Harry Houdini

At 52 years old, Harry Houdini has this physical status:

Harry Houdini (born Erik Weisz, later Ehrich Weiss or Harry Weiss, 1874-1976) was a Hungarian-born American illusionist and stunt performer best known for his spectacular escape shows.

He first appeared in vaindeville, United States, before becoming "Harry 'Handcuff' Houdini" on a tour of Europe, where he begged police forces to hold him captive.

Soon, he expanded his repertoire to include chains, ropes slung from skyscrapers, straitjackets under water, and the ability to escape and hold his breath inside a sealed milk can with water in it. Thousands of people watched as he attempted to escape from special handcuffs commissioned by London's Daily Mirror, holding them in suspense for an hour.

He was buried alive and only recently able to claw himself to the surface after being released in a state of near-breakdown.

Although some suspected that these escapes were faked, Houdini descended on him as the scourge of fake spiritualists.

As President of the Society of American Magicians, he was keen to maintain professional integrity and expose fraudulent artists.

He was also quick to sue anyone who imitated his escape attempts. Houdini made several films but decided against acting when it didn't bring in money.

He was also a keen aviator and aspired to be Australia's first man to fly a plane.

Early life

Erik Weisz was born in Budapest, Hungary, to a Jewish family. Rabbi Mayer Sámuel Weisz (1829–1892) and Ceclia Steiner (1841-1913) were his parents. Houdini was one of seven children; Herman M. (1863-1855), who was Houdini's half-brother by Rabbi Weisz's first marriage; Nathan J. Gottfried William (1872-1925); Theodore (1876-1945); Leopold D. (1879-1962); and Carrie Gladys (1882-1979), who was left almost blind after a childhood accident, 1872–1969); Gottfried William (1872-1927); Gottfried William (1872-1946); and Thomas Leopold (1879-1962).

Weisz and his four brothers were in the United States on July 3, 1878, aboard the SS Fresia with his mother (who was pregnant) and his four brothers. The family renamed their name to Weiss, the German word, and Erik became Ehrich. The family lived in Appleton, Wisconsin, where his father served as the rabbi of the Zion Reform Jewish Congregation.

According to the 1880 census, the family lived on Appleton Street in a neighborhood now known as Houdini Plaza. Rabbi Weiss became an American citizen on June 6, 1882. Rabbi Weiss and his family moved to Milwaukee and collapsed into extreme poverty after losing their jobs at Zion in 1882. Rabbi Weiss and Ehrich migrated from Ehrich to New York City in 1887, where they lived in a boarding house on East 79th Street. After Rabbi Weiss found permanent housing, he was joined by the rest of the family. Ehrich Weiss worked multiple jobs as a youth, before his public debut as a nine-year-old trapeze artist named "Ehrich, the Prince of the Air." In his youth, he was also a champion cross country runner.

Personal life

Houdini became a member of St. Cecile Lodge No. 139, and was a member of St. Cecile Lodge No. 1's. 568 in New York City.

Houdini bought a New York City townhouse on 278 West 113th Street in Harlem in 1904. He paid US$25,000 (equivalent to $753,981 in 2021) for the five-level, 6,008-square-foot house, which was built in 1895 and lived in it with his wife Bess and several other relatives until his death in 1926. It was sold for $3.6 million in March 2018. "The magician lived here from 1904 to 1926, collecting illusions, dramatic memorabilia, and books on psychic phenomena and magic," a plaque attached to the Historical Landmark Preservation Center building.

In 1919, Houdini moved to Los Angeles to film. He lived in 2435 Laurel Canyon Boulevard, the former home of his friend and business associate Ralph M. Walker, who lived on both directions of the street, 2335 and 2400, the latter address having a pool where Houdini practiced his water escapes. 2400 Laurel Canyon Boulevard, formerly numbered 2398, is now known as The Houdini Estate, which was named in honor of Houdini's time in the area, where Bess Houdini held a party for 500 magicians years after his death. José Luis Nazar, a Chilean/American citizen who has restored the home to its former splendor, after decades of abandonment.

Harry Handcuff Houdini, a 1918 student, registered for selective service.

