Houdini and Raymond: Revealing Letters

When looking back at Houdini and the other great magicians of his era we have to piece together the nature of their personalities from written exchanges and reminiscences of others. I have become fascinated by this exchange between Houdini and The Great Raymond (Maurice Raymond), in letters which are part of the collections of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts (in the Billy Rose Theater Collection). It turns out the Raymond began performing a milk can escape and it irked Houdini who had created the trick and heralded it as a main feature of his act. Here Houdini writes Raymond telling him to refrain from performing the effect and Raymond sends back a snarky reply (which prompts a response from Houdini). [See the images of the letters, below.]

These letters caused me to read more about Maurice Raymond and I came across a long article in the August 1928 issue of the magic magazine The Sphinx in which David Bamberg outlines a remarkable tale of mistreatment by Raymond for whom Bamberg was working as an assistant and technician. Bamberg travelled from Europe to South America after he was recruited by Raymond. After much hard work organizing and building Raymond's act, Bamberg was basically abused - at least financially - after Raymond refused to pay his salary. Beyond that Raymond presented Bamberg with a bill for travel and accomodations, even though Bamberg only travelled to South America because he was promised a job by Raymond. I'm sure Raymond too had complexities to his personality, but it is remarkable that such a detailed and frank depiction of his transgressions emerged in the leading magic magazine of the day. Who knows what transpired that wasn't covered in the news? If you find this intriguing, take a look at the Sphinx article which can be found via Ask Alexander and other digital sources [the article has much more intriguing information, although I'm sorry to say it also includes an offensive racial term used by Bamberg in the course of his description of the situation].

In any event, enjoy these three letters which provide revealing perspectives on the competitive nature of magic in the early part of the 20th century and the personalities of two prominent conjurors.