Master Eddie Abbott “The Wonder of the Nineteenth Century”

This post is about what is probably the youngest magician we have covered here on Propelled Pasteboards. He went by the name of Master Eddie Abbott, and his story is an interesting one. Eddie Abbott’s card is slightly oversized, is on heavy card stock, and is blank on the back. Whether it can be called a throw-out card is a matter of opinion.

 

Abbott’s card advertises an appearance at Girard’s Wonderland, which was often referred to as a curio hall.  It was in Buffalo, New York, and it was known for having some unusual acts in its day. This appeared in the Buffalo Evening News for April 27, 1898. A troupe of trained goats heads the bill!

There is basically nothing on young Master Abbott in the magic magazines that I have access to. He was written up however in H. J. Burlingame’s Leaves from Conjurers’ Scrap Books which was published in 1891. Gabe Fajuri included Abbott in his book on child magicians entitled Child Prestidigitators: Precocious Magicians: Wonders, Marvels, & Prodigies published in 2001. Both books have a brief history of Abbott, and mention the fact that Abbott was given much praise for his ability.

My first thought was, if Eddie Abbott was so good, why is there not more on him in the magic journals? Maybe it was because adult performers did not think he warranted the attention, or maybe it was just that there were not many magic magazines in the late eighteen hundreds. Looking at the newspapers of the time seems to confirm what Burlingame had to say about Eddie Abbott. In the following article, they called him “The Wonder of the Nineteenth Century”.

From the Santa Cruz Sentinel for September 17, 1890 and the Topeka Capital for June 23, 1892.

In May of 1889, The Times in Philadelphia said the six year old Eddie will perform at the Carncross Opera House and will be “performing some of the most difficult feats of the older illusionists”.  In October of that year in Carlisle Pennsylvania, this ad ran in The Sentinel newspaper.

Master Eddie was assisted by Prof. H. J. Abbott, who was his father. Also on this bill were Harry and Mildred Rouclere, very well-known magicians and mind readers of the era. Not bad company for young Master Abbott. Two months later, Abbott was performing at B. F. Keith’s Bijou in Philadelphia, and with him on the bill were Mr. and Mrs. Jerry Cohan. For those readers who enjoy the movie Yankee Doodle Dandy, you know that the Cohans were the parents of George M. Cohan, one of the most famous performers and song writers on Broadway in his day. Abbott was referred to as “the infant rival of Kellar and Herrmann”. Once again, Eddie was in very good company!

In January of 1893 Eddie Abbott is playing at Tony Pastor’s Theatre in New York. Tony Pastor was a legendary Vaudeville impresario. Pastor was known for giving the great Harry Houdini one of his big breaks in 1895, but Eddie played there first. Here Eddie is going by “The Only Boy Magician”.

 

It appears that once the twentieth century arrived, Eddie Abbott changed the type of performance that he gave, from that of a magician, to being billed as a “Monologue Comedian”. That was how he appeared at the Ninth and Arch Dime Museum on November 24, 1901 in Philadelphia. I can only assume that this was the same Eddie, as there is no more mention of him as a magician, and the venues seem of the same type for the Eddie Abbott listed. By May 10, 1908 in Washington D C, he was calling himself a “Character Monologist” at the Surprise Theatre on Pennsylvania Avenue. Since it looks as though Eddie was born around 1883, he would have been 25 and an adult at this time. The references to him start to disappear after this period, and I have not been able to discover what became of him.

One thing is for certain. Master Eddie Abbott really did make a mark as a child magician for a few years in the later part of the eighteen-hundreds. There was a lot more written about him in the newspapers than I had expected. Maybe he really was the rival of Kellar and Herrmann, and deserved the billing of “The Wonder of the Nineteenth Century”.

F. W. Thomas – The Story of Pajamas with Feet

When doing research on many of the long lost magicians of the past, you can never know where the journey is going to take you. This is one of those times.

