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Harry Houdini: New York
built 675 days ago
Mayer Samuel Weiss, Houdini's father, served as Rabbi in the Appleton community. His mother, Cecilia Steiner Weiss, was a homemaker. Neither parent spoke English, though both were fluent in Yiddish, German and Hungarian. As a result, the family was poor and at the age of eight, young Houdini went to work to help pay the bills. He sold newspapers and shined shoes until age12, when he left home in an effort to help support his parents. For a year, Houdini traveled the countryside, earning an honest living and sending money home as often as he could.
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Following his two-picture stint in Hollywood, Houdini returned to New York and started his own film production company called the "Houdini Picture Corporation." He produced and starred in two films, The Man From Beyond (1921) and Haldane of the Secret Service (1923). He ... started up his own film laboratory business called The Film Development Corporation (FDC), gambling on a new process for developing motion picture film. Houdini’s brother, Hardeen, left his own career as a magician and escape artist to run the company. Magician Harry Kellar was a major investor.[16]
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Houdini was a masterful performer on a most unconventional world stage and a genius at media manipulation and self-promotion. He reached the public through a variety of means, including the circus; under-water packing crate escapes; prison breakouts; manacled bridge jumps; upside-down straitjacket escapes; newspapers, magazines, and books; radio; silent films; and as a magician at the bedside of hospitalized children. Omnipresent, he transcended the individual venues of his time. Houdini compelled an international audience to enter his performance; as he broke through one barrier after another he liberated their imaginations with his own. He knew he could make many people in an audience think and feel as he chose. He knew the power of his art and he knew its danger.
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Young Harry was always fascinated by magic. Even though the family was quite poor, he would perform magic tricks he made up for the family. Later in his adolescence, he joined a circus and was known as Eric, Prince of the Air. At the young age of 17, in despair by poverty and limits set by society for Jews at the time, Harry told his family that he was going to be a performer named Houdini, christened after the famous French magician Houdin. By the age of 20, Houdini had been performing small acts and shows throughout New York. Houdini soon married and the couple joined a circus.
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Houdini ... held a patent for a style of diving suit. The innovation was granted U.S. Patent Number 1,370,316 on March 1, 1921. The improved construction of the suit was a direct result of Houdini's interest in underwater escapes. The patent reads: "The invention relates to deep sea diving suits or armors, and its object is to provide a new and improved diver's suite arranged to permit the diver, in case of danger for any cause whatever, to quickly divest himself of the suit while being submerged and to safely escape and reach the surface of the water. Another object is to enable the diver to put on or take off the suit without requiring assistance."
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Houdini opened at the New Opera House on Monday Evening, February 7th 1910. He was part of a long programme of songs, dances and comedic sketches, which all began around 8pm and lasted for almost two hours. The Opera House programme was under the direction of musical director Fred Hall, stage manager, James Bell and business manager Frederic Aydon who was the brother in law of Harry Rickards.
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