Jack McMillen

Jack McMillen
Jack McMillen doing his Plunger Card Rise for Ron Bauer, circa 1989
Born	April 19, 1911 Stockton, California
Died	February 14, 1993 (age 81)
Categories	Books by Jack McMillen

Jack McMillen (b.1911-d.1993), an amateur magician, specialized in gambling demos and cards and coins.

Biography

In the 1940s, he was employed as a railroad agent as an undercover detective whose job it was to patrol the line for cardsharps and cheats.

In 1936 when Genii began publishing, he contributed many of his card effects.

McMillen created the Plunger Principle for the Card Rise which along with other (credited and uncredited) items were published in Expert Card Technique.

He was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Fellowship from the Academy of Magical Arts in 1991.

The Plunger Principle

McMillen is best known as the originator of the Plunger Principle for the Rising Cards, which he used in his "J. M. Rising Card" and "Obedient Rising Cards."

"The J. M. Rising Card"

• Genii, Vol. 1 No. 1, September 1936, p. 10
• Encyclopedia of Card Tricks by Jean Hugard, 1937, pp. 328-329
• Greater Magic by John Northern Hilliard, 1938, pp. 400-402
• My Best by J. G. Thompson, 1945, pp. 64-66
• Genii, Vol. 50 No 1, July 1986, p. 50
• Page Wright's Manuscript by T. Page Wright, 1991, pp. 259-262
• Jack McMillen (ebook) by Michael Landes, 2011, pp. 68-75

"The Obedient Rising Cards"

• Genii, Vol. 1 No. 1, September 1936, pp. 10-12
• Genii, Vol. 50 No 1, July 1986, pp. 50-52

Publications

Jack McMillen by Michael Landes (2011)

According to Michael Landes, Jack McMillen had for several years considered writing a book about magic. The tremendous amount of work involved in putting together a short set of lecture notes (Sleights & Swindles) in 1981 changed his mind. Several years later, McMillen's good friend, Paul Chosse, suggested having Landes write the book. Landes started working on the project in 1989, but when McMillen passed away the next year, he dropped the idea. Six years later, he decided to resume working on the book, and finished it in 1998. It was not published until 2011, when Lybrary.com released it as an ebook, titled simply Jack McMillen. It is the largest and most complete collection of McMillen's work in print.

Sleights & Swindles (1981)

Sleights & Swindles is a set of lecture notes written by McMillen and self-published in 1981 for his lecture at The Magic Castle.

Contents:

• "The Barbary Coast Scam"
• "Shade Work"
• "The Old Gambler"
• "From Another Deck"
• "The Voodoo Card Rise"
• "Witchcraft Updated"
• "Quicksilver"
• "Coin, Ring, and Silk" (Senor Mardo)
• "The San Francisco Shuffle"
• "Don't Ever Bet On A Sure Thing" (Three Card Monte)

Take a Card (1928)

Take a Card was McMillen's first publication. It was a collaboration with Judson Brown, published in 1928 by Larsen and Wright.

Contents:

• "A Retrieved Error"
• "From Another Pack"
• "The Joker Location"
• "Another Joker Location"
• "A New Reverse Location"

Other Works

Expert Card Technique (1940)

McMillen also contributed material to Hugard and Braue's Expert Card Technique, published in 1940:

Title	Pages
Double Lift (uncredited)	5-6
"The Middle Deal" (uncredited)	23-24
"Emergency Card Stabbing" (uncredited)	120-121
"The Witchcraft Card Rise"	212-213
"Mind Mirror"	223-225
"Lazy Man's Card To Pocket"	313-315
"The Psychic Stop!" (uncredited)	330-331
"A Quick Reversal" (uncredited)	341-342

Note: All material listed as "uncredited" is according to the bibliography in Jack McMillen by Michael Landes (ebook, 2011, p. 263).

The Braue Notebooks

Some of the material that Fred Braue got from Jack McMillen didn't make it into Expert Card Technique. When Jeff Busby published some of Braue's notebooks, a few items by McMillen were included.

The Fred Braue Notebooks, Vol. 1 (1985)

• Page 25 "Card Control"

The Fred Braue Notebooks, Vol. 2 (1985)

• Page 17 "Card Reversal - A Peek"
• Page 17 "Card Reversal - Another Peek"

Mental Mysteries With Cards (1942)

McMillen's "mental" items from the first year of Genii were compiled in a book by William Larsen in 1942 called Mental Mysteries with Cards (see Items in Magazines):

Title	Page
"Mind Mirror"	32
"Nth Sense"	35
"Astral Vision"	38

Page Wright's Manuscript (1991)

Page Wright's Manuscript: Sixty Years of Lost Secrets, a collection of material from T. Page Wright, was published in 1991.

