a few movements of his powerful shoulders, and Houdini’s arms, which a moment before had been securely held by leather and canvas jacket were free. As he unfastened the straps which had defied all comers, he smiled down at the officers who had adjusted the straitjacket and remarked that he would join them in a moment. He slipped the apparatus over his head and allowed it to fall into the arms of the officers below and gave the signal to “lower away.”

The straight-jacket was furnished by the police and was the most powerful they have. It was put on by several plain clothes men under the direction of Thomas P. Gleason, who tested each strap and said he was satisfied it was “according to Hoyle.”

Tonight on the Orpheum stage, Houdini did attempt to escape from a packing case which has been prepared by the employees in the shipping room of the New England Furniture & Carpet company. The packers have made a box which they believe will defy all the powers of the wizard.

“I do not promise to get out the box,” declares Houdini. “However, I have never failed yet, and certainly will try.”

This feature will be presented instead of the regular act which Houdini offers.

Bonus:

Also, courtesy of the McCord Museum, here is a newspaper image not previously posted for Houdini’s December 4^th, 1915 suspended straightjacket escape from the Express Tribune building.

For details of this escape and other images, see John Cox excellent post:

• Uncovering Houdini’s 1915 Los Angeles straitjacket escape (at last!)

According to a scrapbook clipping at the McCord Museum, it was Houdini night at the Checker Inn 93 years ago today:

A $1.50 dinner and all kinds of smokes free for all members in good standing. Remember, everything free, “HOUDINI” will be there, and we also have a magical surprise for you. Remember the date, time, and place, -Wed, Sept. 22 at eleven P.M. at the “Checker Inn” – 477 Stuart St. near Huntington Ave.  Seats still on sale at the box office of the Majestic.

If you are not in good standing – Bordicott will be there – nuff sed!

Bring a guest if you wish, but remember that it is a stag party, and it will cost you $1.50 per guest.

Related:

• Buried Alive in Boston: Eye Witness

During my visit to the McCord Museum, I was fortunate enough to have read a compilation (April 24, 1920 v1 n1 to June 5th 1920 v1 n7) of “The Amazing Exploits of Houdini” found in The Kinema Comic.

1. The Bride & The Orangutan.
2. The Jewel Thieves.
3. “Stop Thief!
4. The Gold Melters.
5. Adventure of the Midland Express.
6. In The Dead of Night.
7. Out of The Sky.

Each issue contains a several page serialized fictional story (by-lined by Houdini). This week I share my paraphrased version of “The Jewel Thieves” found in the May 1 1920 v1 n2 issue:

Houdini is sleeping in a hotel room on the seventh floor. When he stays in a hotel with a telephone in the bedroom, he makes it a point of screwing off the bell before retiring, thinking that the shock of ringing will not be so great. On this night, the sound of the vibrating hammer was more terrifying than any bell would be.

Houdini answered the phone and was told that the hotel was on fire and he needed to leave his room at once and make his way outside by the back staircase, since the main staircase was ablaze and impossible.

Half asleep, Houdini jumped out bed, and dashed out the door toward the back staircase used by the servants. To make his way down the pitch-dark stairs, he had to feel his direction with his hands on the wall. Suddenly, Houdini received a blow on the back of his head from some hard instrument, dropped to the ground, and was hurriedly searched, but nothing was found.

Houdini was awakened by the corner of a door pushing into his ribs. A man with no shoes on dashed across to a window, opened it, and disappeared.

Houdini slowly rose to his feet, crashed through some swinging doors and on to the floor of one of the hotel corridors. He had a splitting headache and didn’t remember that the building was on fire.

Rising to his feet again, Houdini staggered forward perhaps a dozen yards, when a door opened and a man whose face was drenched in blood from a cut on his forehead, yelled that “They’ve bagged the lot. Taken every dashed thing.”

Houdini asked what happened?

Thieves broke into his room, hit him on the head and stole his diamonds.

Houdini told the man he got hit on the head also and that he should telephone the cops.

Houdini staggered towards the man’s room and threw himself on his bed.

The police were sent for. Slowly recuperating and trying to gather his scattered and wounded wits together, Houdini was able to reconstruct the adventures of the night. Houdini remembered the alarm of fire sent over the telephone, his scramble down the back stairs, then being hit on the back of the head by some unknown assailant. Then it dawned on him, that the thieves somehow called him up on the telephone instead of their victim, their purpose evidently being to decoy the man from his room whilst they robbed him of his jewels.

Houdini rose from the bed and pushed his way past the hotel servants who were attending to the victim of the robbery. Houdini made his way through the door of the room which the man had climbed was situated. It was still open.

