HOUDINI RUSSIAN MYSTERY SOLVED!

(Video link here.)

Our fellow magic bloggers have reported on the delights and pleasures of the recent Washington Symposium on Magic History. Charming items like the automata above really gave us a taste of the old world of magic. A taste of the new came from the long overdue recognition of magical scientific geniuses like Jerry Andrus, about whom we’ll continue writing shortly.

Hardcore Houdiniphiles got a lot of satisfaction, too, and the solution to some mysteries. Bill Kalush presented a newly-discovered picture of Harry’s father, with long beard and longer pipe, holding Harry’s baby sister. Bill also found some great new old footage of Harry flying a plane in Australia.

For us, though, the big news was in this original of Houdini’s contract to play St. Petersburg. Before it was auctioned off for $10,000, we were lucky enough to get a good long look at it for the first time ever. You could have knocked us over with a feather flower when we read the thing. It solved a mystery that’s been baffling us for years.

Harry’s tale of his Russian adventures has always centered around the man cited in the upper left corner of this poster depicting his famous escape from the Russian prison transport van. Harry names his nemesis as one ”Lebedeff,” whom he identifies as chief of the secret police. 

During eight years of research for our upcoming historical novel, The Escape Artist: Houdini in Russia, we searched high and low for any trace of this Lebedeff. We can say with certainty that he was never chief of the secret police, nor, as far as we can determine, of any Russian police force whatever. But at last we know who he was!

Houdini’s contract, made at the U.S. Consulate in Moscow in 1903, was notarized by none other than Mihail Lebedeff! He was a notary, not a cop.

Official translation of Houdini's contract

Did Harry forget the name of his real nemesis and substitute a name he could remember? Or did he intentionally give the man an alias? One mystery solved, two more created.

More Houdini-in-Russia revelations from the Symposium in future posts.



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