This very effective experiment, although built around the evergreen trick of a slate with a loose flap, offers sundry points of novelty in the details. Two slates, after being marked on both their sides with identifying numbers, are tied together with a piece of tape and entrusted to someone in the audience to hold. The titles of well-known periodicals are called out by various spectators and written down in succession by the performer on plain postcards, EACH NAME BEING VERIFIED AS IT IS WRITTEN by a gentleman who stands at performer's side. About half-a-dozen having been suggested, the cards are…
:: SYMMYST :: This is Symmyst, and it identifies a person who has been initiated into the Mysteries. A great favorite of mine since released in 1931 by Annemann has been what was called The One Man 'Genuine' Magazine Test. Peter Warlock, in a biography for The Magic Circular, referred to it "I cannot call to mind in any modern magical literature, any subtlety producing so great an effect." Only once was I "caught", by an alert friend, whose "flash of wisdom" one of those recurrent telepathic ideas gained no doubt from a guilty conscience, gave voice to the correct…
Mr Theo Annemann Waverly, New York Dear sir, The unfortunate combination of scotch block plus a gradual infiltration of scotch liquor may be held responsible for the following idea. I imagine the construction and technique of the ordinary tray in use for the substitution of a pack of cards is known to all. Trying to apply this idea to a less stagey looking object than a tray and also, what was more important, make a saving of the three bucks that the magic depot is only too glad to receive, I thought of gluing the cover of one magazine on…