This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 10/29/2022
ETHEREAL SUSPENSION ILLUSION. Boston: C. Milton Chase, ca. 1900. The magician’s assistant, apparently hypnotized, stands atop a stool on a low platform, with two metal poles supporting his weight. The assistant is lifted into a horizontal position and one of the supports is removed, along with the stool. She remains suspended in the air. Then the second support is removed, and the assistant remains suspended. Finally, the process is reversed and the assistant awakens. Includes gimmick, poles, platforms, and original wooden packing crate addressed to The Great Reno of St. Joseph, Missouri and bearing the return address of the manufacturer, C. Milton Chase of Boston. A description of this version of Robert-Houdin’s Ethereal Suspension can be found in Ellis Stanyon’s Magic (1901), at page 201. A similar illusion – in which both poles were removed from underneath the magician’s assistant, was made popular by the Fakir of Oolu at the Egyptian Hall in London in the 1870s, billing it as “The Last Link Severed.” This is the only illusion manufactured by Chase of which we are aware. Though a prolific builder of props for decades, little of his output has survived the years with the exception of small parlor apparatus. The Reno to whom this illusion belonged should not be confused with the popular Chautauqua and Lyceum magician; The Great Reno hailed from Missouri – Ed Reno was born in New York and spent his later years living in Kankakee, Illinois.