The Last Greatest Magician in the World

by Jim Steinmeyer

  The suit was settled a year later for $1,000. Tampa could continue using the name, and also utilize the illusions he still had in his possession.

  Another mind reader, Rajah Raiboid, produced a contract from March 1936, when Thurston was recovering in Miami Beach. Presumably he was arranging a partnership with Thurston for that fall. Thurston would supply the illusions and the title would read, “Thurston the Magician with Rajah Raiboid.” Raiboid wrote to Billboard, claiming that he would be taking out the show with the billing, “Successor to The Great Howard Thurston.” But the estate ignored his claim and, without any of Thurston’s props, Raiboid had no show.

  IN THE END, there was very little money. The Beechhurst property had been lost to foreclosure. The Florida land had been ruined in a hurricane. Most of the investments had already dissolved, but there was still stock left from the Canadian gold mines, just over $20,000 in “good assets.” Thurston owed back taxes for the last three years of income, and taxes on the ruined Florida property. Paula received just over $8,000.

  As the Thurston estate was settled, Jane discovered that she had been named the beneficiary of a small insurance policy, and that props and scenery of the Thurston show were now in her name. Working with George and Herman Hanson, she learned the intricate choreography of her father’s famous Floating Ball and Spirit Cabinet routines, intending to sign a new act with producers Fanchon and Marco. But as the project dragged on, Jane became impatient. She was tired of the association with the illusion show, and embarrassed by the Thurston family squabbles.

  PAULA THURSTON remarried in 1938. Around that time, a magician and an admirer of Thurston’s, John Booth, met her at a nightclub. It was apparent to Booth, from her slurred speech, that she had continued to overindulge in drinking, despite her promises. She died in 1943.

  DURING HIS TOUR with Thurston, John Northern Hilliard had been carrying his memorial from city to city. He had gathered together many of the best tricks from hundreds of magicians, compiling them into a bulging manuscript for a projected book. Through the efforts of Thurston, and then editor Jean Hugard and publisher Carl Jones, it was published as Greater Magic in 1938, a book of more than a thousand pages and one of the most enlightened texts on the practice of magic.

  DANTE HAD a long, successful career in magic. He returned to the United States in 1939, upon the outbreak of the Second World War, with his assistant, an elegant Australian showgirl named Moi-Yo Miller. His magical review, Sim Sala Bim, appeared on Broadway at the Morosco Theater in 1940, where critics praised the old-fashioned fun of his magic. Dante continued touring across America, also appearing in fairgrounds, on television, and occasionally in films. He retired to a ranch in the San Fernando Valley, outside of Los Angeles, and died there in 1955.

  HARRY BLACKSTONE became one of America’s favorite magicians. In 1933, he acquired the apparatus for the levitation that Harry Kellar had been building in Los Angeles, purchasing it from Kellar’s heirs. In his show, he billed it as the Levitation of Princess Karnac, presenting it with the same grandeur as Kellar and Thurston. The Dancing Handkerchief and the Girl and the Rabbit—borrowed from Thurston—became trademarks in Blackstone’s show. Harry Blackstone continued touring until 1955, and made occasional appearances on television. He died in Hollywood in 1965.

  GEORGE WHITE did his best to guard the Thurston props in Long Island, and even obtained a job with the lumberyard near where they were stored. In 1941, when Dante returned to the United States, George joined the company. Every night, Dante proudly introduced him on stage—as the great magician Howard Thurston’s chief assistant. George traveled back to Los Angeles with Dante and assisted, off camera, during the filming of A Haunting We Will Go, a Laurel and Hardy feature that costarred Dante.

  In the 1950s, George returned to New York and took a job as a porter at a Brooklyn glass company. He was a loyal, hardworking employee, and seldom spoke of his days in show business. He died in Brooklyn in 1962.

  THE PROPERTIES of the Thurston show had seemed priceless in the hands of the famous magician. But just like illusions, the actual apparatus, in storage, had no special enchantment. They were big, heavy boxes and crates, bits of wood and steel in need of paint, repairs, and rehearsals. A wand is worthless without a magician, and the same analogy applied to Thurston’s carloads of equipment.

