Calendars in magic have been scarce, and for that reason, the following ideas may be of quite some interest to those who are looking for something just a bit different. They make nice close-up tricks as well as being adaptable for larger audiences through the use of larger calendar sheets.
In the first effect, it is the purpose of the performer to tell any four dates that are marked off by a spectator. Tear a sheet from a calendar pad and give it to him with a pencil. He is to mark a square around any four dates, as illustrated in the first of the three calendar sheets reproduced on this page.
Telling you the total of these dates, the spectator is given immediately the four figures. For this example, the four dates in the first calendar have been encircled. The total named is 80. You mentally divide by four which equals 20 and subtract 4 to give yourself 16. This is the lowest date in the square. It is easy now to calculate the remaining dates as 16+7 equals 23, and 17+7 is 24. Thus the dates are 16, 17, 23 and 24.
Continue by tearing off another sheet and having another person mark off any nine of the dates in a square. The second calendar sheet above illustrates this. Saying that you won’t give him so much adding to do, ask him only to give you the total of the highest and lowest dates, in this instance, 6 and 22.
This time you mentally divide by 2, and it gives you the center number of the square, or 14. The number to the left of this always is 7 less, or 7 in this instance. The number above is 1 less or 6. Thus you instantly visualise the nine figures as 6, 7, 8, 13, 14, 15, 20, 21, 21.
Again you tear off a sheet and this time a spectator marks off any three figures in a row the way they run. We shall use 14, 15 and 16. You are given the total, which in this case is 45. You mentally divide by 3 which gives you the middle figure. By going back 1 and ahead 1 you get the numbers 14, 15 and 16.
Now hand out the rest of the calendar pad and say that you will endeavor to name the days on which any month started and ended. You are given a month and you ask upon what day the 17th landed. If he says Tuesday you answer by saying that it started on Sunday and ended on Monday.
This is based on the fact that the 15th of the month always arrives on the day the month began, and if there are thirty days in the month it will end one day after the day it started. If there are 31 days in the month it will end two days later than it began. So, when you are told that the 17th was on Tuesday, the 15th must have been Sunday and if a 30 day month it must have ended one day later on Monday.
In February, if there are 29 days, the month always ends on the day it starts. If 28, it always ends one day earlier or before the day on which it starts.
There hardly is anyone but knows the jingle by which the number of days in each month is told instantly.
In my examples I have used an English type of calendar. For the more common type, that in which the run of figures goes across in rows rather than in vertical columns, the procedure is the same for the spectator and very little changed for yourself.
Editor’s note : Mr Sellers’ routine makes a nice start for a series of effects using a calendar or its pages. A novel paper tearing stunt might follow such a routine inasmuch as the pad has been handed out for the last of the four effects described. I would suggest handing these out to separate spectators and doing the last effect two or three times. Then, taking one of the calendar pages, you tear it up and restore it, having of course, called attention to the particular month being used.
The method used is up to the individual performer who needs only to have a duplicate of that particular month which he takes back from the spectator to whom it was given. This, in turn, could be followed with a calendar page to a cigarette or lemon, a corner being torn off to serve as marking. The month of that particular sheet will be noticed also but no stress is put upon it.
In this way, the first three numbers are done with January, February and March. The pad is then torn up and distributed for the fourth effect, and notice taken as to who gets the other months you will use later. Around the last and first of each year you can buy several dozen of these calendar pads at Woolworth’s in whatever size you need. There are no doubt many other effects possible and I’d be glad to print them if submitted.
I hope Mr Sellers will excuse my adding on to his contribution but it opened up a line of thought about what could undoubtedly be made into a novel act.
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