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| An early throwout card for the wizard better known as Ricky Jay |
Inspired by my recent post about Ricky Jay et al., Tom Ewing took a deep dive into his collection, emerging with this gem from early in the magician's career. The "Tricky Ricky" scaling card sports the name "Richard Jay Potash", the legal and original name of the master of card scaling who would eventually become world famous under his stage name Ricky Jay. Based on my knowledge of his career, buttressed by some recent research I conducted on the use of letters and area codes for telephone numbers (more on that in an upcoming series of posts), I would posit that the card dates to the late 1960s. The image appears to bear some edge tearing -- whether this is simply from age and handling, or evidence of propulsion by the world record-holding Mr. Jay may have to be left to our imagination. This piece is likely extremely rare and valuable, as similar ephemera (such as early business cards for the performer known as David Copperfield) often attract the interest of collectors.
