Oakland Magic Circle

So right off the bat, I’ll admit that this current pasteboard was likely not propelled but rather given away as a souvenir of the Seventh Annual Dinner Dance of the Oakland Magic Circle. The affair occurred at the Hotel Alameda on September 10, 1932.

The front of the card features the logo of the Circle and lists past presidents beginning in 1925-26 when Professor El-Tab held the post. The reverse is the Theodore Deland back copyrighted 1913.

Over 100 magicians attended the event including a number from the Golden Gate Assembly #2 of the Society of American Magicians in San Francisco. The master of ceremonies was founding member and past President Lloyd Jones (1930-31). Jones was proprietor of Magic Limited in Oakland, California from around 1941 until his death. He published several in-house magazines including: The Bat, Bat, Jr., S.O.B., Jr. and finally Bat Droppings. He also wrote book reviews for Genii Magazine under a column titled "Light From the Lamp" for many years and later in Tops. He also served as a national president of the Society of American Magicians.

The show that evening was presented by local members including:

· Colonel Grant – Radio Artist on station KFI

· Robert S. Bailey – Londonderry Wizard

· K. Kelly

· Barkann Rosinoff

· Dr. Loren J. Ennis

· L. Caro Miller

The effects ranged from Sun and Moon, Spider Illusion, Phantom Tube Productions, billiard ball manipulations and concluded with a vibroharp selection. Outgoing President W.D. Allstrand was presented with the Circle’s Past President Jewel and the affair ended at 1 A.M.

The previous month, the Circle had celebrated “Zamloch Night,” in honor of Professor Anton F. Zamloch then in his 84th year. He was already an honorary member of the Circle for his record of trouping his magic show over fifty years in the U.S. Mexico, the Hawaiian Islands, and elsewhere. He started out in magic in 1869 and was one of the early “gift show” magicians. After retiring from long distance tours he confined his presentations to vaudeville. A magic show was presented in his honor and it was noted that in Burlingame’s 1891 book, “Leaves from Conjurors’ Scrap Books,” Zamloch was described as, “The leading conjuror of the Pacific Coast.

A month after the Seventh Annual Dinner and Dance, Zamloch passed away October 29th after suffering a heart attack. He was in excellent health at the time although advanced in years.

The photo above shows Zamloch with two of his stage effects, a table which raps in response to questions from the audience and a drum which does likewise. Not only were they worked on stage, they were also taken into the audience and placed in the aisles yet the replies came just the same.

The Oakland Magic Circle remains an active club to this day and meets at Bjornson Hall, 2258 MacArthur Blvd., Oakland, California on the first Tuesday of every month, except July. Their website was last updated in 2016. The list of past presidents below features some very talented full-time magicians and amateurs. From noted book collector, dealer, author and magic historian Byron Walker (current Secretary and Past President of the Circle), I learned that the president in 2017 was Nathaniel Segal. The president in 2018 is Doug Eakin.

OMC Past Presidents
1. Prof. El-Tab 1925
2. Arthur F. Bull 1926
3. Alfred Lamb 1927
4. Lewis Miller 1928
5. Claude Burke 1929
6. Lloyd E. Jones 1930
7. William D. Alstrand 1931
8. W. C. McCulloch 1932
9. Dr. L. J. Ennis 1933
10. R. S. Bailey 1934
11. James H. Muir 1935
12. Caro A. Miller 1936
13. Bert F. Hansen 1937
14. Clarence Cain 1938
15. R. S. Glover 1939
16. Robert J. Stull 1940
17. Lloyd E. Jones 1941
18. Ben R. Olsen 1942
19. Murray Rosenthal 1943
20. Jimmy Eyster 1944
21. Fred Braue 1945
22. Lawrence Hunter 1946
23. Almow A. Thompson 1947
24. John B. Lewis 1948
25. Larry C. Keller 1949
26. Larry C. Keller 1950
27. William Fleming 1951
28. Earl F. Wheeler 1952
29. William Fleming 1953
30. Bert F. Pratt 1954
31. Charles M. Chambers 1955
32. Charles C. Conrad 1956
33. Charles C. Conrad 1957
34. Marvin N. Burger 1958
35. Jimmy Embree 1959
36. Larry Oliveira 1960
37. Victor Merga 1961
38. Ralph M. Larion 1962
39. Price Burlingame 1963
40. Ralph J. Brown 1964
41. Lloyd E. Jones 1965
42. Kenneth B. Bull 1966
43. Kenneth B. Bull 1967
44. Roger Mycroft 1968
45. Peter A. Biro 1970
46. Peter A. Biro 1971
47. John P. Mac Namara 1972
48. Peter A. Biro 1973
49. Kenneth B. Bull 1974
50. Hal Dipboye 1975
51. Hal Dipboye/B. Huston 1976
52. Owen Barber 1977
53. Rene Castillo 1978
54. Richard Fleming 1979
55. Richard Fleming 1980
56. Lloyd E. Jones 1981
57. Mel Wittich 1982
58. Mike Palmer 1983
59. Cas Boxley/M. Palmer 1984
60. James Hamilton 1985
61. Larry Nelson 1986
62. Jeff Vines 1987
63. Dave Berry 1988
64. Dave Berry 1989
65. Fred Casto 1990
66. Fred Casto 1991
67. Tom Cutts 1992
68. Tom Cutts 1993
69. Tom Cutts 1994
70. Tom Cutts 1995
71. Dave Berry 1996
72. Dave Berry/Joe Green 1997
73. Tom Cutts 1998
74. Rich Stewman 1999
75. James Hamilton 2000
76. Dale Chung 2001
77. Dale Chung 2002
78. Dale Chung 2003
79. Peter Winch 2004
80. Bill Austen 2005
81. James Hamilton 2006
83. David F. Fry 2007
84. Scott Alcalay 2008
85. Scott Alcalay 2009
86. Scott Alcalay 2010
87. Michael Della Penna 2011
88.Scott Alcalay 2012
89. Scott Alcalay 2013
90. Byron Walker 2014
91. Michael Della Penna 2015
92. Mark Tarses 2016

