Julian Proskauer has informed that we pulled a boner with that S.A.M. Souvenir (Who’s Who) Program item. It was offered to Parent Assembly members only for 27 cents. It’s funny how we got the impression that it was a National Convention.
Getting the last Jinx out over 2 weeks ahead of our usual date resulted in being scooped out of that Larsen-Proskauer picture featured in the other mags. ‘Twas a sad blow. “As a result of a long talk I had with Mr. Proskauer,” stated Mr. Larsen, “I feel certain that magicians may be assured of his hundred per cent cooperation in the future.” Since the Battle Creek convention, the ex-prexy of the S.A.M. has been actively engaged in forming a N.Y. Ring of the I.B.M. The N.Y. Post has a publicity gag at the World’s Fair. Copies of the daily are at hand with the double streamer lines left out. The printer in the booth has a bottom line set up to read WELCOMED TO NEW YORK WORLD’S FAIR. You write your own top line and get 4 copies for $1. Some of the locals are stuffing their press books, one or two going to the length of having copy set up for a paste in before getting the front page photo-offset reproduced. Not that we look down on things which impress the public but this is a bit raw simply because no magician ever got that kind of publicity. Committeemen aren’t too dumb and a palpable fake in the display book can hurt the other hard earned notices.
After that sermon we offer you the service. The top line takes 30 letters including in between spaces. The Jinx will supply 4 papers to your one line copy for $1.25 postpaid. The quarter takes care of stamps and a beer.
Dr. Jacob Daley suddenly discovered that July 23rd was exactly 100 years from the birth of Prof. Hoffman in 1839. Immediately the wheels began to turn and on that centennial anniversary about 75 gathered for a dinner and Hoffman show at N.Y.’s Piccadilly Hotel. It was a nice show and good turnout for sultry weather.
We haven’t yet taken paid advertising, and don’t intend to, but never let it be said that we don’t give a helping hand.
Jimmy Grippo, S.A.M.’er, and manager of Melio Bettino, the new ex-light-heavyweight champion, is a hypnotist who put the “works” on his fighter before bouts. His best line of suggestion to Bettino’s subconscious mind is “He can’t hurt us.” After the recent meeting between Bettino and Billy Conn in N.Y. it was discovered that Conn had hurt just about everybody within the radius of a mile. Jimmy is in the market for some new mesmeric passes.
Gerald Kaufman’s book, It’s About Time, is selling for 19 cents.
Dave (La Vellma) Lustig has broken a long silence with a 53 pages 8 1/2 x 11 work Entertaining With Ventriloquism. That title is very much to the point. There is plenty dialogue and bits together with good advice on showmanship and angles from a fellow who has been a performer and theatre manager for many years.
Secrets of the Street Conjuror by Wilfred Huggins is an English booklet of swell value. There is hardly a trick you won’t be able to use, and there are several dodges and tips worth a lot to the subtle people. 1/6, which is about 35 cents in our coin.
We had a sort of a merry-go-round session with Lloyd Jones on his trip east but enjoyed it a lot. Some of the west coast jottings haven’t been so flattering but there’s no fault to be found with our meeting unless on his side. He likes good magic and doesn’t expose. You can’t ask for much more than that.
“Think a Drink’ Hoffman is in N.Y. with The Streets Of Paris musicale, and Joan Brandon, fresh from Europe, is at The Glass Hat, Hotel Belmont-Plaza. Carl Rosini has four illusions in a separate room of Ripley’s Odditorium, presented by Albenice. Three are mirror gadgets and the other a human pin cushion effect. Speaking of mirrors, the headless woman era is with us to a fare-thee-well. First described in Hilliard’s Greater Magic, this modern version of the Colonel Stodare Sphinx illusion is “tops” as the best mirror dodge yet conceived. Sam Margulies tells me there are well over 300 in the country right now which fact, and it recalls the “sawing” splurge, will ruin the stunt in one season. By the end of this year, and during the next, you’ll see plenty of walk through exposes gloming the nickles. Of the two at Coney Island, one at the Fair, and one in Hubert’s Museum, the Ripley presentation comes closest to an expose. Without discussing ethics, the presentation speil is along accidental lines tied in with the experiments of Alexis Carrel and others for keeping hearts and organs alive artificially. The curtains are drawn aside and the convulsive actions of the benecked lady are evident while tubes run from the wherewithals to machinery flashing lights and pumping gaily colored liquids. A nurse stands by for the minute or so before the curtain drop and the crowd pumped out at the rear. At Ripley’s, the one place where the “believe it or not” slogan is injected at every turn, and by all exhibit speilers, there is more excuse than ever to tell the story and leave them wondering. However, the gal comes out immediately afterwards to show her head in place, and no one goes away with any further wonderment, and certainly no incentive for telling friends to see the thing. Maybe Rip is sensitive to the point where he fears that if it is presented straight people may lift eyebrows at his other and genuine oddities.
Harry Blackstone surprised not a few by being at the Battle Creek convention, his first since squabbles with the old regime quite some years ago and which resulted in his forming the I.M.C. True to form Harry ascended the platform at the Kalamazoo show as a spectator assisting The Great Levante, whose escaping block trick was a “high” effect of the English contingent to these shores. Never playing his temperament false, The Great Blackstone proceeded to plug his own show by talking out of turn and saying that the audience would see the stunt in his own show this fall. Levante graciously, if not sarcastically, offered to teach him the routine so that it would be done well. If H.B. could let down his hair for a while and not try continually to outsmart and outmanoeuvre every magus he meets, especially when there is from one spectator up, he would be liked a bit more in the profession. However, he doesn’t care, it seems, so he lets that little amount of Houdini in him have full sway. I say little amount for Blackstone’s faults have kept him from ever attaining the heights scaled by Houdini. And personally, I think Blackstone a better all around magician. Maybe someday we’ll put on the record the story of the show that Blackstone did in Towanda, Pa., on a rainy night back in the 1920’s.