This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 12/9/2023
HOUDINI, Harry (Erik Weisz, 1874 – 1926). A Magician Among the Spirits. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1924. FIRST EDITION. Publisher’s ribbed dark blue cloth lettered in gilt, with scarce original aqua dust jacket lettered in blue. Portrait frontispiece of Houdini with Conan Doyle. Plates. Tall 8vo. Ex-libris Bayard Grimshaw. BOLDLY INSCRIBED AND SIGNED on the flyleaf in ink: “To my friend / Carl Germain / with “sincere best” / wishes / HOUDINI / March 19/1925 / “and its all true”.” Affixed to the spine of the jacket is a strip of raised braille letters, used by Germain to read the title of the book in his later years when he was legally blind.
Germain and Houdini were acquainted for over twenty years, and likely forged their friendship in New York at the dawn of the twentieth century, when both men frequented Martinka’s magic emporium at 493 6th Avenue in New York City. As two of the original members of the Society of American Magicians, the performers both rose through the ranks of showbusiness in the same era, on many of the same stages. After his retirement from showbusiness – at a relatively young age – Germain opened a law practice in his native Cleveland. But that career drew to a close too, as his eyesight began to fail. Even an experimental procedure to correct his vision had limited success, and so during Germain’s golden years, he was declared legally blind and was forced to resort to dictation to answer correspondence, write briefs, and draft legal documents. Houdini died in 1926, just two years after this book was written; Germain outlived him by more than three decades.