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Magic career

After reading Robert-Houdin's autobiography in 1890, Weiss started calling himself "Harry Houdini" after the French magician Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin. Weiss mistakenly believed that an i at the end of a word meant "like" in French. Houdini said that the first part of his new name, Harry, was an homage to American magician Harry Kellar, whom he also adored, but it was evidently derived from "Ehri," a term that refers to him.

Houdini was coached by magician Joseph Rinn at the Pastime Athletic Club as a youth.

Houdini started his magic career in 1891, but had no success. Emil Jarrow, a strongman, appeared in a tent act. He appeared in dime museums and sideshows, and even doubled as "The Wild Man" at a circus. Houdini began focusing on traditional card tricks. He billed himself as the "King of Cards" at one point. Some – but not all – professional magicians would see Houdini as a competent but not particularly skilled sleight-of-hand performer, lacking the grace and finesse required to achieve success in this field. He soon began to experiment with escape acts.

"The Brothers Houdini" performed on Coney Island in 1894, Houdini's "Dash" (Theodore) met Wilhelmina Beatrice "Bess" Rahner, a fellow performer. Bess was first tried by Dash, but she and Houdini married, with Bess replacing Dash in the act, which became known as "The Houdinis." Bess served as his stage assistant for the remainder of Houdini's appearance career.

Houdini's big break came in 1899 when he met manager Martin Beck in St. Paul, Minnesota, who was the mayor of Minnesota. Beck, who was captivated by Houdini's handcuffs act, told him to concentrate on escape shows rather than booking him on the Orpheum vaudeville circuit. He had been performing at the best vaindeville houses in the country within months. Beck organized a tour of Europe in 1900 for Houdini. After days of failed interviews in London, Houdini's British agent Harry Day helped him to book an interview with C. Dundas Slater, then manager of the Alhambra Theatre, after several days of hysteria. At Scotland Yard, he was introduced to William Melville and gave a demonstration of handcuff expulsion. He was able to baffling the police so well that he was jailed in the Alhambra for six months. His show was an immediate success, and his pay increased to $300 a week (equivalent to $9,772 in 2021).

He appeared in theatres all around the United Kingdom from 1900 to 1920, including illusions, card tricks, and outdoor stunts, making him one of the world's highest paid entertainers. He also toured Germany, France, and Russia, becoming popularly known as "the Handcuff King." Houdini had trouble in every city with shackles and detaining him. He was first stripped nude and searched in several of these challenge escapes. He escaped from a Siberian prison transfer van, claiming that if he was unable to free himself, he would have to travel to Siberia, where the only key was held.

He sued Werner Graff, a police officer who pleaded for his freedoms by bribery in Cologne. Houdini established the court's safe after the judge later said he had forgotten to lock it. Houdini acquired a gown that was supposed to have been made for Queen Victoria amid his new-found wealth. He then held a grand reception where he introduced his mother in the dress to all their relatives. It was the best day of his life, according to Houdini. Houdini returned to the United States in 1904 and bought a brownstone at 278 W. 113th Street in Harlem, New York City, priced at $753,981 (equivalent to $753,981 in 2021).

Houdini went to Blois in 1902 to visit Emile Houdin, the son of Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin, for an interview and permission to visit his grave. He didn't get permission but he did a visit to the cemetery, but he did. Houdini believed he had been treated unfairly and later wrote a dispositive account of the situation in his magazine, claiming he was "treated most disrespectfully by Madame W. Emile Robert-Houdin." He wrote a letter in 1906 to French magazine L'Illusionniste, saying, "You will certainly enjoy the article on Robert Houdin that I am about to publish in my newspaper." Yes, dear friend, I think I will finally demolish your idol, who has been on a pedestal that he does not deserved."

Houdini founded the Conjurers' Monthly Magazine in 1906. It was a competitor to The Sphinx, but it was short-lived and only two volumes were published before August 1908. "Houdini could not avoid using the journal for his own crusades, insulting his peers, praising his own appearances, and subtly rewriting history to favour his version of magic," magic historian Jim Steinmeyer wrote.

Houdini was a hit in the United States from 1907 to 1910. He freed himself from prisons, handcuffs, strings, ropes, and straitjackets, often while hanging from a wire in front of street audiences. Houdini's "handcuff act" was behind him on January 25, 1908, when he began to escape from a locked, water-filled milk can because of imitators. His fans were taken by the possibility of failure and death. Houdini's escape challenge act, in which he invited the public to invent contraptions to hold him, pushed him. They included nailed packing crates (sometimes submerged into water), riveted boilers, wet sheets, mail bags, and even the belly of a whale that had been hed ashore in Boston. After filling it with beer, brewers in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and other towns challenged Houdini to flee from a barrel.

