Select Secrets: Rare & Important Magicana

Blackstone, Harry (Henry Boughton). Top Hat from Blackstone’s “Who Wears the Whiskers?” Illusion. Circa 1940. Oversize black fabric prop top hat with yellow satin ribbon band, worn in the closing illusion on the Blackstone show. Black fabric stretched over stiff wire frame with elastic chin strap. Height 8”. Well-worn, but sturdy and intact. Accompanied by a note in the hand of Blackstone’s biographer, relating the provenance of the hat. Blackstone developed the “Whiskers” illusion in the 1920s and it remained in his repertoire for decades. Blackstone’s biographer, Dan Waldron, described it in this way: “It was fundamentally a fast-moving switch illusion…. To the lively music of “Shoot,” an old man with whiskers climbs out of a giant Jack-in-the-Box and threatens Harry, who grabs a banner to shield himself. On dropping the banner, the man behind turns out to be, not Harry, but a gorilla (early on, a bear). An assistant fires a gun at the gorilla. The old man and the gorilla dance together. When the gorilla throws off its head it is the assistant. The old man whips off his big plug hat and whiskers. It is Harry.” The illusion was so effective, Harry Blackstone Jr. used it in his own show as well.