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Games of Skill and Conjuringunknown![]() Instructions for games, magic tricks, model building, giving shows, and more.
| $7 to wish list | |
Gambling in its Infancy and ProgressJonathan H. Green![]() A dissuasive to the young against games of chance.
| $8 to wish list | |
Judge's Library No. 79Judge Publishing Co.![]() Judge's Library was a satirical periodical published in the USA from 1881 to 1947. It was a rival magazine to Puck founded among others by cartoonist James Albert Wales, dime novels publisher Frank Tousey and author George H. Jessop. This issue No. 79 of Judge is all about poker. It provides a wonderful glimpse into how ubiquitous poker was in the US that such a successful periodical would dedicate an entire issue to it. Also noteworthy, particularly for Erdnase scholars, is the fact that pretty much all the funny dialogs in this issue are in various national slang and ebonic. Thus the few lines... | $8 to wish listPDF_facsimile | |
The Hand-Book of SwindlingDouglas William Jerrold![]() A humoristic manual about swindling, how to become a successful swindler, as well as why it is such a good thing - featuring the late captain Barabbas Whitefeather.
| $7 to wish list | |
How To Do Chemical TricksA. Anderson![]() Containing over one hundred highly amusing and instructive tricks with chemicals.
| $10 to wish list | |
Scientific Mysteriesunknown![]() A collection of simple and effective experiments illustrating chemical, physical, and optical wonders. Published by the Offices of the Chemist and Druggist. 42 Cannon Street, London.
| $10 to wish list | |
How to do Sleight of HandA. Anderson![]() Containing over fifty of the latest and best tricks used by magicians. Also containing the secret of Second Sight. Excerpt from the introduction: In Egypt, Greece and Rome, sleight of hand, accompanied by the supposed answers of the gods produced by ventriloquism, enabled the priest to keep the ignorant nations in subjection to their will. In the Middle Ages, too, a great deal of what happened under the influence of Black Magic was simply the cunning of professors of sleight of hand, sometimes mixed up with a few chemical tricks. ... One thing the young conjurer must remember, and... | $10 to wish list | |
Faro ExposedAlfred Trumble![]() At one point it was believed that only one copy of this book existed. This and other myths are addressed in the introduction by Frank Lehmann, who has studied this book in detail. The book exposes various ways in which the game of Faro was crooked. It was a very popular betting game in the United States and usually was rigged in one way or another. It was published by Richard K. Fox, the proprietor of the Police Gazette.
| $19.50 to wish list | |
Card and Conjuring Tricks and Book of Riddlesunknown![]()
| $6 to wish list | |
The New Conjuror's Museum and Magical Magazineunknown![]() For magicians most interesting is a section with arithmetic tricks and another with legerdemain featuring effects such as letting a pen-knife jump out of a goblet, some card tricks, coin tricks, and chemical tricks.
| $12 to wish list | |
The Life of Mason Long the Converted GamblerMason Long![]() Being a record of his experience as a white slave; a soldier in the Union Army; a professional gambler; a patron of the turf; a variety theater and minstrel manager; and, finally, a convert to the Murphy Cause, and to the Gospel of Christ. This book is an illustration of this paragraph by S.W. Erdnase: Hazard at play carries sensations that once enjoyed are rarely forgotten. The winnings are known as "pretty money," and it is generally spent as freely as water. The average professional who is successful at his own game will, with the sublimest unconcern, stake his money on that of another's, though... | $10 to wish list | |
The Life of a ShowmanDavid Prince Miller![]() This is a wonderful account of a traveling showman's trials and tribulations in England and Scotland during the middle of the 19th century. Among other things, he was a conjurer. While this is not a book of tricks, one coin trick is explained as part of one story of his life. But much more interesting are the descriptions of various scams and the modus operandi of various ways to defraud the public by traveling hucksters the author encountered. The operation of the thimble rig is explained in detail. It is an account of how traveling showmen struggled essentially their entire life to make... | $10 to wish list | |
Jack PotsCollin MacKenzie![]() For anybody interested in Erdnase, this poker story compilation should be of interest because many poker stories are from Chicago. It was published in 1887 which means it likely overlaps somewhat with the active time of Erdnase. We are not saying you will find a story featuring Erdnase. But such poker stories, even if they are often exaggerated or purely fictional, do provide one with some sense of the times of Erdnase. In particular, it is educational to compare the stories with the ones from Eugene Edwards' Jack Pots. There isn't any significant overlap, however one aspect is noticeably different. Eugene... | $12 to wish list | |
The Game of Draw PokerJohn W. Keller![]() A fairly detailed work on the rules and variations of draw poker. Also includes some advice on how to play the game successfully. This work includes Robert C. Schenck's rules for draw poker.
