Schulte: Penman of Performers Patter

The subject of this post is one George Frederick Schulte, a magician and author who created more humorous patter and one-liners than anyone of his time. This was long before Robert Orbin started turning out patter books. Schulte was born May 22, 1887 in Athens, Wisconsin. He lived there until 1899 when he moved to Chicago, which became his permanent home.

So popular a performer in the Windy City, Schulte was billed as, "Chicago's Most Popular Magician." His first appearance in the city came in 1900. Our subject had a very nice scaling card featuring his photo on the front, his name printed in red at an angle with "The Magician" printed beneath. It had the Deland back in blue.

In 1912, Schulte was presenting a Vaudeville magic act called "Magic As You Like It." I learned this when searching through my photo files and I came upon what I assumed was a postcard of the performer. Turning it over, however, I discovered it was actually part of an image from a larger photo that someone cut down. You can just see the edge of a table in the lower right and one must wonder what he was gesturing at. This was Schulte in his prime. 

He was best known for his series of soft cover booklets of humorous patter and one-liners. He published "Talks for Tricks" (1916); "Magical Monologues," (1919); "Patter Paragraphs," (1921); and "Words for Wizards," (1924). These booklets are prized by collectors. According to Magicpedia, his favorite trick was the Conradi Coffee and Milk effect which was published in Dorny's book Trix and Chatter.  

An auctioned "Words for Wizards" autographed by Schulte

Speaking of collecting, Schulte gathered an impressive amount of material including letters and scrapbooks and photos, many of which were stamped, "Schulte Collection." A number of these items went up for auction in recent years including on Haversat & Ewing Galleries, Potter & Potter, Swann Galleries, and the Christian Fechner auction. One auction included a letter from Houdini to Schulte thanking him for sending his most recent publication. 

Another letter came from Harlan Tarbell who provided Schulte with a complimentary copy of his Tarbell Course with the admonition not to let anyone know he'd done so or he would be overwhelmed with requests. 

Schulte also sold collectible magic at a time when magic collecting was barely in its infancy. He ran an ad in the May 1928 Linking Ring adverting "Old Programs" for sale. The dozen he offered included Thurston, Houdini, Blackstone, The Great Leon, Dunninger, Thorn and others. A buyer that month could have bought them all for $3.75. Sold today, these programs would be worth thousands of dollars. He even offered copies of old time magic dealer catalogs very cheaply. 

Sphinx ad from 1928. 

Noted historian Henry Ridgely Evans once wrote to Schulte complaining about the lack of interest in magic history. His letter noted that he (Evans) should probably just publish all of the articles that he contributed to The Sphinx in the form of a book, which he did some years later. 

He contributed funny lines and quirky patter to The Sphinx for decades, always under amusing titles like, "Funology ala Magic," "Patter from Merryland," "Magicalities," and many others. These short columns featured insightful philosphies on magic and theater as well as self-effacing comments on magic enthusiasts, many who billed themselves as "Great" but rarely were. 

In the fall of 1926, he was featured on the cover of The Linking Ring, and earlier in June 1917, on the cover of The Magic World, published in Philadelphia. He also appeared on the cover of The Osirian in June 1925. 

In 1910 in Chicago, The World's Master Magicians was formed and met in the showrooms of Halton, Janson & LeRoy. The club had about 25 members at best but most were very famous magicians. Members included: Laurant, Roterberg, Christianer, Ralph Read, Lockman, Gilbert, Tarbell and others. The onslaught of World War I caused the club to disband around 1915. It eventually became The Chicago Magician's Club. 

During World War I, Schulte performed with the famous touring entertainment troupe, the U.S. Navy "Jacks of All Trades." He also performed for troupes during World War II as well. Schulte died March 15, 1967, age 79 and was buried in Port Hudson Cemetery in East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana. 

The S.A.M. Match

Apologies for my recent absence from the blog but thanks to Jay Hunter and others for keeping the site fresh. I'm back with an interesting posting that falls in the general category of scaling cards although I'm certain that anyone who obtained a set of these cards would not scale them away into the audience. I speak of a special packet trick issued as a gift from Dal Sanders and his wife during his 2014 S.A.M. presidency. The set is shown below.

