Sitting in the main dining room of the Francis Scott Key Hotel in Frederick, Maryland, one afternoon in November 1924, not many guests recognized the unassuming man eating lunch with his wife until he cut off his thumb. Actually, that panicked them, but when he reattached it with a flourish of his hand, they realized they were in the presence of “the greatest mystifier of all time,” as the Frederick News called Harry Houdini.
The announcement that Houdini would appear in Frederick as a guest of the Maryland National Guard to give a lecture and demonstration at the armory caused much excitement in the city. He was an internationally famous magician and escape artist. He had even appeared in motion pictures, but in his later years, he had become the scourge of spiritualists and mediums because he had made it his mission to expose them as frauds.
Knowing Houdini had arrived in Frederick, a reporter tracked him down to the hotel and introduced himself to the couple. The reporter called the international star, “Quiet and unassuming, he was the essence of friendship and there was none of the mystifying appearance which one would naturally expect to see in a man of Houdini’s type.”
To the reporter’s surprise, Houdini said this wasn’t his first time in Frederick. “I was in Frederick about 30 years ago when I was with the Welsh circus, which is now out of existence.”
John and Michael H. Welsh ran the Welsh Brothers Circus, which was based in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. “The Houdini’s presented their Sub-trunk Routine along with a second sight demonstration. They also had other duties as well, among them A Punch & Judy Show, Bess [Houdini’s wife] as a singing clown and Harry’s work as a Wild Man,” according to the “Wild About Harry” blog.
The circus was believed to have performed exclusively in Pennsylvania, but according to “Wild About Harry,” the circus did venture of out the Keystone state on a few instances, and one was to perform in Frederick on September 14, 1898, or “about 30 years ago” as Houdini recalled. The circus arrived on the Pennsylvania Railroad and set up its large tents on Burger’s lot on East Patrick Street. They then marched through the city with music, dancing, and animals to announce their arrival and attract patrons.
“I remember while walking in the parade, going past the house where Barbara Fritchie waved her flag. All the boys took off their hats,” Houdini recalled.
At that time, he and Bess were far from the celebrities that returned to Frederick. Houdini’s career had moved through several phases, and, as a 50-year-old man, he was more interested in exposing frauds than escaping from a straitjacket while being hung upside down from a skyscraper or digging himself free from being buried alive.
Those tricks were physically taxing, and although still fit, Houdini wanted to keep people from being fooled by charlatans.
“I consider the work I am now doing to be the greatest I have ever done in my life,” he said. “Spiritualists and mediums are frauds. As for Conan Doyle and Oliver Lodge, they ought to be muzzled. Anyone who believes in that kind of bunk is insane. They must be. There is a natural explanation for all of it and I am devoting my entire time to exposing it.”
Not only did Houdini know some of the tricks mediums and spiritualists employed through his work as a magician and illusionist, but he had also been trained as a medium himself. He knew the trade secrets, so to speak.
While talking, Houdini suddenly said to the reporter, “Here, did you ever see this?”
The great mystifier then picked up the knife next to his plate and proceeded to saw through his thumb, cutting it off, while experiencing no pain. “The reporter did look and he saw the thumb on Houdini’s right hand completely severed,” the Frederick News reported. “The two pieces being about an inch apart.”
Then with a few passes with his good hand, the severed thumb was once again attached and where it should be.
“Is that another example of the hand being quicker than the eye?” the reporter asked.
“No, it is
simply to teach you not to believe all that you see,” Houdini told him.
The show at the armory that evening consisted of six parts. First, Houdini spoke on his own experiences as a professional medium. Then he talked about different professional mediums and the tricks they had used.
He performed magic for half an hour, which included a trick where he swallowed 50 needles and a ball of thread. Then he washed it down with a glass of water. “The next thing the spectator sees is Houdini bring the needles out of his mouth threaded,” the Frederick News reported.
He then held a séance that he used to demonstrate slate writing. This was a technique where a spirit would supposedly write on a closed slate with chalk. Next, he showed how the trick was performed. And finally, he held a séance in the full light, showing how the darkness helped hide tricks the medium did.
It was both an educational and enjoyable show for audience.
The Houdinis left Frederick the following day to perform in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania.
Sadly, less than two years later, Harry Houdini died from peritonitis after a show in the Garrick Theater in Detroit. It may have been related to an appendicitis or possibly punches he had taken to his stomach about a week before. He died on Halloween 1926.