Jon Racherbaumer products: page 1

From the Preface:

Elucidations of a classic card trick: The Biddle Trick

The basic plot is fairly straightforward: A card is selected and in the process of determining its identity it is winnowed down to five possibilities. Then, in a surprising act of differentiation, the selection disappears from this five–card packet and reappears elsewhere. In most cases, the selection ends up face up in the middle of a spread deck. This trick has been variously named but ultimately it was christened "The Biddle Trick", named after Elmer Biddle who published the trick in Genii magazine in 1947. It marks the first appearance of the well-known...

This manuscript is an exploration of the origin and evolution of one of the most dependable, commercial, and semiautomatic card tricks extant. Even its name is unusual and memorable - "Further Than That"

• INTRODUCTION
• FURTHER THAN THAT / Stewart James
• FURTHER THAN FURTHER THAN THAT / Harry Lorayne
• FURTHER THAN THAT / J. W. Sarles
• A LITTLE FURTHER / Darwin Ortiz
• THREE-DIMENSIONAL FURTHER THAN THAT / Cushing Strout
• STROUT FELLOW / Allan Slaight
• A Poker Demonstration
• A POYGRAPHICAL POLLOOZA / Jon Racherbaumer
• TAKING IT TOO FAR?
• MUCH FURTHER THAN THAT / Al Thatcher
• TAKING FURTHER THAN THAT TOO FAR / Jon Racherbaumer
• THIS...

• LEITMOTIFS
  • Copycat Cards
  • Rashomonian Universal Card
  • Counting a Conclave
• LOCUS POCUS
  • Mine Finds Yours
  • A Narrow Margin
  • Bubkus Divination
  • No-Frills Invisible Toss
• PUZZLETS
  • Changling Sandwich
  • Another Challenge
  • Easy O. Henry
  • Recliner Mind Reader
  • Either-Oracle

A retrospective look at Dai Vernon's Five-Card Mental Force.

• Introduction
• The Prototypal Version From Early Vernon
• A Woolgather's Aside
• My Skirmish with the Five-Card Mental Force
• 30 Years Passed
• Five Card Mental Farce / David Acer
• Max on Five-Card Mental Force / Max Maven
• Outtings
• Rescuing the Five-Card Mental Force / Allan Slaight
• The Ultra Effect / Paul Rylander
• Dai-Cipher / Phil Goldstein
• I Have It / Edward Marlo
• Psyboards / Tom Frame
• Indisputably Predictable / Jon Racherbaumer
• Post Mortem

This is an interesting study of the X-Force and variations thereof only the way Jon Racherbaumer can do it. The X-Force is the simplest force that every magician has learned to do at one point in their life. Jon dissects the X-Force or Criss-Cross Force and then puts it back together in different and new ways. This is fodder for those that want to go into the fine and nuanced details of performing this force.

• Introduction
• Drilling Down
• A Little History of the X-Force
• Layered-Cross-Cut Force
• First Method
• Second Method – Layered Double-Cross
• Two Cuts Are Better Than One
• Three Free...

This manuscript is ancestrally related to Criss-­Crossings: Unleashing the X-­Force insofar as it also deals with cutting cards. In this case, it deals with "cuts" and "turnovers."

This type of combinatorial maneuver began with Henry Christ's forcing technique that he developed in the early 1920s. He originally developed six variations but he only published the fifth one in Ted Annemann's book, Sh-­h-­h It's a Secret, calling it "The 203rd Force." It subsequently has been referred to as the Christ Force and it spawned many versions and applications.

Because of the cut-­?turnover-­?and-­?replacement mechanics, the Christ Force is often confused with Ed Balducci's...

The presentations in this manuscript are homage to the nonmanipulative, off-the-cuff approach taken by Chan Canasta.

The material is stuff Jon has published elsewhere, mostly piecemeal. The thrust of the ebook, though, is how these effects are PRESENTED in a CANASTA WAY. This then is its organizing principle. It is basically designed to demonstrate Canasta's approach. The material is easy and commercial.