I have this throw-out card for “Thomas Prestidigitator”. It is one of my favorites

Newmann’s European Novelties and Sensational Features!

C.A. Newmann (1880-1952), was one of America’s greatest hypnotists and mentalists. He humbly appeared as “Newmann the Great.” Here for the first, and probably last time, we feature a throwing card bearing his advertising.

 

Newmann first started performing hypnotism and mind-reading at age 13 billing himself as a “Boy Wonder.” He confined his work primarily to the mid- and upper-Midwest. Although he presented primarily mind-reading and related arts, he was not above offering magic illusions in his show. To publicize his show he frequently performed blindfold drives through the town where he was appearing. These were the days of horse and carriage, of course, and it must have been an amazing sight to see him racing through town while blindfolded.

As magic historians know, Newmann amassed a wonderful collection of magic and an extensive library. He boasted that it was the largest in America but the problem was that because of his touring and itinerant lifestyle, Newmann did not have anywhere to permanently display his entire library.

However he did once secure an empty store and for one brief period, had shelves built, and then filled them with books and rare manuscripts and adorned the walls and columns of the room with posters and broadsides. I have seen photographs of that temporary library and they are impressive.

His friend Howard Thurston acclaimed him one of the greatest of all mentalists. Magician, author, and magic columnist John Northern Hilliard was also amazed at Newmann's incredible feats, declaring him a true artist.

He even eventually ended up teaching classes in psychology at colleges in Minnesota and North Dakota. According to Magicpedia, as late as 1950, Newmann was still appearing in the major auditoriums in Montana and adjacent states. By that time he had been performing continuously before the public for over a half century.

Prior to his death, as well as afterward, Newmann’s library was scattered about. Some 1,000 volumes were given to the library at the University of Minnesota. Collector David Price acquired Newmann’s posters for his Egyptian Hall museum and several of Newmann's scrapbooks are in the Carl W. Jones collection at Princeton University. 

My friend, the late Frank Dailey and I spent considerable time looking over the two scrapbooks at Princeton’s Firestone Library and I was able to photograph a great number of pages. In fact, I lectured on the scrapbooks at a Magic Collectors’ Association weekend back in the 1980s. Newmann died in Minneapolis and his funeral services were conducted by Carl Waring Jones.

And so, why is this Newmann scaling card so rare? Is it one-of-a-kind? Well, yes – sort of. The card was acquired in a larger collection of scaling cards and the previous owner occasionally created scaling cards by pasting some image or advertising on a regular playing card. Such is the case with this card. Running a fingernail across the face of the card, it is clear that he glued on a piece of Newmann promotional material.

Still, it’s a fun card and image and I’ll not be tossing it out. So, fellow enthusiasts, did Newmann have a real throwing card? If so, post it on our site. Here are a sample of some images from Newmann’s scrapbooks at Princeton. You will see that for most performers Newmann wrote up a short item of interest. Every description was flattering to the performer. One scrapbook was devoted to magicians, the other to mentalists. Enjoy!

Tom Ewing 

 

 

--  Postscript by Judge Brown --

Tom, I too have a "sort of" Newmann throwing card.  Like you, I got this from an avid throwing card collector.  It's an odd piece -- about the size of a playing card, with two rounded corners and two square corners.  And it does seem to have been cut from something else-- and not too carefully.    But the typescript "With Compliments...." and address have clearly been added with a typewriter, to turn it into an effective business card.  So my presumption is that this piece was created by Newmann himself.

I had always assumed that the improvised nature of this piece showed Newmann -- who was once a major star -- having hit hard times.  He was, after all, hand typing his cards!  But at the last NEMCA conference in 2016, I met a collector-historian who specializes in studying Newmann.  He assured me, with a laugh, that I was wrong.   The card I own, he advised, does not show economic desperation.  Rather, he told me that the piece was typical for Newmann, whom he described as extraordinarily eccentric and parsimonious.