The window gave on to a lower roof of an adjoining building. The drop from this window to the roof would be about eight feet. Houdini curiosity was aroused, and despite his aching head he decided to investigate.

Just beneath Houdini, on the top floor of the building, he could see a lighted window. There was no reason for a lighted room at that time. Almost before the resolution was made, Houdini’s leg was over the parapet; a drainpipe ran down the front of the building, Houdini tested its strength. It appeared to be safe enough. Houdini risked it, and clinging almost like a fly, slipped down the sill of the window.

Only a corner of the room was visible, but a side of a table was in view. At this table, he could see one hatted man removing precious stones from their settings.

Suddenly, without the slightest warning, the spring of the blind was released. Houdini discovered there were three men in it, the one at the table, another one at the other side of the table, and the one who by letting up the blind had exposed Houdini.

The man nearest the window moved towards Houdini and raised the sash. As Houdini waited his fate, he felt a strong hand grip his ankle and then another took hold of his other ankle.

Houdini was dragged into the room and bound hand and foot. Houdini smiled!

Houdini’s back against the wall, freed his hands; Tied behind him, it was quite a simple matter to hide his actions from view of the men.  Then, working very gingerly, got his feet loose, undetected.

Houdini reached for a revolver from his hip pocket and covered the three men.

Houdini ordered the men into the corner of the room. When they were safely in the corner, Houdini picked up one of the instruments which they had been using and threw it through the window.

Down below in the street, you could hear pattering of feet, and then the shrill blast of a policeman’s whistle.

Within five minutes, three policemen, hammered their way into the room where Houdini held the men prisoners.  All facts were so conclusive. The jewels on the table were sufficient to condemn the men.

Of course, Houdini was thanked by the victim of the robbery. “You must have been called up on the telephone instead of me.” he said. “As a matter of fact, I occupied your room on the previous evening.”

What really happened on October 24^th, 1926 between the train arriving and the show in Detroit?

Let’s see what the biographers have to say.

According to Williams & Epstein [1951]:

he took his scheduled train that evening, to Detroit. The doctor’s summoned to meet him at the station in the morning diagnosed appendicitis and ordered an immediate operation, but Houdini insisted that he must appear in the theater that evening. When he walked out on the stage he had a temperature of 104 degrees.

According to Gresham [1959]:

Urged by Bess, Collins sent a wire ahead of them from the train. When they pulled into Detroit, they were met by a doctor. Houdini’s temperature was one hundred and two degrees.

He scorned going to a hospital. But when they got to the hotel he crawled into bed and had Bess pile blankets on him. His chill, which shook the bed, lasted a half hour.

In spite of his loud refusals, Bess sent for a committee of doctors. They were unanimous—Houdini had appendicitis and needed an operation at once. Bess wept and argued all day when Houdini was not dozing uneasily. When curtain time approached he asked for news from the box office. The report came back, “Sold out. Not a vacant seat in the house.” That settled it, “Help me up. They’ve paid their money to see Houdini. “By God, they’re going to get a show.” His temperature was now one hundred and four.

According to Kendall [1960]:

“You can’t take that train to Detroit tonight,” Bess insisted, “show or no show”. He was scheduled to appear in Detroit the next evening.

“A train ride won’t hurt me. I always do my best thinking on trains.”

Stubbornly, he had his way. But as the train clacked onward across the autumn-colored landscape, all thought was driven from him. He was conscious of only one thing, pain driving through him with every turn of the iron wheels on the rails. At last he was forced to give in to the pleas of the nurse and Bess that a wire be sent asking a doctor to meet the train at the station in the morning.

The doctor was there. As soon as Houdini could be gotten to a hotel, the doctor his temperature and examined him. The thermometer measured 102 degrees. Then a severe chill gripped him and he lay shaking for almost a half hour. Other physicians hurried to his bedside.

“Your symptoms indicate acute appendicitis,” one of them told the shivering and sweating magician. You must be operated on at once.”

Houdini clenched his teeth and asked Bess, “How many tickets have been sold for the show tonight?

“All of them, someone else spoke up. “A full house.” “I’ll go through with my act,” Houdini said.

That evening when he walked out onto the stage his temperature was 104 degrees.

According to Christopher [1969]:

A telegram was hurriedly dispatched to George H. Atkinson, the show’s advance man in Detroit, when the train made a brief stop at London, Ontario. He was instructed to have the best doctor in the city ready to give Houdini a thorough examination before the opening, Nurse Rosenblatt took Houdini’s temperature, it was 102 degrees.