| $8 to wish list | |
Draw: rules for playing pokerRobert C. Schenck | $5 to wish list | |
Gambling ExposedJonathan H. Green![]() Full exposition of all the various arts, mysteries, and miseries of gambling. It is a complete exposure, of the different and various ways of deception and cheating in all the numerous games played, such as Faro, Two, Three, and Four-Handed Poker, Shuffling Cards, Roulette and Rolling Faro, Vingt-Un, Brag, Euchre, Game of Boston, All Fours, Cribbage, Whist, Dice, Stealing out Cards, Palming, Playing by Signs, Marking Cards, Backgammon, Solitaire, Playing Three against One, Spring Tables, Spring Boxes, Pulleys, Ingenuity of Gamblers, Card Manufactories, Lotteries, then modes of drawing and... | $12 to wish list | |
Games and Tricks with CardsJonathan H. Green![]() You will find here card tricks, cheating exposes, card games, and gambling stories. A later expanded version of this book was published under the title Gamblers' Tricks With Cards Exposed and Explained.
| $8 to wish list | |
The Magic Oracle or Conjuror's Guideunknown![]() This work reveals a mix of card tricks and other small magic effects, science tricks, and in particular chemical stunts and experiments. It also covers the making of fireworks in some depth including how to make an artificial volcano. Interesting was that even in 1850 it was clear that experimenting with mercury (quicksilver) was risky as the following quote from the book shows: Feats performed through the medium of quicksilver should be executed with the greatest caution, as there is some danger attending them. (Obviously, nobody should be casually experimenting with mercury. It is... | $10 to wish list | |
The Supernatural?Lionel A. Weatherly & John Nevil Maskelyne![]() In this work, Lionel Weatherly inspects and investigates stories of mirages, prophetic dreams and the experiences of historical figures like Joan of Arc. Illusionist John Nevil Maskelyne, who exposed the fraud of a number of spiritualists including the Davenport Brothers, and who created several famous illusions which are still being performed today, examines the truth behind a number of famous Eastern magical illusions. Maskelyne also scrutinizes mediumistic fraud, questioning the credibility of figures like D. D. Home and Madame Blavatsky, in an entertaining and carefully argued investigation... | ★★★★★ $12 to wish list | |
After Dinner Tricks and Puzzles with your Seal Brand Coffeeunknown | $10 to wish listPDF_facsimile | |
Amateur MagicianJ. Dazley Theobald![]() From the preface: The object of this work is to thoroughly explain to the Amateur Magician the various subterfuges which are made use of by Professional Conjurors to mystify their audiences, and to afford such instructions as shall enable any person to give a private performance. That there is plenty of room for a work on the subject of magical secrets and contrivances is evident by the few books that are in circulation, and even some of these are of but slight value, as they give graphic descriptions of what tricks are performed, while but scant and imperfect explanations of how they are... | ★★★★★ $8 to wish list | |
Magic and its MysteriesJ. Dazley Theobald![]() From the preface: In the following pages it has been my aim to give such plain and practical instructions, as shall enable the amateur conjurer to perform with confidence and success. In the limits of a book of this size, it is impossible to describe more than one-tenth of the various tricks in modern magic in vogue at the present day, and I have therefore carefully excluded the larger professional apparatus, such as are used only on the public stage, believing that what is most needed is a sound treatise on drawing-room magic, and I trust in the following pages the reader will find such... | ★★★★★ $10 to wish list | |
The Real New London Conjuror or the Art of Legerdemainunknown![]() Showing the various ways of performing tricks by sleight-of-hand on dice, cards, etc., together with many surprising deceptions.
