Chapter Five: The Magic Shop
Henry also had the idea to set up a gift and souvenir store into which one would enter when exiting the museum. He also had an idea to open a magic shop as part of the gift store.
One Sunday, he heard about a magicians’ convention taking place in nearby Hamilton. He decided to go to the convention to try to find a magician to help set up the magic store and to “pitch” magic tricks, that is, to demonstrate the tricks and then sell them to the visitors for the visitors to take home and entertain their friends.
While at the convention, Henry did find a young man who was doing tricks and impressed Henry with his charisma. Henry approached him and asked him if he would be interested in coming to work at the museum full-time to set up and manage the magic shop. He came to Niagara Falls the next day to see the location, and after some discussion, the magician said yes, and they agreed on a salary and that he would start full-time the next Sunday. He did say though, that the next day he was going to New York City to audition for a part in a play on Broadway. He said that if he did not get the part, he would be at the museum on Sunday to begin work, but that if he did land the role, he would have no alternative but to accept it, and thus would not be able to work at the museum.
As history would have it, the man landed the role and never did come to work at the museum. The show was called The Magic Show and the man’s name was Doug Henning.
Henry did end up hiring two great magicians to run the magic shop: Hugo Furney and Ron Conley. They set up the magic store and “pitched” magic to people exiting the museum, who were already in the magic mood.
The main item which was pitched was the Houdini Magic Set, which consisted of a Svengali Deck, Cups and Balls, Nickels to Dimes and a Snap-It. The sets retailed for about six dollars. During those two summers, and thereafter as well, I also worked the magic counter, demonstrating and selling magic tricks to visitors.
The Svengali Deck was a deck of cards in which a guest was asked to choose a card, after which the magician is able to turn the entire deck into the card which the visitor chose. The Cups and Balls was a trick in which the magician makes cotton balls appear to penetrate the solid cups and move through the air from one cup to another. Nickels to Dimes was a trick in which the magician makes four nickels turn into four dimes. The Snap-It or Snapper was a puzzle in which the magician is able to hook a hook onto a rubber band at the end of a tube, but the audience members are unable to do so.
We also sold other magic decks named Mental Photography, the Stripper Deck and the Invisible Deck, which as mentioned earlier was instrumental in getting me my first job on Wall Street.
Other magicians who worked at the magic store in subsequent years were Joe Nickell and Vince Matejka. Later Henry hired someone from Rochester, New York, whose stage name was Dante and whose real name was Barrett Kirkendall. He drove a hearse.