  Harry and Rae Thurston sold the Mysteries of India show to a young, charismatic performer named Will Rock, who used some of the illusions in his show. Jane, in turn, sold Rock some of her father’s props. But in the late ’30s, she neglected to pay the storage bill at the Beechhurst warehouse. A magician named Gerald Heaney purchased the contents of the warehouse for the back storage, paying a mere $380, and arranged with Jane to have it shipped to his barn, near Oshkosh, Wisconsin. The cases and boxes moldered for decades. The barn was finally emptied in the 1980s, when some of the illusions were destroyed and other mementos were sold to magic collectors.

  HARRY THURSTON died in Miami, Florida, on May 6, 1941. After a brief tour of Mysteries of India in 1935, he never performed, but acquaintances felt that he’d always considered himself a magician, and talked proudly of his work on the stage. He was buried at the family plot in Columbus, Ohio.

  JANE THURSTON worked for several years with Isham Jones as a performer and songwriter. Her songs were composed under the name Gene Willadsen: Willadsen was used to deliberately put her years as Jane Thurston behind her; Gene was used because ASCAP, the songwriter’s union, was restricted to men. One of her most successful songs was a hit from 1942 titled “My Best to You.” Later Jane was employed by PanAm in Miami, working in operations. She also learned to fly. She married a flight engineer named Guy Lynn, and had two children. After Lynn’s death she married Dick Shepard, a retired navy captain. Sometime in the 1960s, she proudly became Jane Thurston again, gradually contacting her old friends and fans in magic, visiting magic conventions, and writing about the years with her father’s show. All of the unhappiness was forgotten, all of the good times were recalled with warm good humor. Once, when a friend asked her about her “birth father,” she offered a conspiratorial response. “I think it was Thurston. I mean, my mother was a showgirl at the time, and Howard Thurston was a big star. Who is to say that something didn’t happen?” At the end of her life, she didn’t mention the name Willadsen, nor did friends hear the song title “My Best to You,” as this would have led them to her real name.

  Jane’s happy memories of the Thurston show usually centered around the cast. She didn’t focus on the tricks or the theaters, but remembered almost everyone—assistants, technicians, carpenters—with fondness. One day she paged through a Thurston scrapbook that had been assembled by a magic collector. “Oh, there’s Jackie! She was so kind to me when I joined the show.... And Fernanda, she was beautiful in the Levitation. Oh, Herman and Lillian! Dear Herman!” She turned the page and found a formal portrait of Harry Thurston. Jane stared at it for a long moment. “He was a pig.” Then she moved to the next page to find another friendly face.

  Jane Thurston Shepard died in 1994.

  TODAY THE PUBLIC has forgotten the name Thurston. That’s a shame. Ironically, when most people imagine a great magician of the 1920s, they summon the name Houdini. But few understood what Houdini’s show really looked like—gazing at a curtained cabinet and waiting for him to escape, or listening to him harangue the local spiritualist mediums. It was Thurston who presented the magic show of our collective memories, the bright, fast miracles that complimented the 1920s—the floating princesses, the painted boxes suspended over the heads of the audience, and the gunshots that caused handfuls of fluttering showgirls to disappear.

  Houdini’s legacy was Houdini. After his death, scarcely a handful of performers managed to achieve success as “escape artists.” The category existed solely for Houdini. Without the force of his personality, there was no special artistry in escaping.

  But Thurston’s legacy was much more complicated. Just as he inherited the tradition of the gr
eat magic show from his predecessors, it continued after Thurston, in the performances of Dante and Blackstone.

  Of course, fashions and entertainment trends have changed. There’s no need for a World’s Greatest Magician in a world saturated with media opportunities, when fame is the result of instantaneous recognition rather than a lifetime of careful choices. But the grand touring magic shows have continued with new generations of performers, like Harry Blackstone, Jr., Doug Henning, and David Copperfield—and in Las Vegas, where these spectacular shows were exemplified by performers like Siegfried and Roy, and Lance Burton.

  It’s often been proclaimed that magic is dead, that the good old days are over and modern audiences are too sophisticated to watch a magician. But the fantasy of magic has always been at the root of any entertainment—and the promise of seeing it live, in front of our eyes, continues to be irresistible. “The love of mystery” was a part of our human condition, an unchanging trait that Thurston recognized in audiences throughout his career. That’s why another young, charismatic wonder-worker, surprising us with a combination of new feats and old classics, can always find an audience.