| $6 to wish list | |
The Art of Modern Conjuring Magic and IllusionsHenri Garenne![]() From the introduction: I have written this work not as an exposure of the art of Conjuring and Magic, but simply to act as a guide for amateurs and young beginners; therefore I shall enumerate many tricks and illusions that my young friends can perform at home amongst their numerous friends. In addition to this, I shall also enumerate those tricks and illusions which demand a larger amount of room, and also require specially constructed apparatus; such tricks the amateur would do well not to attempt, as they are only suitable for performance on a stage. I shall give a description of most... | ★★★★★ $8 to wish list | |
The Study of Trance Muscle ReadingGeorge Miller Beard![]() From the preface: The following narratives and analyses of facts relating to the investigation of important and interesting phenomena of the nervous system are published in the belief that they will be new, in whole or in part, to the majority of neurologists and practitioners, both in Europe and America. Some of the facts connected with the detailed history of muscle-reading are here put on permanent record for the first time, and have been obtained partly from memory and partly from public and private documents in my possession. It is interesting and incredible that these phenomena... | $8 to wish list | |
The Involuntary LifeGeorge Miller Beard![]() The 'involuntary life' would today be described as trance or as a hypnotic state. Beard writes: Every human being lives two lives, the voluntary, in which he acts more or less under the control of the will, and the involuntary, in which he acts automatically, and over which the will has but a limited power, or none at all. The acts of both the body and the mind, may be involuntary as will as voluntary, and in both body and mind, the two lives are constantly blended. However, he was a skeptic when it came to the popular practices and explanations of these phenomena by the means of animal... | $5 to wish list | |
Physiology of Mind-ReadingGeorge Miller Beard![]() The type of 'mind-reading' George Beard means here is what we today call muscle-reading, which is a term that Beard himself coined. Beard describes several experiments he conducted and describes very clearly the physiology of muscle-reading, and that it is an involuntary muscle contraction that has nothing to do with animal magnetism or thought transference. 1st edition 1877; PDF 10 pages. | $5 to wish list | |
The History of Playing CardsEd. S. Taylor![]() Includes chapters on conjuring, fortune-telling and card-sharping.
| ★★★★★ $10 to wish list | |
Wyman's Hand-Book of MagicJohn Wyman![]() This work covers a lot of ground, from various parlor tricks, chemical tricks, card tricks, to a section on two person codes, and a section on artifices of cardsharks.
| ★★★★★ $8 to wish list | |
The Lives of the ConjurorsThomas Frost![]() This is considered one of the best early histories of magic. From the Preface: The present volume closes the series of works on the entertaining classes which I contemplated when writing Circus Life and Circus Celebrities, the greater part of which was written before The Old Showmen and the Old London Fairs was commenced, though the publication of the latter work preceded that of the former. In embracing within the present volume the lives of the conjurors of every period and every country, while the record of shows and showmen is confined to London and the suburban districts, (which may now be said to embrace a circle of twenty miles across,) and that of circuses... | $8 to wish list | |
The Old Showmen and Old London FairsThomas Frost![]() A detailed chronology of places, dates and performers of fairs in and around London. We learn mostly of theatrical productions of various kinds including pantomime and dances, and menageries exhibiting exotic animals, and less so of tumbling and acrobats, juggling, balancing and the like. It includes some coverage of conjurers including Fawkes, Pinchbeck, Breslaw and others. There is some overlap of stories from Circus Life and Circus Celebrities because some performers and operators were active in both venues.