• INTRODUCTION
• KISS MET
• OPTICUNNING CUTTING
• SOMATIQUE
• TACITRIX
• VOCALYSIS
• THE JOKER EATS YOUR MIND
• UNTOUCHABLY YOURS

1st edition 2016, 25 pages.

Effect: Four blue-back cards are shown. One at a time each card - the Ace, Two, Three, and Four of Diamonds - turn face up. Their backs then change to red and then one at a time the backs change back to blue. Finally, the cards change to four Fours of Diamonds.

1st edition 1975 in Paul Diamond Presents Magical Masterpieces #2, updated 2018, PDF 15 pages.

The contents of this series, for the most part, emphasize the history of effects and ideas. There are effects and methods in some of them, though.

From the introduction:

The contents of this series, for the most part, emphasize the history of effects and ideas. There are effects and methods in some of them, though.

• Proem
• About this Issue
• Excerpts Taken from a Photocopy of a Letter Written from Ed Whitford to Edward Marlo
• A Marlo Letter to Persi Diaconis
• Racherbaumer Letter to Charlie Miller
• Shall We Ask All The King's Horses and Men?
• Correspondence Between Jon Racherbaumer and Stephen Minch Regarding the So-Called Hide-Out Move
• Appendix: Paul Curry's "Out of this World"; a new version / Ed Whitford

1st edition 2014, PDF 30 pages....

Brother John Hamman's effects are conducive to creating strong, synergistic routines. That is, many of his individual effects, including its discrete parts, can be combined to form powerful presentations. The following nine-phase is a good example.

Holistic Hamman was originally part of an unpublished book titled Real-World Cardstuff: Synergistic Schemes.

Requisites: A regular deck of cards.

1st edition 2000, 2nd edition 2013, 15 pages.

This ebook explores variations on the Universal Card theme, is part of the Yod series. Universal Card is a classic card plot in which a single card (like the joker) transforms to one at a time to match each of the selected cards. Originally posed by Karl Fulves in his Pallbearers Review, where he used the term "Universal Card", a name that caught on.

• The Hypnotic Card
• Marlo's Favorite Universal
• Universal Solutions
• Universal IV
• Tout's Universal
• The Chameleon Card
• Universal Combine
• Hypno-Versal Way
• Cervon's Universals
• More Universals
• Not Quite Ambiguous Universal
• Full-Circle Universal
• Open-Faced...

Robert Walker was a unicycling, high-school student. Looking five years younger than he was, he was a dyed-in-the-wool card guy tutored in Marlovian ways. He was also a precocious writer-creator, obsessed with false counts and packet tricks. He spent many hours "twisting the night away," taking voluminous notes, and developing new methods and approaches. His first mini-treatise dissected a marketed packet trick by Larry West ("Wild, Wild West") which he passed onto Jon Racherbaumer to publish. It became the second installment of the loose-leaf Avatar, printed on pink paper and unadorned by illustrations...

Several decades ago Bob Hummer invented a new principle which caused a short-lived stir among cardicians. The effect was called "The Mindreader's Dream". It sounds too good to be true: A spectator merely thinks of a card and performs a few, unseen dealing procedures with a deck of cards. The magician briefly scans the cards, consults a "dream book," and then names the mentally selected card.

Racherbaumer collects in this ebook several improvements and variations on this basic principle, including the original Hummer method. The contributors are an eclectic group of specialists including Justin Higham,...

Racherbaumer thinks that the greatest sleight of the 20th-century is the Double Lift Turnover. If we consider the scores of different ways to lift, turn, toss, propel, flip, rotate, and spin two cards as one—not to mention ways of getting ready, gripping, insuring alignment, and unloading, then this is certainly a pretty valid move to pick as the most important sleight. At the minimum Racherbaumer has me convinced.

