Around 1963 or 1964 my dad snookered me with one of the simplest, oldest card trick methods known. At this time the extent of my magic knowledge was Clipper (the cut and restored newspaper strip, Rope Thru Neck Routine, and I forget what the trick was called but you stick a pin in a balloon and it magically does not pop, really simple stuff. So it is no surprise how easily I got fooled. I don't think I new very much about card tricks at the time. My dad picked up the deck of cards, handed them to me, let me shuffle the deck as much as I wanted and told me to look at the bottom card, he took the cards back and may have "shuffled" again. Or it may have went like this, he shuffled the cards and may even have let me shuffle, showed me the bottom card, let me shuffle again, and then found my card in the deck. My memory is a little hazy. Then to my astonishment he revealed the card to me. I was totally blown away. First of all I had never even seen my dad do a card trick and it may have been the only one he knew. Well, he was having a real good time knowing how flabbergasted I was with his "Houdini" feat of card dexterity. I was also getting pretty ticked off becuse I immediately demanded to know how he did it, and it appeared he was going to keep the Magician's Code Of Honor and not tell me how the trick was done. He let me suffer for a little while. After I pouted and hollered for a while, and after my mom probably said "Harold, tell him how you did it so he'll shut up, quit being so mean", he finally revealed the method. I was then pretty mad at myself, because it was so very easy to do! My dad was pretty clever, it wouldn't surprise me if he had never done a card trick in his life and made that one up on the spot. These were magical times anyway, as this is the house where I saw the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964. Geez, magic, magicians AND the Beatles (they were truly wizards as far as I could tell). I had just started playing guitar at about that time and of course the Beatles have been one of my biggest influences in music.
When I was in, I believe, High School my dad brought a friend of his over to our house. I can't remember his name. I believe he was a teacher, but he was also a magician. He performed quite a few tricks for me and I was really amazed. At that point I knew a little about magic and new some of the methods on a couple of things, but certainly did not let on. I think he did some form of "Oil and Water." That would have been the first time I saw this trick performed. The second time, I believe, was on the Tom Snyder" nightime show "The Tomorrow Show." It was performed by Derek Dingle. It blew me away. He may have also performed another card trick or two that night.
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AuthorI am a musician by trade, but magic has always been a love of mine. Archives
August 2014
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