The Montreal train arrived late. Collins doubted they could track the equipment to the theater, hang scenery, and get the magical apparatus uncrated and assemble before curtain time. Rather than check in at their hotels, the entire company went directly to the theater. There was no doctor waiting at the Garrick despite the urgent wire. Houdini pitched in and helped stagehands and his assistants set up the heavy gear.

Dr. Leo Dretzka and the show’s advance man paced the lobby at the Statler Hotel. The doctor had to leave for a medical convention that night, but he had promised to examine the ailing escape artist first. After asking a dozen times at the desk if Houdini had checked in, Atkinson finally phoned the theater.

There was no cot in Harry’s dressing room at the Garrick. He stripped off his clothes and stretched out on the floor. Dr. Dretzka knelt and touched the inflamed stomach. Bess didn’t hear the doctor say that an ambulance should be called immediately, that Houdini was suffering from acute appendicitis. Had she known the danger her husband was in, there would have been no performance that night.

Harry dressed for the show. The theater manager had stopped to say the house was sold out and standees were lined outside to get in. “They’re here to see me,” Harry explained as the worried doctor rushed away to make his train. “I won’t disappoint them.”

According to Fitzsimons [1981]:

After the show the company boarded the train for Detroit, where they were booked for a two-week run. When the train started, the pain was so intense that he could hide it no longer. He told Bess about the blows to his stomach. Nurse Rosenblatt took his temperature and it to be 102 degrees.

The train was scheduled to stop at London, Ontario, and from there a telegram was dispatched to the show’s advance man in Detroit, instructing him to have a doctor waiting. When Houdini arrived the doctor examined him. He diagnosed acute appendicitis and ordered an ambulance to be called immediately. But Houdini refused to go into hospital right away. The theatre was sold out and he would not disappoint the audience.

According to Brandon [1993]:

Houdini closed in Montreal that Saturday, 23 October, and was due to open in Detroit the following day for a two-week run. On the train he was no longer able to conceal his suffering. Bess, distraught, and barely recovered from her own illness, telegraphed ahead to the show’s Detroit advance man instructing him to get the best doctor in Detroit ready to examine Houdini before the opening.

The train was late – too late for them to check in at the hotel before leaving for the theatre. The doctor was waiting, meanwhile, in the hotel lobby. Finally the advance man, waiting with the doctor, thought to telephone the theatre. The doctor rushed round and examined Houdini on the dressing room floor, there being nowhere else he could lie down. He diagnosed acute appendicitis and said an ambulance should be called at once to take Houdini to hospital. Bess did not hear this, and Houdini did not tell her. Nor did the theatre manager, who was present during the examination. He had his own worries. The house was sold out and queries were still waiting outside the theatre. He said, “We have a $15,000 advance sale. What are we going to do? to which Houdini replied, “I’ll do this show if its my last”.

He was now running a temperature of 104 degrees.

According to Silverman [1996]:

Scheduled to open in Detroit the next evening, he, Bess, and their entourage got to the train late that night. Once on board he experienced such severe stomach pains that a wire was sent ahead asking for a physician to meet the train at the Detroit station in the morning.

Houdini arrived in Detroit with a temperature of 102. After examining him hurriedly, a physician found signs of appendicitis. Houdini nevertheless checked into the Statler Hotel, where for a half hour he shook with chills. He was determined to give his opening night show, even though at curtain time his temperature had risen to 104.

According to Kalush [2006]:

After Saturday’s evening show, the troupe prepared to take an overnight train to Detroit, where they were scheduled to open their run on Sunday night.

The opening night sold-out crowd at the Garrick Theater in Detroit was getting antsy Houdini’s show was scheduled to start at eight-thirty, but after a short announcement that there was a delay due to the late arrival of personnel and equipment from Toronto, it was almost nine and there was still no sign of the mystifier. Suddenly, the familiar strains of “Pomp and Circumstance” echoed through the theater and Houdini walked onstage.

“We have just made a thousand-mile journey from Montreal, and we are tired,” he exaggerated, as he began to perform magic.

A doctor had examined him before the show and had urged him to the hospital immediately, but Houdini had refused. “They’re here to see Houdini,” he spoke of the sold-out house. “I won’t disappoint them.”

So what is the source for these different versions.  It appears, Williams & Epstein, Gresham, Kendall, and Silverman’s source was Kellock [1928] and the New York Times, 1 Nov 1926.

According to Kellock [1928]:

He had to make a train for Detroit, where the show was due to open the next evening.