| $5 to wish list | |
Circus Life and Circus CelebritiesThomas Frost![]() A history of the circus in Britain during the 19th century. One chapter deals with America, another with circus slang. Perhaps most interesting are the recollections of a gymnast and how he made it into the circus. From the Preface: But of the circus artistes - the riders, the clowns, the acrobats, the gymnasts, - what do we know? How many are there, unconnected with the sawdust, who can say that they have known a member of that strange race? Charles Dickens, who was perhaps as well acquainted with the physiology of the less known sections of society as any man of his day, whetted public... | $5 to wish list | |
Isn't It Wonderful?Charles Bertram![]() A history of magic interwoven with Charles Bertram's recollections. From the introduction: The profession of conjuring, if not the most ancient, is certainly one of the oldest professions in the world, and, before commencing my account of the efforts made by a humble professor of the art, I trust that the reader may be interested by a short sketch of its history. Without this, it is possible that he might receive a book relating to the conjurer's art with a shrug of the shoulders. But conjuring, if it has now drifted down to the level of mere entertainment, has played its part in the history... | $5 to wish list | |
Herrmann the MagicianHardin Jasper Burlingame![]() From the preface: Having devoted a number of years to the inventing, manufacturing and sale of many of the most popular magical apparatus made in this country, I now present to the reader, biographies of the two great conjurers known to the world under the names of Carl and Alexander Herrmann, both equally famous in their specialties. The main portion of the book is devoted to clear, compact and illustrated descriptions of the best tricks performed by the two Herrmanns, whom I unite under the appellation of Herrmann the Magician, and by other celebrated performers, such as Cazeneuve, Kellar, Vanek, Heller, Samuels,... | ★★★★★ $6 to wish list | |
Parlor Tricks with CardsWiljalba Frikell![]() The subtitle reads: Containing explanations of all the tricks and deceptions with playing cards. Tricks with cards performed by skillful manipulation and sleight of hand; by the aid of memory, mental calculation, and the peculiar arrangement of the cards; by the aid of confederacy and sheer audacity and tricks performed by the aid of ingenious apparatus and prepared cards. The whole illustrated, and made plain and easy. The first section of this book is identical with the card section in The Secret Out.
| $10 to wish list | |
The ExpositorWilliam Frederick Pinchbeck![]() A series of letters, between an unidentified friend and his correspondent (William Frederick Pinchbeck) comprising of how to train a pig, invisible lady and acoustic temple, philosophical swan, penetrating spy glasses, several magic tricks, such as how to catch a bullet, and reflections on ventriloquism. This book includes the first known description of the "Eight Kings" card stack.
| $6 to wish list | |
Lorento's Wizard's GuideLorento![]() This is a fairly typical magic book from the 19th century. It mixes magic tricks and illusions with science experiments. Due to the fact that back then many did not have a basic understanding of physics and chemistry, many of these exhibitions of science appeared like magic.
| $5 to wish list | |
Magicians Own BookWiljalba Frikell![]() The authorship of this book is not entirely clear, but Frikell is a likely author of at least good parts of the book. However, most likely it is a compilation of material from different sources with potentially a number of editors and compilers. Some of the other names associated with this book are H.L. Williams, George Arnold, Frank Cahill, and John Wyman, Jr. The book covers not only magic tricks of various kinds, but also a lot of what we would call today "kitchen table top experiments" in fields ranging from mechanical and chemical to optical, math and others. It also features a section... | ★★★★★ $10 to wish list | |
The Secrets of Stage ConjuringJean Eugene Robert-Houdin & Professor Hoffmann![]() Translated by Professor Hoffmann.
| ★★★★★ $5 to wish list | |
The Black Art or Magic Made Easyunknown![]()
| ★★★★★ $5 to wish list | |
Tricks with Cards: A Complete Manual of Card ConjuringProfessor Hoffmann![]() A complete manual of card conjuring. This is not identical to the card sections in Hoffmann's other books such as Modern Magic etc. But this book has been released in sections under the titles Card Tricks With Apparatus and Card Tricks Without Apparatus since 1893. It appears Hoffmann was not too happy about breaking it up into parts.
| ★★★★★ $15 to wish list |