The Ponzo Illusion "Throw-Away Card"

Ad from the Sphinx, 1909

In a separate post, I wrote about the "Phantom Base Ball" illusion card offered to readers by the M. Lewis Company in the Sphinx in 1908.   About a year later, M. Lewis Company sprang for a second display ad in the Sphinx, offering "Magicians' Throw-Away Cards."  That itself is interesting, as the term "Throw-Away Card" adds to the list of monikers applied to throw-out cards, scaling cards, throwing cards. etc.   This ad featured a more cerebral optical illusion which requires the viewer to make an observation and then "verify its correctness by measurement."  Also, this card was cheaper, advertised as the "Biggest Bargain ever offered," sold for $1 per thousand, one-third the price of M. Lewis's earlier offering.

The illusion featured is a very early variant of the famed "Ponzo Illusion," an optical illusion created by Italian psychologist and artist Mario Ponzo (1882-1960). Interestingly, the first published example of this illusion is generally cited as 1911, two years after this ad appeared.

Given that this ad, based on my research, only ran a single time, my chances of finding a card with this particular back were as scant as finding the "Phantom Base Ball" card.  Once again, I had underestimated the power of the most important magicians' throwing card blog in the known universe. And, just like with the "Phantom Base Ball" card, co-contributor Gary Frank came to the rescue again.  Searching his extensive holdings, Gary managed to conjure up this fabulous exemplar issued  on behalf of A. Coke Cecil:

Though Gary Frank has done so elsewhere, I had not researched the career of A. Coke Cecil, "Entertainer DeLuxe," as there seemed little need to, since he provided his entire biography on the back of this throw-away card.  His day job, impressively enough, was as a licensed pharmacist, operating Cecil's Drug Stores in High Point, North Carolina.  He liked to travel, and performed as a magician, ventriloquist and hypnotist, offering shows for school, churches, clubs, banquets and lodges.  

And we know one other thing: A. Coke Cecil was one of few magicians -- and it seemed possibly the only magician -- to order Ponzi Illusion back cards from The M. Lewis Company.   

But wait -- faster than you can say "Abracadabra," our friend Jay Hunter weighed in with two additional Ponzi illusion cards from his collection:

 One is for the performing duo of Chester & Walters, the second photographic card showcases Walter "W.C." Jeans.    The duo appears to have included George R. Chester, a Philadelphia-area magician and ventriloquist.  Walter Cerretta Jeans (1877-1942), born Walter Janes in Birmingham, England, was a noted magic inventor famed for creating the "Mirror Tunnel" principle.  Houdini hailed Jeans as"the greatest unknown man I have ever met."  He is sometimes credited as the inventor of the color changing knife.  Will Goldston devoted a chapter to him in his famed locked book of magic, while Peter Warlock wrote an entire biography of Jeans.  

Phantom Base Ball: "The Finest Magicians' Advertisement Ever Known"

Ad from the Sphinx, 1908

One evening, while searching for something completely different in AskAlexander, I came across this wonderful advertisement from the Sphinx published in 1908.  In that ad, a Philadephia firm called the M. Lewis Company, exhorting magicians to purchase "the finest magicians' advertisement ever known."  Hyperbole aside, M. Lewis was attempting to entice practitioners to acquire, at the cost of $3 per thousand, blank faced playing cards bearing this interesting illusion-back design.  The card offered the possibility of spinning the card to make the "Phantom Base Ball," printed slightly off center, appear to jump to the center of the disc.


Since the "Phantom Base Ball" ad appeared, to my knowledge, only once in a single magazine, and I had never seen such a card, my hopes for finding one (if one ever existed) were slim.  Of course, in discounting these chances, I once again underestimated the remarkable collection curated by, in the aggregate, the contributors to this blog and their many kind friends and associates.   This time it was Gary Frank to the rescue, searching his extensive holdings to produce a gorgeous exemplar:

While M. Field's claim that the illusion back is "the finest ever known" cannot be fairly evaluated, it is certainly a fine, striking back. Like many throwout cards, the vivid, intricate back design is of a far higher quality than the face.  The card promotes Marque, a magician about whom we've been able to uncover nothing, other than to note that like many traveling performers of the period, Marque used The Billboard as a permanent mailing address.


I'm not sure what to make about the manufacturer's concerns about "Bugheads" claiming to have invented this illusion, or the biblical references that follow, other than to conclude that, even in 1908, the illusion was nothing new.  But we certainly can speak to its staying power.

The illusion featured here is one of many "spinning disk" illusions that were and remain popular ways to distort visual perception.  Similar designs can often be found on grafted onto spinning tops or yo-yos.

While there are all kinds of variations of this illusion, a very similar design appeared on the face of several throwing cards, including one for Manfred Scholtyssek as well as another card for the magician Topper Martyn.  Manfred Scholtyssek (1927-2008), publisher of “Zauberkunst”, the magic magazine of the former GDR, which Scholtyssek produced after political change in Germany. The Martyn card, seen here, has an aviator back which may have been produced by Haines House of Cards. The Scholtyssek card came as part of the collection of the Swedish Magic Archive.

Package for Tenyo Moonspinner Illusion

While discussing this card with enthusiast Lee Asher, he pointed out the similarity of this illusion to that incorporated into Tenyo's Moonspinner paddle illusion.