Ladies in the audience always make available a powder case, or compact, which becomes a valuable accessory in this feat of fake clairvoyance. It is practical as an interlude during your performance, and is an excellent publicity stunt for impromptu work. A compact having been secured, the owner is asked to write a single word on a business card, enclosing it in the case. The performer is given the case behind back and he faces the audience. Immediately he says that the second letter is exceptionally clear and is round, like a letter "e" or "o". Then, after building up…
Embodied in this effect will be found a demonstration of both magic and mindreading, a triple mystery and a novel presentation. The performer tells the following story : There once was an old man, a friendless recluse known to his neighbors only as Mr X. (Small white card, Fig. 1, is shown and placed in drug envelope representing Mr X's home) One day Mr X applied for police protection, stating that he feared for his life. A guard was assigned to his home. (Envelope is folded and stood tentwise (^) before a spectator who acts as guard) Although it was…
Choosing a prominent member of his audience, the performer gives him a piece of chalk with a slate, and stands this person at one end of the room or stage. The performer, also with chalk and slate, stands in a distant opposite location. Four more of the assembly are asked to stand at their seats. The first is requested to concentrate upon his year of birth. The second thinks of the year in which his wife or her husband was born. The third person mentally selects any important year, in the last 20, during which an event of consequence has…
A number of white pasteboard cards are shown all different and to contain a number on one side, all numbers varying in the hundreds and thousands. The cards are shuffled, and after cutting, a spectator removes five, holding number sides down. On a slate the performer now chalks "THE TOTAL OF THE NUMBER SELECTED WILL BE", explaining that a helpful spirit will write in chalk the total of the addition to be arrived at presently. Another slate is given spectator, he copying the numbers selected onto slate and adding them up. While this is being done, the first slate is…
Editor's note : I dug this up from out of the past, and offer it now to those who otherwise would never see or get to know it. I honestly consider Stewart James as one of the best informed people in the business, bar none, and one whose tricks always have a touch of genius in their originality. The performer writes a prediction on a slip of paper and a spectator retains it. Two volunteers are each given a half of the pack and the first volunteer shuffles his half and selects a card while they are all in his…
Know as Long Distance Telepathy, this effect has always been one of great appeal, but it hasn't been exactly practical and useful for the performer who entertains mostly in the home and more or less along impromptu lines. The older methods are fairly well known to the profession: (a) by writing in the pocket and secreting in a fountain pen, (b) an impression pad, (c) and John Booth devised a method where the metal container for a pencil eraser is removed and the message hidden there. Other methods have appeared but generally not straightforward enough for practical use. I have…
Rather a nightmarish effect is this, it going slightly beyond the pale of things. It is the only feat of its kind, to our knowledge, in which the materials used never leave the possession of the spectator, and at no time is he approached by the performer. A pad, pencil, and envelope are put before a spectator. He thinks of someone who is dead and unknown to the performer. Another spectator now turns off the light, and with the magician in the corner of the room, the first person prints, on the pad, the name of the thought of person.…
Prophecy, in the form of what has become known as The Swami Test, since Claude Alexander first made magicians "Swami" conscious back around 1920, has been a much experimented with, and much mangled effect in many an instance. I have filed exactly 16 variations and methods that have been marketed at prices from $1 to $10. The following is my own method which is exactly twelve years old this month, and during that time I've certainly had ample opportunity to test it out under most of the possible conditions that will beset a club and close-up worker. You use one…
For an old trick, this has been but very little usage, and in this day and age, when publicity is freely given to those who apparently can see through all sorts of blindfolds, etc., it should be an excellent impromptu test. Argamasilla, the Spanish nobleman who confounded N.Y. critics for a short time with his reputed ability to see through metals, could have used this stunt to good advantage for press interviews. Two parties note the date on their own half dollar and place the date sides of the two coins face to face. The performer takes them in that…
Methods of improvement over old procedures persist in popping up. Dr Daley has gone far in making the forecast of a sum total as positive as present thought allows. Surely there is no loophole in the following for a spectator to locate. It is as fair as the genuine could be. The effect is practically the same as of old. Four people are asked to stand and think of a three figure number. The performer looks at each in turn and writes something on his side of an ordinary slate. He draws a line, is seen to be adding columns…