[DAI VERNON] Signed Program from the Night Vernon Fooled Houdini. [Chicago], 1922. Folded pictorial program picturing Houdini on the front, and printed as a souvenir for those in attendance at a Society of American Magicians banquet and show held in honor of Houdini at the Great Northern Hotel. Performers on the program include Harland Tarbell, B.L. Gilbert, W.R. “Russ” Walsh, and Arthur Buckley. BOLDLY INSCRIBED AND SIGNED by Houdini on the front cover: “Houdini / Born April 6 – 1874 Appleton/ Wisc / USA.” Provenance: The Jay Marshall Collection; offered as Lot 200 in the sale of Marshall’s collection conducted on May 5, 2007. Fewer than 150 magicians attended this fete at Chicago’s Great Northern Hotel on the evening of Feb. 6, 1922. And while Houdini was certainly the most famous conjurer in attendance, the man whose reputation was made that evening was a little-known sleight-of-hand performer from Canada named David Frederick Wingfield Verner – to his friends, Dai Vernon.
Houdini claimed he could discover the secret behind any magic trick shown to him three times. But at this event, Vernon baffled the “master mystifier” and escape artist with the same effect, a miraculous card trick, eight times in a row. As one spectator watching the performance exclaimed on the eighth go-around, “Admit it, Harry – you’ve been beaten!” But instead of admitting defeat, Houdini stormed away in frustration.
It was this encounter that led to Vernon’s billing as “The Man who Fooled Houdini,” and helped secure his reputation as a performer in both New York’s top nightclubs and at elite social functions. He later became, arguably, the most influential magician of the twentieth century.