Puzzling Pierson, the Wisdom of Petronius and the Yale Divinity School

Having long ago acquired one of Puzzling Pierson's throwout cards, pictured here, I featured it on ThrowingCard.com, without much information of value.  However, access to increasingly more powerful research tools, as well as some old-fashioned shoe leather, permits me to tell you a great deal more about this charming piece, an unglazed card with square corners and an optical illusion Deland back.  The back bears a copyright date of 1907, making this a century old piece of magicana.  The face bears a Latin phrase, attributed to Petronius, "Mundus Vult Decipi Decipiatur," meaning "The world wants to be deceived, so let it be deceived" and also graces Martinka magic tokens of this era.   The face design really packs it in: the unique imp-devil character, hand with wand, linking rings, appearing bird cage and fabulous font make for an exquisite example of throwing card art.  (Another variant of this card -- which I've seen but do not own -- features a steamboat back.)

Well before his first appearance in magical literature,  George Pierson, a/k/a Guy H. "Puzzling" Pierson (b. circa 1879) is mentioned in the quarterly journal of the Yale University Divinity School, which describes him as a prestidigitator who entertained students on St. Patrick's Day, 1911.  It is in the same publication that we learn of his day job -- for the previous ten years, he had served as assistant superintendent of the Divinity School's buildings.  Less than a week later, the Yale Divinity News reports, a Professor Macintosh offered a sleight of hand demonstration “in imitation of Pierson” as part of a “Faculty Stunt Night.”  By 1917, Pierson began reporting New Haven's magical happenings in the Sphinx with an occasional feature called "Pierson's Paragraph."  In 1923, he helped organize this effort by forming a magic society headquartered at the famed Petrie Lewis company.

In 1947, The Sphinx ran a wonderful autobiographical piece about this performer.   In it, Pierson describes his early influences in magic, including a seminal trip to Martinka's, a friendship with its proprietor, and his acquisition of a copy of Professor Hoffmann's Modern Magic. "In my day we could not buy or hear anything about magic, especially in small towns," he reflected.   "We started with a chair round with a brass tack stuck in the end for a wand and a deck of cards,a few tin cups made by the local plumber and a home-made table with music rack legs. But suddenly the Great Mysto Company sprang up in New Haven and we began to get some good magic."  In 1949, he wrote a reminiscence about traveling medicine shows and the opportunities they offered magicians for The Sphinx, which elicited published comments by Augustus Rapp a few months later, and in 1950, he did a similar reflection on early travelling magic shows.   The last reference I can find about him was a performance mentioned in M*U*M in 1958.



Not satisfied that I had unearthed everything I could about Puzzling Pierson, I packed one of his cards with me on an early 2017 trip to Ray Goulet's Magic Art Studio, figuring that, on a well-attended Saturday, one of the assembled experts on New England's magic history could tell me something more about him. Well, I didn't find a subject matter expert, but among the many treasures there, I found something equally interesting,  Perched near a Spirit Clock, I spotted a cabinet-style card with a photo of Pierson.   In the photo, he's posing next to a small tripod magic table covered with vintage magic equipment, including a large ghostly chronometer. The Clock in the picture appears to be a different one than the one in the shop, unless, as one of the wags present noted, Pierson made the numbers change to Roman numerals from beyond the grave!

