The Houdini Podcast

 

The Houdini Podcast is a new project using the existing episodes from The Magic Detective Podcast that are on Houdini and creating its own playlist. Eventually, I may take these various episodes and pull the featured audio and add new commentary for an actual separate podcast. But for now, you can listen to 30 plus episodes on Houdini and folks that had connections to him. 

The best way to get to the podcast is go to TheHoudiniPodcast.com and you will see the list. I have tried to put episodes in a timeline of when they happened, not when the episodes appeared. 

Any future episode of the Magic Detective Podcast that features Houdini will also go directly into the Houdini Podcast. What can you expect going forward? Margery the Medium, Houdini in Various Locations, Houdini In the Movies, And interviews with authors, collectors, and historians!

Theodore Weiss - The Boxer

While working on my podcast episode 119 on Theo Dash Hardeen, I stumbled upon an article that appeared in the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader on June 28, 1928. The article mentions how Hardeen had boxed in that very city 30 years earlier. I had never heard of that. I knew Houdini had a little bit to do with boxing, amateur as it was. Here now was an example of Theo boxing. This would have been the time period between when he stopped working in the Brothers Houdini and before he went to Europe to tour as Hardeen, 1895-1899 time frame.

He would not have gone by the name Hardeen, because it hadn't even been created yet. What he went by I am not sure. But clearly the reporter knew exactly who he was, remembering him vividly. 

The photo at the top of the page, also got me thinking. We see a number of people in this imagine, among them on the far lower left is Leonard Hicks, a protege of Houdini. And the upper right is Hardeen. But standing next to Hicks is Willie Ritchie, a light weight prize fighter. This is not the first example of Hardeen or Houdini for that matter in the company of a boxing champ. 

Below is the article from the newspaper!

An interesting side note, a relative of Hardeen's, his great grandnephew is also a boxer. https://www.wildabouthoudini.com/2016/08/chris-hardeen-in-ring.html

Houdini's Library by Eric Colleary Featured This Week

 

Dr Eric Colleary, curator of Performing Arts at the Harry Ransom Center in Austin Texas was my guest on episode 118 of the Magic Detective Podcast. Eric spoke about his upcoming book and the exhibit of the same name, Houdini's Library which is running until Jan 24, 2027. 

It was a very informative talk. He gave us the history of Houdini's collections, where they went to, who ended up with them, how some items ended up in places that maybe they shouldn't have. There was more here than I expected. Eric even recalled some names I didn't immediately  remember, one in particular Henry Evans who went by the stage name Evanion. You can read more about Evanion here, or on Episode 33 of my podcast. Which is not to be confused with Henry Ridgely Evans, who we also spoke about but who is an entirely different individual. 

Houdini loved his library. It was massive. One thing I love about this talk was Eric said Houdini didnt just collect these books and things, but he also went through them, looked at the items, read the books. His library was extremely valuable to him and highly cherished. This is documented in various letters that Houdini wrote.

During this episode you will also hear about a mysterious Houdini Bookcase, which is different from the one that was in the Houdini home on 278 and is now in the Copperfield collection. 

You can hear the podcast episode by clicking this link.

Now, on September 17th at 6pm central, Eric Colleary will be speaking at the Harry Ransom Center on his book and doing a reading from the book as well. This is being live streamed on youtube for anyone interested in viewing it.  Click below for the link on September 17th.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGOl5Q_TjBY