It contained several contributions by McMillen, most of which had been published in the late thirties by Larsen in Genii after Wright's death in 1930 (see Jack McMillen#Items in Magazines):

Title	Pages
Artistic touch for L.W. False Shuffle	91-92
"Spring Force"	98-99
"Improved Knife Force"	99-100
"McMillen Change"	109-112
"A Cut at Any Number Throughout The Deck"	167-168
"A Card Reversed At Any Number"	170-171
"A Quick Reverse"	204-205
"Instant Speller"	220-221
"J. M. Rising Card"	259-262
Psychological force	279-280
"A Simplified Five Card Problem"	292-293

Items in Books

Title	Book Title	Author	Year	Pages
"Ghost Ring"	The L.W. Pocket and Parlor Mysteries	Larsen and Wright	1928	5
"The Prophesied Leaper"	The L.W. Card Mysteries	Larsen and Wright	1928	11-12
Card pushed through pack changes	Page Wright's Notebook	T. Page Wright	1933	9
"The Continuous Spelling Trick"	More Card Manipulations No. 1	Jean Hugard	1938	16-17
"The Triple Discovery" (with Charlie Miller)	More Card Manipulations No. 3	Jean Hugard	1941	29-30
"Ghost Ring" (uncredited)	The Tarbell Course in Magic, Vol. 3	Harlan Tarbell	1943	306-309
"The Key To The Draw" (with Charlie Miller)	Card Tricks Without Skill	Paul Clive	1946	145-146
"Mirror of the Mind"	The Royal Road to Card Magic	Jean Hugard and Frederick Braue	1951	34-35
Edge Work	The Secret of the Palmettos	Jeff Busby	1998	31-32
"One-Way Glass" (with Jeff Busby)	The Secret of the Palmettos	Jeff Busby	1998	64-64

Items in Magazines

Title	Magazine Title	Vol.	No.	Date	Pages
"The Mysterious Handkerchief"	The Sphinx	25	5	July 1926	140
Needles from Mouth on Thread	The Sphinx	27	4	June 1928	190
"X-Ray Vision"	The Sphinx	27	12	Feb. 1929	577-578
"The Transformer Card"	The Sphinx	28	1	Mar. 1929	25
"The Mystic Touch"	The Sphinx	28	2	April 1929	65-66
"The Futuristic Camera" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	28	3	May 1929	97-98
"The Perplexing Penny"	The Sphinx	28	6	Aug. 1929	210-211
"Fathom"	The Sphinx	28	7	Sept. 1929	235
"Something For Slickers" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	29	7	Sept. 1930	275
"Controlled Cubes" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	29	8	Oct. 1930	308-309
"Typewriter Telepathy"	The Sphinx	30	1	Mar. 1931	42
"Mental Photography"	The Sphinx	30	1	Mar. 1931	42
"Sinister Vision"	The Sphinx	30	1	Mar. 1931	42-43
"Ghost Eyes" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	32	10	Dec. 1933	297
"The Specter Envelope" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	32	11	Jan. 1934	339
"Telltale Color" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	33	1	Mar. 1934	12
"Poker Artistry"	Genii	1	3	Nov. 1936	17
"Mind Mirror"	Genii	1	4	Dec. 1936	12
"'Nth' Sense"	Genii	1	5	Jan. 1937	11
Artistic touch for L.W. False Shuffle	Genii	1	6	Feb. 1937	11-12
"Astral Vision"	Genii	1	7	Mar. 1937	7-8
"Ghost Eyes" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	36	1	Mar. 1937	6
"The Spring Force"	Genii	1	8	April 1937	8
"The Improved Knife Force"	Genii	1	8	April 1937	8
"The McMillen Change"	Genii	1	10	June 1937	11
"A Cut at Any Number" (uncredited)	Genii	2	3	Nov. 1937	80
"A Card Reversed At Any Number"	Genii	2	6	Feb. 1938	198
"The Diving Card"	Genii	3	1	Sept. 1938	12
"A Quick Reverse"	Genii	3	7	Mar. 1939	222
"Turnover Reverse"	Genii	3	8	April 1939	254
"Tell Tale Color" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	39	10	Dec. 1940	247
"Mental Photography" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	39	11	Jan. 1941	292
"Tip-Over Change" (with Judson Brown)	The Sphinx	39	11	Jan. 1941	293
"I'll Match You"	Genii	9	8	April 1945	290
"Impromptu Salt Vanish"	Genii	9	8	April 1945	290
"A Twist On The Color Change"	Genii	9	8	April 1945	290
"The Counterfeiter"	Genii	9	12	Aug. 1945	427
"Easy Openers"	Genii	10	1	Sept. 1945	12
"Spectral Envelope" (with Judson Brown)	The Conjurors' Magazine	1	8	Sept. 1945	28
Coin vanish	Magicana (Woodfield)		2	June 1946	8
"The Ghost Ring" (uncredited)	Genii	11	6	Feb. 1947	182
"Gambler's Coin Vanish"	The Conjurors' Magazine	3	7	Sept. 1947	40
"The Inverted Aces" (with Charles Nyquist)	Genii	14	2	Oct. 1949	43
"The San Francisco Shuffle" (with Charles Nyquist)	Genii	14	3	Nov. 1949	12
"Slip Slide Sleight"	Genii	33	5	Jan. 1969	204-205
"Karate Kontrol"	Genii	46	5	May 1982	308-309
Coin vanish	Genii	56	5	Mar. 1993	310