Magical festivities were numerous during the past month. Dr Jacob Daley had a riotous affair at his home with about 30 present for dinner and embellishments. The feature of the show was Dave Bamberg’s colored movies of his travels, superb costumes, and of his father, Okito, in action. A week later Frank Dodd had his annual outing on his Babylon estate, and over 100 partook of lunch, dinner, games, and watched the open air performance with a stein in each hand. Four days later the I.B.M. Convention opened at High Point, N.C. with over 300 registered as present. At the moment, I feel like yelling long and loud when anyone mentions the “pass”.
One can have only regret that Bamberg has left our country to its mad and harum-scarum methods of show business. He turned down a thousand a week to chop the production into bits and work the movie presentation houses with four and five shows a day. And now he’s back in the Latin climate where he can be his own boss, present magic to his own satisfaction, and continue to prove he has plenty “on the ball” or he never would have been able to build up the most artistic magic show we’ve ever seen.
Lucid moments at High Point, N.C. — Mystic Craig’s Mystery Bar being demonstrated hourly, and making his booth the most popular oasis in the town. N.C. being hard liquor dry, an opportunity was passed up to be arrested on the first night show for the producing of illegal beverages. Every wire service in the country would have carried it. — Caryl Fleming with his perennial good natured look and attitude. Those polo shirts should have been assorted in color instead of all alike, though, because unless one counted the wrinkles and saw them disappear every several hours (we did just that after the second day !) the opinion could easily be that there was but one and only one. — The inexhaustible kegs of “mountain dew” that were too easily accessible in Frank Bunker’s room. — Floyd Thayer’s Grab Bag for a quarter, a most popular spot with plenty of value. — Les Gilbert mooning over the program error that made of him “A Magical Pottourri.” — And Charley (Baffles) Brush trying to placate him with puns he had collected for his Linking Ring and Sphinx columns. — Hazel Miller’s air of devotion to all I.B.M. matters while her stomach turned flips in reaction to the change of climate, food, water, and perhaps a beer or two. — Letter at hand : “There is one thing that makes your Jinx worth ten times its price. Occasionally you recommend some item. Heath’s dice was one and I’m going to buy Walsh’s Magician’s Dream and Vosburgh Lyon’s Rising Cards. You see, you carry no advertising and I’ve found that if you say an item is good, then it really is ! I have a dresser drawer filled with unusable junk, and have sworn not to add to it, nor have I recently.” (Signed) Gaylor A. Wood.
Thanks, Mr Wood. And if there are any others like you, I can honestly and vociferously say I like Tom Osborne’s book on Cups and Balls as being most complete in routines, and Max Holden’s publication of the Encyclopedia of Card Tricks in the decent form due such a work.
Laugh of the month : Walter Gibson has written “Now that Holden is putting out the Encyclopedia in printed form, I’ve been puzzled as to what to do with Gravatt’s mimeographed opus. Fortunately, Gravatt — who seems to think of everything — has himself provided the answer on page 9 of the June Genii. His last paragraph really furnishes the inspiration.” (We quote the Gravatt inspirational verbatim as well as reproductional on the funny page. Ed.)
The following excerpt should settle once and for all the controversy in which we have taken some part. We have had our say in issues gone by, and quoted the various claimants to the bridge trick together with their remarks about the others. Frank Travers mailed this to me on June 10th, and it leaves no room for argument.
“— One thing I wish you would settle for all time is that ——- bridge trick, so far six letters have reached me each claiming the trick. Mickey MacDougall, Jerry Kahler, Frank Lane, all the bunch arguing like hell. I traced this method back to Robert Houdin’s “Tricks of the Greeks, or Card Sharping Exposed” on page 267 in the fine print. This tells about placing the high cards second and fourth. It is known as bricklaying among the gamblers. The book was published in 1861 and if any of that bunch can show priority they are entitled to it.” —
I have no comment for the above. Just give a deep sigh and turn to the next page.
Off hand note : The Houdini name seems controlled by fate as well as reputation. The Summer 1937 Manhattan Directory has it in big type at the top of the page because of it being the first one in line ! — In the N.Y. Post for June 29th, somebody by the name of Albenice posed for a series of pictures exposing three tricks, the worst being the cigarette vanish in hank. His expressions are worth looking at, though. About as much personality (but not versatility !) as the thumb tip which is pictured. — Because of the undeniable popularity of the cups and balls at the present time, we’re starting a complete series next month which will be reprinted as the most exhaustive study of the subject known to exist. — Mitchell Kanter of Philadelphia has taken over the Keith Clark Encyclopedia of Cigarette Tricks and it will be off the press about the middle of July. This will be good news to those who have waited for their remittance to come back bearing fruit. I have plugged it before as the greatest (I saw the manuscript and all pictures) and I’ll do so again with renewed confidence. — What is that rumor going about that says a too well known announces foreign trips and hides away at a road side eatery in New England ? Or do such things just pop up as a result of too many hard knocks with a hank pull ? — Caryl Fleming had a bit of advice at High Point. Fleming’s idea of writing is to give each trick completely and without any of that “use your favorite method” business. Even if the force, or vanish is old, Caryl says it should be given to make the effect absolutely complete in detail throughout. There are many who may know the “bit” you put in, but there are many also who don’t, and many who have read it somewhere but the exact details have slipped their mind. Why sell a trick, and then compel the reader to check up somewhere else for the main part of it ? Or experiment with a number of “favorite methods” when the writer is in a position to give them the best for that particular effect ? The advice is O.K. with us, Mr Fleming, and from now on try to find fault, on that point, at least.
Tom Bowyer wrote and wanted to know what was, or is, an “Oss”. That title in the Summer Extra must have upset him no whit. “Oss”, Tom, simply means “prophecy” and little else. We’re just getting dictionary mad in an effort to find a few new titles. — And who is that fellow who wrote me for the telephone number of the gal being shot at by Proskauer in the last issue. We’d like to know ourselves ! — And one of the odd facts of the month is about the collector in Minneapolis who also has a great array of erotica which he keeps separate from his magic. He doesn’t know in which one to put Guy Jarrett’s book ! — It’s too bad the I.B.M. had to garner that bit of rather unfavorable publicity, especially so as the miscreant wasn’t a member. I had some good data ready to run this issue, but as we rush to the printer a bit belatedly, it’s such a maelstrom of “true” and “false” statements, as well as “dream” stories, that we’ll just bide our time, and perhaps save our necks.