Howard Thurston (July 20, 1869 – April 13, 1936) was a stage magician from Columbus, Ohio.
Thurston had the largest traveling Vaudeville magic show for the time, requiring more than eight entire train cars to transport his props across the country.
He is still famous for his work with playing cards. Thurston was one of the first magicians to take advantage of the Back Palm with cards. According to legend, a Mexican magician appeared at a magic sh...
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Howard Thurston (July 20, 1869 – April 13, 1936) was a stage magician from Columbus, Ohio.
Thurston had the largest traveling Vaudeville magic show for the time, requiring more than eight entire train cars to transport his props across the country.
He is still famous for his work with playing cards. Thurston was one of the first magicians to take advantage of the Back Palm with cards. According to legend, a Mexican magician appeared at a magic shop in New York city owned by Otto Maurer. The enigmatic magician demonstrated how he could make cards disappear, one by one, at his fingertips.
Maurer showed Thurston the move, which he would later feature in his act. He added the "Rising Cards" trick from Professor Hoffman’s Modern Magic, the book from which Thurston had learned the rudiments of magic. For this trick, he would walk into the audience and ask several people to choose cards from a deck of cards. The deck was shuffled and placed into a clear glass. Thurston would then call for...
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