Ottokar Fischer

Ottokar Fischer
As Viennese Correspondent to Conjurers Monthly Magazine, 1906
Born	Ottokar Fischer November 10, 1873 Austria Leschan, Mähren (now Lešany, CZ)
Died	December 01, 1940 (age 67) Vienna Austria
Resting place	Zentralfriedhof, Vienna, Austria
Categories	Books by Ottokar Fischer

Ottokar Fischer (1873 - 1940) was was an Austrian magician.

Biography

Ottokar Fischer was born in Leschan, a small village in Mähren, Austria (now Lešany, CZ), to Josef Fischer und Christine Fischer (born Večera). In 1891 he was married to Barbara Eiböck (1875-1938), they had a son (Dr. Otto Fischer).

In 1883 his parents moved to Vienna, where he saw Charles Arbre, Herman Mellini, Ben Ali Bey, and other noted performers. He gave his own first public performance at age 18.

Fischer studied with A. Fredmar, who claimed to be the successor of Compars Herrmann. In 1895 Fischer met George Heubeck, who was one of the pupils of J. N. Hofzinser. Heubeck taught Fischer all of Hofzinser's effects he knew.

Starting in 1898 Fischer managed and appeared regularly at the Kratky-Baschik theatre in Vienna, a magic theatre with nearly 1000 seats. For 12 years he performed nearly daily with a two and a half-hour show of magic. In his Kratky-Baschik performances Fischer billed himself as "O.F. Marteau". (Note: Some sources in Internet claim Fischer's name was "Ottokar Fischer Marteau", which is wrong.) Several times Fischer performed before the Imperial Court of Austria and before other crowned heads.

Fischer founded his own magic shop "WIENER KUNSTSTÄTTE" (1914-1929) where he also sold a lot of Hofzinser's tricks. Fischer had many famous people like C.H. Larette, Valentino Graziadei, Rolf Hansen, etc.

Fischer was always interested in the history of magic and dedicated a great part of his life in its research. He started to investigate J.N. Hofzinser's life and continued his research of historical magicians around the world. He also stayed in contact with a lot of magicians (i.e. Harry Houdini, Okito, Dr. Rohnstein, Clement de Lion, etc.)

In 1908 Fischer founded the "Wiener Magischer Club" and was its president for several times.

He is buried at Zentralfriedhof in Vienna, Austria.

Awards and honors

• Cover of American Magician November 1910
• Cover of Linking Ring April 1936.
• In 1939 the Society of American Magicians made Fischer an honorary member.
• In 2016 a street in Vienna was named after Ottokar Fischer on the initiative of Magic Christian.

Books

• J. N. Hofzinser's Card Conjuring - Johann Nepomuk Hofzinser Kartenkünste (1910)
• The Miracle Book of Magic (Das Wunderbuch der Zauberkunst) (1929)
• Illustrated Magic - Zauberkünste (1931)
• Aus Eins Mach' Zehn (1937)
• Johann Nepomuk Hofzinser Zauberkünste (1942)

References

This page incorporated content from Ottokar Fischer, 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

• Die Zauberwelt, Vol. 8, No. 9, September 1902, Ottokar Fischer, by Josef Hartel, page 179
• Cover, The Sphinx, Vol. 2, No. 6 August 1903, The Magician of the Month – Ottokar Fischer, page 68
• Cover, The American Magician, Vol. 2, No. 8, November 1910, Ottokar Fischer, page 115
• Cover, The Linking Ring, Vol. 16, No. 2, April 1936, OTTOKAR FISCHER, I.B.M. No. 316, page 96
• The Linking Ring, Vol. 21, No. 2, April 1941, Death of Ottokar Fischer, by H. R. Evans, page 132
• The Sphinx, Vol. 40, No. 2, April 1941, Ottokar Fischer Dies, page 117
• The Magic Wand, Vol. 30, No. 191, October-November 1941, Ottokar Fischer, by S. H. Sharpe, page 145
• Magie (Magischer Zirkel v. Deutschland), Vol. 71, No. 3, März 1991, Aktuelles, Reinhard Müller, Ottokar Fischers Todestag jährt sich am 1. Dezember 1990 zum fünfzigsten Male., page 100
• The New Tops, Vol. 30, No. 5, May 1990, MEN OF MAGIC, by Robert Olson - Hofzinser, page 34
• M-U-M, Vol. 95, No. 7, December 2005, Who’s Who in Viennese Magic - Ottokar Fischer, page 32
• https://www.biographien.ac.at/oebl/oebl_F/Fischer_Ottokar_1873_1940.xml;internal&action=hilite.action&Parameter=hofzinser

This page incorporated content from Ottokar Fischer (German), a page hosted on Wikipedia(de). 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