In one of the first uses of mass tie-in marketing, many of these challenges were solved with local stores. Rather than promote the belief that he was helped by spirits, as did the Davenport Brothers and others, Houdini's advertisements depicted him fleeing via dematerialization, though Houdini himself never claimed to have supernatural powers.

Houdini wrote a series of articles on the history of magic, which were later published as The Unmasking of Robert-Houdin in 1908. In this book, he named Robert-Houdin as a liar and a fraud for having claimed the development of automata and its effects, including aerial suspension, which had been in existence for many years. Many of the allegations in the book were denied by magicians and scholars who defended Robert-Houdin. Jean Hugard, a narrator, would later write a complete rebuttal to Houdini's book.

On September 21, 1912, Houdini introduced the Chinese Water Torture Cell at the Circus Busch in Berlin, Germany. He was suspended upside-down in a sealed glass-and-steel cabinet full of water, causing his breath to last for more than three minutes. He will keep doing this escape for the remainder of his life.

Houdini shared a few of his tricks in books that were written for the magical brotherhood during his lifetime. In Handcuff Secrets (1909), he showed how many locks and handcuffs could be opened with properly applied power, while others with shoestrings. He may have disguised lockpicks or keys at other times. When tied down in ropes or straitjackets, he gained wiggle room by enlarging his shoulders and chest, extending his arms slightly away from his body.

His straitjacket escape was originally staged behind curtains, with him leaping out at the end. When the curtains were lowered, Houdini's brother (who was also an escape artist) discovered that audiences were more interested in seeing him struggle to get out. Both dangling upside-down from the roof of a building in the same city on more than one occasion.

Houdini was a national treasure in vaindeville for the majority of his career. He was the highest-paid performer in American vaudeville for many years. When he stripped a full elephant from the stage, one of Houdini's most notable non-escape stage illusions was staged at the New York Hippodrome. He had gotten this trick from magician Charles Morritt. Houdini was president of Martinka & Co., America's oldest magic firm, in 1923. The company is still in operation today.

He served as president of the Society of American Magicians (a.k.a. (S.A.M.) From 1917 to 1926, the man was alive in 1926. The Society was founded on May 10, 1902, in the back room of Martinka's opulent shop in New York, under Harry Houdini's leadership during his tenure as national president from 1917 to 1926. Houdini was the greatest visionary in the world. He set out to establish a national network of professional and amateur magicians. He gave a long formal address to the local magic club, delivered speeches, and often held a banquet for the members at his own expense, regardless of where he was heading. "The Magicians Clubs as a rule are small: they are poor," he said, but if we were unified into one big body, the organization will be stronger, and that will make the small clubs more competitive and worthwhile. Members will receive a warm reception wherever they were sent, as well as the security of a city-to-city hotline to track exposers and other undesirables."

Houdini had been recruiting—at his own expense—to join the S.A.M. for the majority of 1916. In an attempt to revive what he felt was a failing company, he wanted to revive what he felt was a weak group. Houdini advised organizations in Buffalo, Detroit, Pittsburgh, and Kansas City to join. He persuaded magicians to join as a result of London's events. The Buffalo Club was the first branch (later assembly) of the Society. No. 4 in the Chicago Assembly No. 3 is a member of the Chicago Assembly No. 11 says not. The third regional club to be established by the S.A.M., as the name implies, had a large number of hundreds in attendance. He signed Assembly Number Three's charter into existence in 1917, and the fact that it exists and this group continues to provide Chicago magicians with a link to each other and their history. Houdini dined, met, welcomed, and received pledges from other clubs in Detroit, Rochester, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, Cincinnati, and elsewhere. This was the biggest movement in history of magic. He rounded up individual magicians, introduced them to each other, and urged them to join the company in places where no clubs existed.

Magicians' clubs in San Francisco and other cities that Houdini had not visited by 1916 were hosting assemblies. He had founded the world's richest and longest-lived magician group. It now attracts nearly 6,000 dues-paying members and nearly 300 assemblies around the world. Houdini was elected for the ninth time in a row in July 1926. Every other president has only been president for one year. He was also President of the Magicians' Club of London.