  When Theo Bamberg was touring with Thurston, he met with Karl Germain, the artistic Lyceum magician. Thurston’s impressive show had put Bamberg in a philosophical mood, and as the conversation turned to the changing tastes of the audience, Bamberg asked if Germain ever doubted the future of magic. “Of course not,” Germain answered quickly. “Magic will never die so long as children are born.”

  If we’ve forgotten one particular magician, standing in the spotlight with his face turned up toward the balcony, it’s because he performed his magic so effortlessly, so masterfully. For many years afterward, audiences fondly remembered the exhilaration of Thurston’s marvels. The spell that he left behind sparkled in the memories of countless American children.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND SOURCES

  Photographs, letters, manuscripts, and memorabilia from Thurston can be found in important collections devoted to the subject of magic. My research was a happy process, an opportunity to visit with many friends in this field and examine many wonderful libraries and storehouses of information. I was extremely grateful for the help I received and the generous offers of information, manuscript copies, or time to peruse these collections. Generations after his death, many historically minded magicians are fans of Thurston’s memory and were encouraging and enthusiastic about his story.

  First, thanks to my friend Mike Caveney and his Egyptian Hall Collection in Pasadena, California, for his continual help and inspiring advice. George and Sandy Daily’s exquisite magic collection included many important Thurston artifacts. Kenneth Klosterman was generous with time and enthusiastic in his support. Rory Feldman has amassed an astonishing collection of Thurston material, and his help was essential to this project.

  I am also grateful for the help of William Kalush and the Conjuring Arts Research Center. George Goebel was especially gracious, sharing his Thurston artifacts and his perspective. William Self, who as a boy knew Thurston, was interested and encouraging, helping with an early draft of the manuscript.

  And sincere thanks to the following collectors, magicians, or interested parties: Robert Bazell, Jim Berg and Fred Baisch (Twin Cities Magic), David Copperfield, Claude Crowe, Noel Daniel, Diego Domingo, Tom Ewing, Gabe Fajuri, Gary Frank, Steve Freeman, John Gaughan, Joseph Hanosek, Jay Hunter, Ricky Jay, Richard Kaufman, Jim Klodzen, Dennis Laub, Bill Maloney, Tom O’Lenick, Robert E. Olson, Michael Perovich, William V. Rauscher, Ben Robinson, Dale Salwak, Mike Sanderson, Laurie Schaim, David Sigafus, Peter Weis, and Wayne Wissner.

  I recall the help provided by my late friends Werner Dornfield, Walter Gibson, John A. McKinven, Jay Marshall, Vic Torsberg, and Orson Welles.

  It was a big adventure, but it only became a book because of the clever insights of my agent, Jim Fitzgerald, and my editor at Tarcher/Penguin, Mitch Horowitz, who somehow instantly understood the appeal of a story about a forgotten magician and then made the story even better with their suggestions.

  And finally, thanks to my wife, Frankie Glass, who is knowledgeable about the subject and a good judge of how to tell a story. Her love and support were important parts of this formula. Frankie is the critic whom I respect most of all.

  INTRODUCTION: “I WOULDN’T DECEIVE YOU...”

  I’ve previously written about Thurston in my book Hiding the Elephant (Carroll and Graf, 2005), principally related to his interactions with Harry Kellar and Guy Jarrett, and in The Glorious Deception (Carroll and Graf, 2005), regarding his interactions with William Robinson. Harlan Tarbell’s remarks are quoted from The Tarbell Course in Magic, Volume 2, published originally in manuscript (Tarbell Systems, 1927) and then in book (Louis Tannen, 1942). Al Jolson sang “My Mammy” in the famous 1927 Warner Bros. talking film The Jazz Singer, and his spoken lyrics have been incorporated into most versions. The biographical information is from Herbert G. Goldman’s Jolson: The Legend Comes to Life (Oxford University Press, 1988). Edmund Wilson’s quote is taken from his essay “John Mulholland and the Art of Illusion,” from Wilson’s book, Classics and Commercials: A Literary Chronicle of the Forties (Macmillan, 1950).

