Yesterday was Day 1 of the first virtual “Yankee Gathering” from the New England Magic Collectors Association (NEMCA).
Houdini was part of the annual conference with five Houdini-centric presentations by five fascinating gentlemen, Kevin Connolly, Jim Hagy, Ken Trombly, Arthur Moses and David Ben.
Kevin Connolly: At a young age, Kevin and his father watched the 1953 movie “Houdini” starring Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh. The movie would impact his life from that moment on. It began a life-long career of collecting Houdini- related materials, many of which are unique to his collection. The memories of the movie and his collection of Houdini artifacts have forever created a connection between Kevin, his father and “Houdini himself”.
Jim Hagy: Interested in conjuring history for more than 55 years. He has written extensively about 19th and early 20th century performers, including biographies of Henry Evanion, James Savren, William Henry Young, and Edwin Dearn. He has been the editor and publisher of Perennial Mystics and its predecessor publications for collectors and is a Member of the Inner Magic Circle (London). In real life, he is Distinguished Lecturer in Residence at Loyola University Chicago and founder and director of The Rooftops Project for the international charitable sector.
Ken Tromby: Growing up in Newton, MA in the 1950’s and 60’s, Ken religiously watched the Ed Sullivan show, and remembers Jay Marshall, Richiardi, Fred Kaps and Al Flosso as some of the performers who inspired him. By the time he was 8 or 9, he was regularly taking the street car into Boston to visit the joke shop to buy tricks. By junior high, he had discovered Holden’s Magic Shop, and a junior high school magic club, The Presto Club, headed by magician and teacher, Herb Downs. Performing magic from junior high through law school and into adulthood, he also discovered Milbourne Christopher’s Panorama of Magic, which ignited an interest in magic posters and related imagery. Since the 1970’s, Ken has collected magic posters, broadsides, and ephemera with emphasis on 19th century magicians and the greats of magic’s Golden Age, particularly Harry Houdini. He has presented talks on his collection in London, Boston, Washington, LA and Chicago. Ken operates www.magicposters.com, and also regularly displays items from his collection on Instagram at magic posters.
Arthur Moses: Became interested in Houdini when he read a book about him in the 7th grade. Now more than 40 years later, he has over 6000 items of memorabilia in his collection. Individually each is just an interesting artifact but when put together as a whole of a collection, you get a sense of who Houdini was; what he was like; what he thought. ”With any of the period pieces it is very awe inspiring to know what is in my hands. I am holding history. Someone has owned these items before me and someone will own them afterword’s; I am just a caretaker for a brief moment in time. It comes with an obligation to learn, teach, and protect. It is the ”chase” looking all over the world that makes this exciting, fun, challenging, and even sometimes lamentable.”
If you look at the information from his website you will see he is one of only two persons that hold the complete recording of Houdini’s voice. www.houdinispeaksout.com
Author: Houdini Speaks Out, Houdini Periodical Bibliography, and Harry Houdini & Sherlock Holmes Together Again In 1908
Articles: over two dozen articles published in magic magazines & journals
Featured in September 2013 on the Canadian television program Extreme Collectors
David Ben: A world-renowned practitioner of sleight-of-hand who has performed throughout Canada and the United States. He is also a lifelong magic collector and magic historian. The co-founder and Artistic Director of Magicana, a performing arts organization and registered charity dedicated to exploring and advancing magic as a performing art (www.magicana.com), he is the publisher and editor of Magicol – A Journal of Magic History and Collectibles. A magic consultant on numerous film, television and theatre projects, he is also the author of six books related to magic, and several feature-length profiles of magicians in magic journals. He was the guest curator of the exhibition Illusions – The Art of Magic at the McCord Museum in Montreal and at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, Canada.
HOUDINI PRESENTATIONS
Lecture #2: “Houdini Deltiology” by Kevin Connolly
Deltiology is defined as the hobby of collecting postcards, especially picture postcards. Like most collectors, Kevin collects items that he enjoys. This was his initial incentive to start collecting postcards. Kevin’s presentation focused on his related postcard collection which he has compiled over many years. He hopes that you enjoy viewing them as much as he has enjoyed collecting them.
Kevin shared 48 amazing postcards, many signed by Houdini himself. My particular favorites were the ones related to his movies. For example, Item 8 was a Houdini for President Postcard and on the back was an ad for the Master Mystery: If you liked the “Master Mystery” please ask the manager of your theatre when the next HOUDINI picture will be shown here.”
Lecture #6: “Dazzled By Diamonds: Evanion and Houdini” by Jim Hagy
Of the many legends concerning collections of conjuring material, none may be as renowned as the acquisition by Harry Houdini of playbills and ephemera from Henry Evanion. Houdini’s published recollections told only a small part of Evanion’s story as Harry unquestionably knew it.
This presentation, based on the upcoming new and enlarged edition of Jim Hagy’s groundbreaking 1985 Early English Conjuring Collectors, traced how Evanion fits into the Houdini narrative, the Evanion legend crafted by Houdini himself, and the broader reality of the life, performing career, and collecting habits of Evanion and fellow magician, collector, and friend, James Savren.
Gallery of Collections #1: Ken Trombly
In his approximately 30 minute tour of his collection, Ken shared with us some highlights of what he has been able to track down, restore and display over the years.
This included showing us a number of Houdini items like French and German Challenges, Photographs, postcards, Telegrams, Early Metamorphosis poster, Circus Busch Poster, Prison Cell Poster, and Mirror Challenge Poster.
Gallery of Collections #2: Arthur Moses
Arthur shared his Houdini Collection with a Video Tour of his home.
He shared a 1903 Russian handbill; several documents pertaining to Houdini’s patents; an insurance policy, challenges, playbills, programs, postcards, straightjacket, pitchbooks, handcuffs, movie pressbooks, rare stanhopes, glass lantern slides, autographs, posters, photographs, personal effects, and books and magazines in over 25 different languages.
Gallery of Collections #3: David Ben & Julie Eng – The McCord Collection
David Ben gave a presentation on The Art of Magic at the McCord Museum in Montreal and at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, Canada.
It featured some amazing Houdini posters from the Alan Slate collection of over 1000 Houdini items. It included 3 sheet posters of the image that was used on the 2002 stamp, a buried alive on stage poster, and water torture cell poster, as well as an 8 sheet buried alive poster. Posters of some of Houdini competitors were also on display. A total of 58 magic posters made up the exhibition at Art Gallery of Ontario, along with a Houdini straightjacket that I have never seen before. David Ben also had some of his personal collection on display, which included footage of Houdini doing straight-jacket escape and card manipulations that was acquired from the McIlany Collection.
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