The Great Zelmo - “The Man Who Keeps Them Guessing”

The subject of the following two throw-out cards took me quite a while to discover his history. The two examples of The Great Zelmo’s cards have the same information on their faces, and early variant examples of Bicycle Playing Card backs.

Great Zelmo Throw-Out Cards with Bicycle Lotus and Wheel No. 2 Backs

I found a number of references to Zelmo on the Ask Alexander search engine. The earliest ones were from The Sphinx for 1910 and 1911. In June of 1910 it states, “The One and Only Ozarra Zelmo, ‘the man that keeps them guessing’ called at the office of The Sphinx a few days ago and informed me that he would soon take out his own show again.  Zelmo is one of the cleverest manipulators of coins that I have seen for many a long day”. For March of 1911 it says, “His ‘World’s Prayer and Easy Money’ is a combination act in which he catches silver money from the air and is immediately changed in his hand to bright new crisp paper money. He also demonstrates an electric device by which he produces a bright electric light without the use of wires”. Both of these tricks are mentioned on the front of Zelmo’s throw-out cards.

From The Linking Ring for January of 1957

It appears Zelmo stayed busy as a magician as he traveled over a large part of the U.S. doing shows. Dayton, Ohio magic dealer Carl Lohrey, speaking of the late Zelmo,  said about him in The Linking Ring of January, 1957, “The man worked 52 weeks in the year, and could do more with a pack of cards, with his left hand, than some of the boys do today with two hands and a stripper deck”.

Lohrey also mentioned the trailer Zelmo traveled in. The Billboard magazine for August 26, 1922 referred to it as “a specially constructed auto truck that is fitted up with all the comforts of home”. The Billboard included a photo of the auto truck/trailer as did The Linking Ring for February of 1930.

The Linking Ring for February of 1930

In April of 1957 in The Linking Ring, magic historian and world renowned collector David Price submitted this story.

I had trouble finding an Emil Buckheim that matched the data Price had given. It turns out there was a typo as to the spelling of Zelmo’s real name. It was spelled Buchheim. I then found him on Find-A-Grave as Emil G Buchheim. He was born on April 27, 1871 in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, and he passed away on February 19, 1941 and was buried in his hometown of Sheboygan. He was 69 years of age.

One last thing about that trailer. The Linking Ring in May of 1939 had this amusing blurb. “Zelmo had a truck built like a Pullman, and knocked down the stoplight in Richmond, Ind., and was chased over into Ohio by the cops”. I guess Zelmo was always on the move!