This is not a magic trick but a carnival game, a con game, where the operator can decide if you should win or not. Everything looks fair and above board, but there is simply no chance for the mark to win. It looks so innocent, a ball-chain loop, put out on the table in a figure eight. One loop in the eight catches your finger the other does not. You have to find the one that catches your finger. Only problem is that you will never find it if the operator so decides.
This game is sometimes called Loopy Loop, Figure Eight, the Chain Swindle, or Pricking the Garter. You will find in this ebook several well honed routines with patter and moves to fully control the chain.
This publication was part of the Supreme 'Know-How' Series, edited and written by Will Ayling. It was the follow up to the famous Teach-In Series written by Lewis Ganson after Ganson died. (We have all the Teach-Ins available as ebooks.)
1st edition 1983; original 44 pages; PDF 48 pages.
If you are just as captivated by this swindle as we are, then you might want to seek out other information on the endless chain:
- Loopy Loop by George Blake, 1949, 23 pages.
- Chain-Trickery by P. Cinimod, 1978, 6 pages.
- Chain Station by P. Cinimod.
- The Chain Gang by Mark DeSouza, 2000, (45 min) VHS.
- Johnny Thompson does the George Blake version of the endless chain on volume 2 of his Commercial Classics of Magic released by L&L Publishing.
(Bibliographical information provided by Joel Muroff.)
- Foreword
- History
- Rex Taylor's routine for The Endless Chain
- A Magical Opening
- Fast and Loose
- Figure of Eight
- Laying out the chain with one finger
- Kettle/Ganson routine
- The Beer Crate Eight
- Albert Verity Release
- Alf Goodwin's Loop Variation
- Drink Can Release
- Two novel moves
- - KNOT OFF THE LOOP
- - THE RING OFF THE LOOP
- Triple Circle Routine
- Spectator's Choice Climax
- Patter Routine for the Triple Circle Routine
word count: 10087 which is equivalent to 40 standard pages of text