  CHAPTER ONE. “A BIT OF FUN”

  My account of Houdini’s visit to the show is based on a letter from Houdini to Kellar, reporting on the event, December 7, 1920, now in the collection of David Copperfield. Thurston’s presentation was in transition at this time; he was using a committee of assistants on stage. To dramatize the account, I’ve constructed his routine using lines of patter from levitation scripts recorded in Howard Thurston’s Illusion Show Work Book, Volume 1 (Magical Publications, 1991) and Volume 2 (Magical Publications, 1992), both edited by Maurine Christopher, with additional material by this author. Thurston’s backstage ritual has been described by his daughter, Jane Thurston, in Howard Thurston and Jane Thurston Shepard’s Our Life of Magic (Phil Temple, 1989) and by Fred Keating, “Howard Thurston, Merchant of Magic,” The Sphinx, March 1952.

  I was fortunate to know Orson Welles, who recounted his memories of Thurston’s show. Gresham’s account is from “The Voice of the Master,” The Linking Ring, April 1956. I wrote about the Levitation in Hiding the Elephant. Dale Carnegie is quoted from How to Win Friends and Influence People (Simon and Schuster, 1937). Walter Gibson shared his impressions with me in a 1980 interview.

  CHAPTER TWO. “CREATION”

  I had the opportunity to examine Thurston letters, and letters related to his time at Mount Hermon, which are in his personal file at Mount Hermon Academy, Northfield, Massachusetts. These included Round’s letters about the boy and Thurston’s letters pleading for an opportunity. During my day in the library, the Mount Hermon archivist, Peter Weis, helpfully negotiated these files, grade books, photographs, and school newspapers. He insightfully interpreted Thurston’s schooling in conjunction with Dwight Moody’s intentions and could finally pass judgment on the prevailing myth: Howard Thurston did not study for the ministry.

  Information on Dooly’s church is from the New York Times, May 25, 1885. Additional information on Dunn’s House of Refuge and William Round is taken from articles in the New York Times, January 15, 1883, January 14, 1889, April 21, 1891, October 31, 1892, October 26, 1894, and Round’s obituary, January 6, 1906. Professor Hoffmann’s Modern Magic (Routledge and Sons, 1877) has been in print since its original publication. Howard Franklin Thurston’s early life is reconstructed from U.S. census records, Thurston’s autobiography, My Life of Magic (Dorrance and Company, 1929), and Our Life of Magic. Thurston’s autobiography includes many romantic elements of his childhood travels. Other elements are taken from Thurston’s autobiographical screenplay outline, “Jimmy,” in the collection of Jim Berg and Fred Baisch at Twin Cities Magic in St. Paul, Minnesota. For example, in “Jimmy,” Thurston explains that it was Reddy who bought Jimmy the book on magic. The family problems are also suggested in “Jimmy.” Alvin Richard Plough’s article “Thurston, the Man,” from
The Linking Ring, July 1942, recounts Thurston watching the Ink to Water Trick.

  Henry Sawyer’s remarks are recorded in the Mount Hermon Academy archives. I’m especially grateful to Peter Weis for the Moody’s philosophy and how it was represented in the founding of Mount Hermon. Thurston’s academic and athletic records are from his files as well as accounts in the school paper, The Hermonite. The Christmas party is reported in The Hermonite, January 4, 1891.

  CHAPTER THREE. “THE MOTH AND THE FLAME”

  Information regarding Thurston’s time at Burham Industrial Farm is from My Life of Magic and from letters in the Thurston files at Mount Hermon Academy. I was also grateful for insights from Philip Kaminstein, archivist at Berkshire Farm (formerly Burnham). George Daily has a document, with Thurston’s signature, from his days at Burnham.

  I’ve reconstructed Herrmann’s show from newspaper accounts and reviews that season. I previously wrote about Herrmann in The Glorious Deception, and am grateful for the perspective of James Hamilton, a researcher on the Herrmann family. The Boston critic is quoted in H. J. Moulton, Houdini’s History of Magic in Boston, 1792-1915 (Meyer-books, 1983).

  Thurston’s account and early recollections are taken from My Life of Magic and from his St. Mark’s Church speech (May 6, 1928), which was recorded in manuscript and is in the Twin Cities Magic collection. I’ve also used the newspaper article “When Thurston Spieled Freaks,” by William E. Sage, the Cleveland Leader, October 30, 1912. Robert-Houdin’s mistake is from the English edition of his autobiography, The Memoirs of Robert-Houdin (Dover, 1964). Thurston family information is from the U.S. census.