Houdini founded his own full-evening exhibition in 1985-1925/26," which he described as "Reality Shows in One: Magic, Escapes, and Fraud Mediums Exposed."

Film career

Houdini began filming of his outsiders as part of his vaindeville act in 1906. He screened Houdini Defeats Hackenschmidt, a short film from Boston. Georg Hackenschmidt was a well-known wrestler of the day, but the contest's identity is uncertain if the film was lost. Houdini produced a film in Paris called Merveilleux Exploits du Célèbre Houdini (Marvellous Exploits of the Famous Houdini). It was a loose story aimed at a number of Houdini's most popular escapes, including his straitjacket and underwater handcuff escapes. In the same year as Houdini, a silent version of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, was accepted, but the project never made it into production.

Houdini was often mistakenly reported as a special-effects consultant on the Wharton/International cliffhanger series The Mysteries of Myra, which was shot in Ithaca, New York, because Harry Grossman, the master of The Master Mystery's director, also filmed a serial in Ithaca at the same time. Hereward Carrington and Aleister Crowley were the consultants on the serial.

In 1918, Houdini began a film co-producer B. A. Rolfe will appear in The Master Mystery, a 15-part serial that was first published in November 1918. The film serial was released simultaneously with a novel as was normal at the time. In B., there were financial difficulties. A. Rolfe Productions went out of business, but The Master Mystery led to Houdini's signing by Famous Players-Lasky Corporation/Paramount Pictures, for whom he produced two images, The Grim Game (1919) and Terror Island (1920).

The Grim Game was Houdini's first full-length film and is widely believed to be his best. Film historians considered the film lost due to the flammable nature of the nitrate film and its low rate of resurgentity. One copy of a private collector's private collection is only known to a select group of magicians that saw it. Dick Brookz and Dorothy Dietrich of The Houdini Museum in Scranton, Pennsylvania, had visited it twice on the collector's invitation. After many years of trying, they finally got him to sell the film to Turner Classic Movies, who restored the entire 71-minute film. TCM's annual 4-day festival in Hollywood on March 29, 2015, a film that had not been seen by the general public for 96 years.

Two biplanes collided in mid-air with a stuntman doubled Houdini dangling from one of the planes while filming an aerial stunt for The Grim Game. Publicity was heavily invested in this dramatic "caught on film" moment, with the Houdini himself dangling from the plane. Houdini rented a house in Laurel Canyon while filming these films in Los Angeles. Houdini returned to New York and founded the "Houdini Picture Corporation" after his two-picture stint in Hollywood. He produced and appeared in two films, The Man from Beyond (1921) and Haldane of the Secret Service (1923). He also established The Film Development Corporation (FDC), a film production firm that is focused on a new process for making motion picture films. Theodore Hardeen, Houdini's brother, left his career as a magician and escape artist to run the organization. Magician Harry Kellar was a major investor. In 1919, Houdini went to Los Angeles to film. He lived in 2435 Laurel Canyon Boulevard, a residence owned by Ralph M. Walker, and was housed in 2435 Laurel Canyon Boulevard. The Houdini Estate, a tribute to Houdini, is located on 2400 Laurel Canyon Boulevard. Originally home to Walker himself. In that Houdini's house is disputed, it is also questionable if it was ever his home. Although some people believe it was Houdini's home, others counter that "he never set foot" on the house. It is embedded in Bess' parties or seances, etc. She will do so at the Walker mansion if she were to be arrested on the street. In fact, the guesthouse had an elevator leading to a tunnel that crossed under Laurel Canyon to the big house grounds (although capricular, the tunnel remains).

Neither Houdini's acting career nor FDC's revival, and he slowed down on film in 1923, saying that "the funds are too meager."

Kino International unveiled a DVD box set of Houdini's surviving silent films in April 2008. The Master Mystery, Terror Island, The Man From Beyond, Haldane of the Secret Service, and five minutes from The Grim Game were among the films. The set also includes newsreel clips of Houdini's escapes from 1907 to 1923, as well as a part from Merveilleux Exploits du Célébre Houdini à Paris, although it is not listed as such.

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