Questions have arisen in the blogosphere wondering if Houdini's London debut really started with his challenging Scotland Yard to handcuff him. His escaping from 'the Darbies' has been a central feature of his legend for the past 114 years.
The main thrust of the argument goes: if he did it, how come we never heard about it from the newspapers or Harry's own publicity material?
As with many other "unsolved" Houdini mysteries, a look inside the marvelous Quincy Kilby scrapbook at the Boston Public Library casts light.
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While researching this story we came upon this playbill for Harry's debut in England. As far as we can determine, no one has ever reported that on his first appearance in Europe he shared the stage with headliner Chung Ling Soo.
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(Clippings courtesy Boston Public Library. Playbill from Victoria & Albert Museum, London.)
Thanks for sharing this additional evidence that Houdini really did escape cuffs at Scotland Yard.
ReplyDeleteI also love the fact that Houdini appeared at number 10 for 20 minutes and Chung Ling Soo appeared at number 14 for 15 minutes.
Wow. I feel a little attacked. As far as I know, I'm the "skeptic" "hell-bent" on "belittling" Houdini by calling the full Scotland Yard story into question. Weird and surprising tone here from you, David. I don't get this. :s
ReplyDeleteJohn, my apologies! I confess I didn't go back to fact-check the origins of the Scotland Yard story, I just went from memory. I retract the statement because your sincerity and dedication are beyond doubt or reproach. I'm fixing the blog post ASAP. As long as we're confessing, this was published in a bit of haste because I'm going away for a couple of weeks and needed to feed the blog, and technical glitches made me decide to publish this immediately, our of fear that I would lose it entirely. I'm a big admirer of your work and I should not have published in such haste.
ReplyDeleteThank you David. I figured something like this must have happened. Believe me, I sometimes stew at what I call the "Houdini haters" and the crazy stuff they say and I somethings can't resist going at them in some of my own posts. But I knew there was some confusion here. No problem. :)
DeleteGreat find, btw. I still question the full narrative of the bet with Slater and arms around the pole, etc. as told in Kellock. That's really what I was questioning. Something happened at Scotland Yard. I'm just not sure what. But this is an important find.
The Chung Ling Soo thing is really interesting, isn't it? I may have mentioned that in passing because I did know about it (saw it in Derek Tait's book, I believe?), but I'm surprised more has not been made of it. What a historic week that was at the Alhambra!
Thanks again. This Kilby scrapbook posts are gold!
WOW! Sensational. As we often say even so many decades after his death, there is so much we are still learning.
ReplyDeleteThanks for this great find. Please keep following up wherever you can.
Dorothy Dietrich and Dick Brookz
The Houdini Museum
The Only Building in the World Dedicated to Houdini
Thanks for the additional material reference the "Scotland Yard" incident. BTW, looking forward to your book. My number one Christmas present. From me to me :-)
ReplyDeleteThanks to all for your kind words. As for the book - John Cox had it first on his blog, even before we announced that it's been accepted for publication! Will put up a link to John's piece. I'm off to the mountains for two weeks to work on, guess what? The sequel to THE ESCAPE ARTIST: Harry Houdini in Russia! The blog is on autopilot, but if all goes right you'll see two more stories from the Kilby scrapbook, one on Houdini's Smoking and the next on Houdini & God.
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