The sitter is ushered into the "reading" room of the medium. He is seated behind a flat top desk or table. The seeker of enlightenment is seated opposite and invited to write his or her most important queries, not upon a pad or file-board, but upon a plain blank business card. From a small box the seer takes a crystal ball. He gazes into the sphere of so many hidden mysteries, shakes his head and then advises the sitter to drop his card into the now empty box, writing side down. The box is closed and remains in full view…
Every bit of action in this effect means something, and I have no doubt but that there will be not a few who have discarded the number addition trick who will find the following idea a welcome new face for their routine. After other card effects the performer attempts a mindreading experiment. He hands the deck to a spectator for shuffling, and that person is to think of a three figure number as he mixes the cards. The deck is given a second person who shuffles and also thinks of three figures. The same thing happens with a third person.…
Requirements for this impromptu mystery are very simple and ordinary. A pencil, a slip of paper, and a single die complete the list of necessary apparatus. The basic principle is a mathematical oddity which seems to be little known, and, in this particular instance, quite easily overlooked by the very few who might have heard of the idea. It is excusable on their part for misdirection at the beginning makes the feat appear far from being mechanical. The performer has members of his audience give him "any single number" until six are named. Should one of these be repeated another…
Quite some years ago our trade journals were seldom without an advertisement by a person named A. Honigman, of Canada. Mr. Honigman was selling an intrigue labeled The Language of The Eyes and the gist of the adverts was that one could read another's thoughts merely by looking "deeply" into his eyes. Now this may be true when practised by soul mates but it isn't readily applied by the mystical fraternity. Mr. Honigman's denouement, after seeing with his own eyes a certified check or money order, gave a system of glancing at another person without moving the head, and through…
Stewart James introduced this principle in Jinx #25 under the title of Numismatigic. That erudite discoverer of oddities had found that Canadian five cent pieces were magnetic while the like coins of the U.S. were not. (It should prove both interesting and probably practical for residents of other countries ((and we get to 22 other countries, too! Ed.)) to test their own metal currencies for magnetic qualities.) My presentation here is completely different from that of Mr. James. I have also added a subtlety not heretofore used (in print) by those who have made use of magnets. It is simply…
Quite some years ago Mr Hull published an effect which he called Sheet Readings and which embodied a very effective method of presenting an old principle of sealed message reading. I made a few notes on it at the time for the action seemed very fair from the audience's viewpoint. However, there were also a few little points that didn't suit my own way of working and a detail or so which I subsequently added to make the working even more effective to the onlookers. In the original effect the performer passed out small envelopes, cards and pencils for the…
Handwriting is something which may or may not identify one person from another. It's a moot question and therefore leaves the path open for a magician to make the most of things. From a newspaper clipping reproduced here we have seen that the effect might be of use to many readers. What we reveal here is an effort to give a method so that all may accomplish the same thing, if not genuinely, as per the English newspaper man, by underhanded trickery as per nearly all magicians. In a room from 10 to 20 people the performer passes out a…
While this effect has been sold under different names and credited to as many different people, no one as yet has published the presentation which I first used over 25 years ago. (Back in Jinx #6 I used this principle with a torn out piece of newspaper. Previous to that, I supplied Thayer's Trick of the Month Club with the effect as eventually made quite popular by Mogul. Previous to that Joe Ovette sold the idea in a slightly different form via the manuscript route. Previous to that Martin Sunshine used it for private readings. And Martin told me subsequent…
If you actually could do true mind reading you would proceed exactly as you do in this hitherto unrevealed and astonishing test. That is what arouses the amazement of the spectators -- entire absence of any apparent method. Every move is seemingly done by the spectators themselves -- any one spectator or several, it makes no difference. If you see a spectator who has brought his own newspaper you may use that, if you wish. Any newspaper, any page, any column, any want ads from that column -- entirely free choice. You never see the want ads which are selected.…
This is one of the most thought provoking little secrets to be evolved in many a moon. Dr. Van Deusen learned of it at a Paris hotel bar, and it is being passed on, for to the best of our knowledge the effect has never been published for magicians. In action and conception the procedure resembles a "finger" game quite popular with members of the Italian race. In effect the performer acts as a medium or thought reader and turns his back upon two spectators who will act as transmitters. Both of these spectators now hold out from 1 to…