Houdini was so ill on the train that his attendants wired for a physician to meet him at the station in the morning. His temperature on arrival was 102. As soon as he reached his hotel in Detroit he had a chill which lasted twenty-five minutes. Several physicians, who had been called insisted that he cancel his performance. They said that his symptoms indicated appendicitis, and an immediate operation was imperative.  Houdini, informed that the house was sold out, doggedly declared that he must go on. Just before the curtain went up his temperature was taken at 104.

According to NYT:

He suffered no distress at the time but after he had boarded a train for Detroit, he complained of pain. At first he attributed it to something he had eaten but as it increased he called in the company’s nurse, who in turn arranged by wire to have a physician meet the magician in Detroit.

Dr. Leo Kretzka, a prominent physician, made a hurried examination and told the patient there were symptoms of appendicitis. He left it to Houdini to decide whether it would be advisable for him to appear that evening at the Garrick Theatre for the opening night of the show. Houdini would not disappoint his admirers.

Fitzsimons, Brandon’s and Kalush source was Christopher, although neither mention a Dr. Dretzka. And Christopher’s source was the Conjurer’s Magazine May 1948 article, The Last Man to see Houdini Alive, by Bruce Reynolds:

George Atkinson, Dean of Theatrical Press Agents, told me the story one evening in the Lambs Club in New York City. “Then the fateful day when I was in Detroit where Houdini was to play next. I received a wire from his manager who was in Montreal, that ‘The Great Man’ had suddenly been stricken ill and that I was to have a doctor meet the train upon his arrival.  He was due in Detroit on Sunday afternoon and was scheduled to give a performance that night. I had a doctor waiting at the hotel but Houdini did not come to the hotel; instead he went directly to the theatre, and there in grave alarm I found him running hither and thither, anxious about his props. I quickly phoned the doctor back at the hotel. The doctor rushed to the theatre and found Houdini sitting on a packing case, with his funny little hat pulled down over his eyes. His temperature was 103. The doctor hurried him into his dressing room, laid him on the floor and made an examination. ‘Appendicitis,’ the doctor said. He ordered Houdini to his hotel and to bed. Cold compresses were to be administered at regular intervals. Houdini scoffed at the doctor’s orders. Defiantly, he went on about arranging his props and he gave a show that night.”

So did a physician see Houdini on the train, the floor of the dressing room at the Garrick Theatre, or at the Statler Hotel? Did Houdini go to the Statler Hotel before going to the Garrick Theatre, or did he go directly to the Theatre?  I tend to believe the following:

According to Sophie Rosenblatt’s (nurse) affidavit [Feb 15^th, 1927]:

He had to leave Montreal that night for Detroit and on the way to the railroad station and at the station itself, he was very sick and constantly complained of pains in his stomach. I took him in a restaurant to get a cup of hot boiled water and took a bottle of black coffee for him on the train. He was unable to sleep all that night after leaving Montreal and constantly stated that he had pains in his stomach.

The following morning I took his pulse and told Mrs. Houdini that her husband was a very sick man. I asked Mr. Stuckel, his manager, to have a physician meet the train at Detroit as I realized that Houdini was very ill and was getting worse ever since the blows were struck in his dressing room. Dr. Leo Dretzka of Detroit was the physician who first saw him in Detroit. His temperature was 102, his pulse from 120 to 128 and his respiration 46. At the hotel in Detroit where he went upon leaving the train, he had severe a severe chill which lasted for about twenty-five minutes. At that time his temperature was 103.6, his pulse was 130 and his respiration 48. We then called Dr. Richards, the hotel doctor, who saw Houdini at about 6:30 in the afternoon and prescribed pills for Houdini to take every half hour for his pulse and respiration. He went to the theatre to give his evening performance. He was practically helpless and was unable to dress himself for the performance. We took him to the theatre and he was in bad shape throughout the performance. It seemed that he was unable to open his eyes while he was putting on his make-up for the performance. After each act he literally fell down almost helpless and dragged himself on the stage again. After the performance he was carried to the hotel and his condition was reported to Dr. Richards who was then out of town. Dr. Richards recommended Dr. Cohn and Dr. Cohn called on Dr. Owen who took a blood count. It was then decided to call in Dr. Watkins and Dr. Kennedy, distinguished surgeons of Detroit, to examine Houdini. He was taken from the hotel to the Grace Hospital in an ambulance and an operation was decided upon.

I suppose its also possibly that Houdini went to the theatre first, saw Dr. Dretzka, who ordered him to his hotel where he saw Dr. Richards and then returned to the theatre to perform.

What do you believe?

Related:

• Houdini’s last train ride