In this ebook Jon collects ways to finesse the move and also traces its historical development. I am pretty sure you are using probably several times a double lift turnover somewhere...

Can a magic trick be too perfect? Too impossible? Well, opinions differ. Some of the most prominent minds in magic disagree. Reading these essays will help you form your own personal opinion on this fundamental question. The theorists are:

• Rick Johnsson
• Jon Racherbaumer
• Tomas Blomberg
• Magic Christian
• Robert Neale
• Bob Fitch
• Jamy Ian Swiss
• John Carney
• Michael Close
• Darwin Ortiz
• Harry Lorayne
• Martin Lewis
• Patrick Watson
• Simon Aronson

1st edition 2008; 61 pages....

These are Jon Racherbaumer's contributions to the New Pentagram Magazine from 1979.

• Surprising the Princess: ESP card effect with a surprise ending that will whack you down.
• Simplex Mental Reverse
• Magical Separate Colors
• King-Currence
• Still Another Lie Detector

articles first appeared 1979; 14 pages

The 'Real-Gone Aces' problem is a side branch of the classic four Ace trick. In the classic you place four aces on the table, then put three indifferent cards on each ace, and magically all aces end up in the same pile. In the 'Real-Gone Aces' plot which was originated by Marlo, after correspondence with Neal Elias, three aces vanish to join an isolated leader ace.

If this plot appeals to you then you will learn a good number of variations on it in this ebook. And I am sure, if you are the kind of guy or gal who enjoys reading such detail filled descriptions of finesses and fine points, then...

"The Filet Mignon of Ace Assemblies." - Ed Marlo

Olram Aces is a tribute to the genius of Edward Marlo which shows how Marlo's lifetime work steadily influenced Jon.

The presentation makes maximum use of the gaffs and the Aces in the non-leader packets disappear in different ways that are successively stronger. It has been audience-tested on laypersons and magicians.

In typical Racherbaumer style you also get a history on the Ace Assembly plot starting with The Discoverie of Witchcraft.

1st edition 2009; 10 pages.

This routine was inspired by a magician’s challenge that it was unfeasible and unadvisable to perform several Ace Assemblies in a row for lay audiences. In fact, he argued that most Four-Ace Assemblies are neither entertaining nor interesting to layman because they are essentially magician’s exercises. This synergism is an exercise based on an opposite view; however, a key lies in presentation. The performer ostensibly is relating a bit of history regarding how a card trick was performed in the 16th century. In the course of the explanation, he acts as a proxy for skeptical spectators who...

Karl Fulves published in Pallbearers Review an unsolved card problem wherein an Ace having the same suit of a previously selected card changes into that selection. The puzzling aspect of this problem was this: The four Aces are shown, mixed, and tabled face down. Nobody knows the order or disposition of the Aces, not even the spectator.

Jon describes eight solutions each with its own trade-offs, strengths and weaknesses.

Jon concludes his manuscript with:

Gene Castillon presented this lecture at a meeting of Ring #27 IBM in the early 70’s, calling it "The Double Undercut Routine". This routine was designed to feature only one sleight or move—the Double Undercut. To prove the versatility and usefulness of this one move, Gene incorporated into one routine a series of different effects all accomplished by this one move. As you will discover, there are magic appearances, a simple sandwich prediction, several Ace tricks, a poker deal, and a simple triumph trick.

When recently asked to lecture again, Gene pulled out his old lecture notes and was surprised...

Regarding changes, sexual and otherwise.

This is an unusual one, but Jon Racherbaumer always weaves an interesting yarn meshing history with magic and card tricks with culture. In this short but nevertheless interesting ebook Jon starts out with a historic event that in the 1950s made huge waves. Today it would hardly make the news. In 1952 a man by the name of George William Jorgensen Jr. had a number of operations to change his sex and became Christine Jorgensen. Edward Marlo exploited this event and created a card trick called "Christine", and with Christine, he meant Christine Jorgensen. This is...