Harry Houdini

Harry Houdini
Born	Erik Weisz March 24, 1874 Budapest, Hungary
Died	October 31, 1926 (age 52) Detroit, Michigan
Categories	Books by Harry Houdini

Harry Houdini (b.1874–d.1926) whose birth name in Hungary was Erik Weisz (which was changed to Ehrich Weiss when he immigrated to the United States), was a Hungarian American magician, escapologist (widely regarded as one of the greatest ever), and stunt performer, as well as a skeptic and investigator of spiritualists, film producer, and actor.

Biography

Initially, Houdini's magic career resulted in little success. He performed in dime museums and sideshows, and even doubled as "the Wild Man" at a circus.

Early in his career, Houdini focused on traditional card tricks. At one point, he billed himself as the "King of Cards". But he soon began experimenting with escape acts.

In 1893, while performing with his brother "Dash" at Coney Island as "The Brothers Houdini", Harry met and married fellow performer Bess (Wilhelmina Beatrice Rahner). Bess soon replaced Dash in the act, which became known as "The Houdinis", and in 1894 they were married. For the rest of Houdini's performing career, Bess would work as his stage assistant.

He had changed his name to Harry Houdini because the French conjurer, Jean Eugene Robert-Houdin was one of his biggest inspirations.

Legacy

Harry Houdini is the one of the most famous escape artists/magicians who has ever lived.

Houdini escaped from many unique situations, and invented some of the most memorable escapes in the history of magic, such as the "Chinese Torture Cell", "Metamorphosis" and a number of others.

During his career, Houdini inspired many imitators, men and women. Some duplicated his escapes and others during the height of his fame were just trying to capitalize on his name. Houdini often ruthlessly defended his domain by challenging these imitators, advertising that his act was "patented" with threats to sue them, exposing them, or training someone of his own liking (including his brother Hardeen).

Quotes

"It's not the trick. It's the magician." --Harry Houdini

Books

• The Right Way to Do Wrong (1906)
• The Unmasking of Robert-Houdin (1908)
• Handcuff Secrets (1910)
• Magical Rope Ties and Escapes (1921)
• Miracle Mongers and Their Methods (1920)
• Houdini's Paper Magic (1922)
• Elliott's Last Legacy (1923)
• A Magician Among the Spirits (1924)
• Exposes the tricks used by the Boston Medium "Margery" (1925)

Periodicals

Houdini published his Conjurers' Monthly Magazine, that ran for one year from September 1906 until August 1907, as a competitor to the Sphinx.

The magazine touted Houdini's importance to the world of magic, and contained gossip about magicians he did not like and criticism of his imitators.

References

This page incorporated content from Harry Houdini, a page hosted on Wikipedia. Please consult the history of the original page to see a list of its authors. Therefor, this article is also available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License

• Cover Genii 1936 October
• Cover Genii 1938 October
• Cover Genii 1940 October
• Cover Genii 1941 October
• Cover Genii 1942 October
• Cover Genii 1953 June
• Cover Genii 1955 October
• Cover Genii 1956 October
• Cover Genii 1961 October
• Cover Genii 1962 October
• Cover Genii 1972 October
• Cover Genii 1975 November
• Cover Genii 1993 November
• Cover Genii 1999 December
• Cover Genii 2011 January

• Bess Genii 1938 October
• Hardeen Genii 1943 October

External links

• Wild About Houdini Bibliography
• Brief Biography at The Magic Nook
• Houdini Collection catalog at Library of Congress
• John Cox's Houdini Site
• biography by John Cox
• Kevin Connolly's Houdini site
• Wild About Houdini Blog
• Findacadabra - World map of magic places, featuring points of interest related to Harry Houdini.
• Foreign language bibliography
• The House of Houdini Budapest Research News