Secrets of a Former Teenage Magician

I love magic. Over the years I have witnessed many spellbinding feats and dabbled in some conjurings of my own. The life of my imagination is dotted with magical moments large and small -- like the time David Copperfield made my husband disappear. (Spoiler alert: he came back.) Or my long-ago trek to Machpelah Cemetery in Queens to pay my respects at the grave of Harry Houdini. Or even longer ago, when, as a teenage prestidigitator and card-carrying member of the Society of American Magicians, I performed children’s birthday party favorites like the Chinese Linking Rings and the Hippity Hop Rabbits. Once, I accidentally poured milk into an unwitting little girl’s ear when my trick pitcher malfunctioned. Her mother was a good sport about it. Today’s mothers would have demanded oat milk.

A Portrait of the Author
as a Young Magician

Other boys idolized sports stars and bonded with their dads by tossing footballs. Not me. My heroes were the ’70s hippie illusionist Doug Henning and Italian sleight-of-hand master Slydini. My dad gamely indulged my hobby. Looking back, I believe he was also captivated by magic and got vicarious enjoyment from my pursuits. 

On select Saturday mornings, Dad drove me downtown to patronize our city’s lone, dingy magic shop (I believe it was called Snyder’s), which has long since disappeared. I can’t even imagine a magic shop staying in business anywhere but New York City anymore, but back in the day, it was my happy place. 

Dad would buy me props, tricks, and other paraphernalia that were an amateur magician’s stock-and-trade. I used these to decapitate my sister Missy and levitate my 10th-grade biology teacher on a magic carpet that floated an impressive three feet above the stage floor in the high school variety show. While I dreamed of trisecting Missy in a presentation of the era’s most confounding illusion, the Zig Zag Girl, my dad’s biggest splurge was on a trick guillotine. 

Doug Henning Performs the Zig Zag Girl
© Getty Images

The rest of my family wasn’t so supportive. With my spirits still soaring after attending a sensational magic show at Cleveland’s Hannah Theater, I confided to my snobbish grandmother that I hoped to be a professional magician someday; she huffed, “and be on a stage with those sweaty girls?” (I hadn’t even noticed that the magician’s assistants were perspiring. I thought they were fabulous – certainly more fabulous than my classmate Rob, the hapless sad sack I had cajoled into serving as my own assistant). Siblings were my harshest critics. When I proudly demonstrated the new and expensive tricks I had just learned, they unhesitatingly told me I stank and that the trick guillotine’s secret was obvious. So much for the willing suspension of disbelief.

Louis Tannen's in the 1970s
Used by Permission

What did they know? Their palpable jealousy did not deter me from acquiring new tricks. When I graduated from the local magic shop, Dad took me to New York to check out the greatest of all magic shops, Louis Tannen’s. 

Supplying America’s magicians since 1925, it was a revelation. Originally located somewhere near Times Square, the ’70s Tannen’s served as a mecca for magicians of all stripes. Businessmen who dabbled in magic spent their lunch hours there. Unemployed performers hung out in the elevator, welcoming customers with feats of legerdemain. You might even catch a sleight of hand trick or two performed by Slydini himself. 

It is heartening that this inspiring institution lives on in present-day Manhattan, albeit in a somewhat diminished version on the sixth floor of a West 34^th street office building. They still offer private lessons and a week-long summer magic camp. 

Joe and I went to Tannen’s a few years ago and acquired some small effects that have ended up languishing, unperformed, in my dresser drawer. While my passion for magic persists, my days as a practitioner may have finally run their course. 

 

 

In retrospect, I don’t know how anyone put up with my magical exploits. My siblings were right. I was terrible. Performing magic is a talent that relies on skill, stage presence, and salesmanship. I possess none of these and admire anyone who does have what it takes to do magic for a living. 

My Father, My Patron

My dad surely realized I was a middling magician and sponsored me anyway all those years ago. That's what dads do. It astounds me that he would be 95 in two days. If he were still here, he would be cheering me on in my latest trick -- pulling rabbits out of hats to bring you this blog every week.

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Author's Note: Join the Vertes'Verities Facebook group to get in on a well-kept magical secret this Sunday, and to receive other bonus content. Also, while I appreciate each and every one of your comments, my mind-reading powers are on par with my magical skills. Please sign your comments below and save me from the rubber room.