Harry and Theo belonged to the latter category but had decided for their own séance show to understand all the tricks so well that they could not be caught. It caused a boom in new mediums but also an avalanche of charlatans.

In the late 1800s, spiritualism was a hot item in the United States. Together with his brother, he had already organized a show where they supposedly fell into a trance as mediums and passed on messages from the dead. One of the things that always kept pulling Harry Houdini was the occult. Ehrich also decided to change his first name and from that moment on he made world fame as Harry Houdini. In a very short time, Beatrice took Theo’s place on the traveling show. New Yorkers came to know them as the Houdini Brothers.ġ894 marked the end of their collaboration.

They bound each other with heavy handcuffs and chains and escaped from boxes and cages on wheels. They had found they could attract larger crowds if they focused on impossible escapes. It was spring in the year 1894 when Ehrich and Theodore, two sons of an immigrant Hungarian rabbi, performed magic tricks in New York.

Houdini best magic trick