A second Pierson variant from Gary Frank's collection.

For anyone who might be interested, I have a duplicate Puzzling Pierson card in my collection which I'd be happy to trade for something of similar vintage.

Theodore DeLand's Got Your Back!

Deland's "Watch the Dice, 6 or 7," on the backs of throwout for J.W. Wilson, Puzzling Pierson and Lightner

As part of our continuing study of throwing cards, we have often stressed the importance of examining a card's back to provide added insight as to it provenance, manufacture, and approximate age. And if you look a enough magicians' cards, it will not be long before you notice one or more with this intriguing design, produced by Theodore DeLand, an eclectic, prolific magic card manufacturer in 1907. It's called "Watch the Dice, 6 or 7," and it's a terrific negative space illusion: Rotate the card 180 degrees and the number of dice in the stack appears to change.




Another unusual aspect of these cards is the manner in which they were created.  Unlike the various cards we've discussed which were sold as blanks, such as the Roterberg Stock Card and the Bamberg Magic Card, or cards that were professionally printed on both sides, to create these backs, DeLand sold printing blocks to allow magicians to create them on their own. I was fortunate enough to be able to add one of these rare printings blocks for the "6 or 7" back to my collection.   That block, seen here with a Puzzling Pierson card back, is in beautiful condition, and I suspect it was never really used.  It bears the emblem of the S.A.M. embedded in the design.

Gary Frank was able to provide me with one of the ad cards that DeLand used to sell these printing blocks.  The "Advertise Yourself" copy was printed on the face of playing cards with printed images of the three backs for which they were available.  Price: three printing blocks for $1!  (I paid much, much more for mine, even when adjusted for inflation.)  One of those three designs, obviously, was the "6 or 7" back.  In addition, I believe a second one was the "Dollar Deck" back, seen below as well as on the reverse of the promotional card used by McDonald Birch.  The third may have been the Daisy Deck back, though we have been unable to locate a throwing card with that particular design.

Jay Hunter was able to turn up something else: The M. Lewis Company, the work of which will be discussed in another post, advertised the DeLand "6 or 7" printing plate in the Sphinx in 1907.  Interestingly, as seen in the ad reproduced here, Lewis sold them for $1 each, offered with or without the S.A.M. emblem engraved in the circles in the design.  Lewis suggests having the corners rounded like a playing card, or square like a business card, and notes that it had a "large supply on hand."

Jay also kindly prepared an array of cards sporting the "6 or 7" back, printed in four different colors, both with and without the S.A.M. emblem as well as with rounded and square corners:

So who was Deland?  Well, according to Magicpedia, "Theodore DeLand (1873-1931) created the phenomenon of packet tricks between 1906 and 1915, during which time he marketed almost 100 tricks using gimmicked cards and decks, many of his own unique creation. DeLand was a clerk at the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia and died in an insane asylum in Norristown, Pennsylvania."   That snippet hardly captures DeLand's unusual story; for many years, Richard Kaufman has been working on a biography, DeLand: Mystery and Madness, which is expected to be released soon.

And while DeLand did not have a throwing card, many of his decks and effects included signature aces, which are quite interesting.   Several are seen below, which Mr. Kaufman helped me identify.

Ace of Spades from original Deland Dollar Deck
(later printed by S.S. Adams)

Ace of Spades from Deland's "Twister" trick

Ace/Three from a DeLand effect called "Pickitout"

Senator Clarke Crandall

Clarke Crandall was born on April 23, 1907. In 1947, Clarke participated in the Society of American Magicians convention in Chicago. This was one of the first times audiences had the opportunity to enjoy his dead-pan expressions, droll patter, comic thoughts, and his whole act fit nicely in his banjo case (oh, there was no banjo). At one point of his life while he was living in Chicago, he was working as a stock hand possibly as a buyer of cattle. It was said magician Johnny Paul approached Clarke in the 1950’s and offered Clarke a job as a bartender/entertainer.

McDonald Birch

Having just released my new book, “Birch the Master Magician: The story of McDonald and Mabel Birch,” it seems fitting that I do a little post on his scaling card. It is of the “good luck” variety and features the back designed by the legendary trick card genius Theodore Deland.