Shown are extremely well crafted playing cards featuring some of the more famous leaders of the S.A.M. as well as some well-known magicians. Featured are: Harry Kellar, Harry Houdini, Harlan Tarbell, Howard Thurston, Jay Marshall, and David Copperfield. The recipient gets a set in red and matching set in blue. The reverse side features the S.A.M. logo in the middle.

The packets allow the owner to do a trick based on Larry Becker's "Will The Cards Match?" from the award wining book Stunners Plus first published in 1992. Two spectators are given the packets of cards (one red - one blue) and then they will move cards from the top of their stack to the bottom, one for each letter in the sentence, "Great magicians Are in SAM." The order of that movement will be at the pleasure of audience members.

The effect starts with the performer going through the face up cards mentioning who each person is and their association with the SAM. On the membership cards that year (above) was the sentence "Great magicians are in SAM." Audience members are asked to decide which color card (or cards) will be moved from the top to the bottom of the stack, They can decide one red, one blue, two reds, one blue, or whatever alternating colors they wish. After the act of moving the cards is completed the top face down cards of each pile are turned over and they match. The next in line don't, nor do the bottom cards.

Once again the sentence is spelled and cards moved in any order. Again the top cards match. This continues until the last cards match. The effect involves a stack and is self-working. While clearly not scaling cards per se, I like them anyway and I've added them to the collection.

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.

Spoo-Kee-Ching

O.K., so here I go again, straying outside of the domain of scaling cards. This card is not so much a scaling card as it is an advertising piece because there is no playing card back on it. I guess then by rights it shouldn't be on this post. If the masses rise up and say, "This shall not pass!!" I will take it down. I still think it's a fun post though so here goes.

This involves an Indianapolis magician named Bert Servaas, an amateur who billed himself (politically incorrectly) as “Spoo-Kee-Ching” and who joined the unending ranks of Anglo magicians trying to portray Asian characters. He also performed straight magic. I first wrote about him in my book “Cornfields and Conjurors: Magic on the Indianapolis Stage.” Here is the card in discussion,

His full name was Baastean Hanus Servaas, and he was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan in 1889. His family moved to Indianapolis in the early 1900's and sometime around 1913 he helped found the city’s first magic organization, the Indiana Magic Fraternity. 

Spoo-Kee-Ching 

Servaas in 1922 from the Indiana Magic Fraternity (IMF)

His business card featured a photograph of him in costume and on the reverse, this unusual listing of effects he performed as part of his, “Program La Fun:” 

Hong-Kong Kee
Pekin Fire
Devo-Kiki-Thim

Merkan Fla
Glasso-Eep
Wato-Gono

Dicee-Monee
Balle-Sip

Lon-Rap 

Domee-Lido
Cigwet
Karto-Mor-Too

It’s clear that in his effort to appear Asian, he assigned nonsense titles to tricks involving fire, vanishing glasses of water, dice and money tricks, billiard ball effects, rope, dominoes, cigarettes and cards. At the age of 49 Servaas joined the Indiana Society of Magicians. According to his application, he received his early exposure to magic from Professor Ogden and Dr. E.S. Pierce, a medium. Apparently he was also a member of the Yogi Club of Michigan. 

Servaas in 1932 with magic apparatus 

Seen on his table are a Sliding Die Box, pack of playing cards, a set of Multiplying Bottles in sore need of paint, a Rapping Hand, a skull, and of course his Linking Rings.

He gave his first “boy wonder” show in 1902 at the Academy of Music in Kalamazoo before 1,000 people. His early schooling came at the Monnock Private School and he eventually attended the University of Michigan. His parents were from Holland. Although he did not provide any details, he noted on his application that he worked all the Houdini shows and knew Thurston for 22 years. When he wasn’t performing magic he worked in the engineering and sales department of the Sinclair Refining Company. He died October 1, 1957. I close this posting with an early image of Servaas and his family. 

Servaas with his two sons, Buert and William, wife Lela, and perhaps his older daughter Lela Jo Wiliams.

Tom Ewing