Kathryn (00:10)
Hello, welcome to I Scream You Scream. We are your weekly scoop of the most chilling histories, mysteries, and paranormal perplexities. I'm Kathryn.
Gina (00:20)
And I'm Gina.
Kathryn (00:21)
And for the month of November, we are sharing stories about circuses. While we enjoy slushies, If you already know us, welcome back. And if you want more from us each month, including episodes ad-free and one week early, go on over and join us on our hot fudge tier over on Patreon. But until you do that, grab a spoon and let's dig in.
I have to take a Lactaid I almost forgot.
Are you eating the same thing as last month? What week I mean?
Gina (00:52)
Yeah. And you know what I realized?
that vanilla and pear ice cream that I talked so much shit about, that is
Kathryn (00:58)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (00:58)
the same brand as this one. And it was also a fruit cream ice, not a fruit ice cream. So I'm a big old fucking hypocrite for saying I didn't
Kathryn (01:07)
Ha ha ha ha.
Gina (01:08)
like that one. And I like this one, but I think it's cause my expectations were different. I thought the pear and vanilla
Kathryn (01:13)
Yeah.
Gina (01:13)
one was going to be an ice cream, not slushy ish.
Kathryn (01:18)
Which yeah, if expecting a nice scoop of creamy ice cream, texture's important, you know?
Gina (01:26)
And I was
expecting a scoop of creamy ice cream.
Kathryn (01:30)
But instead you have cream dice. Right? That's what it's called? Yeah, that's so weird. I've never heard of that. What flavor do you have this month? That's right, okay.
Gina (01:34)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, cream ice. It is good though. It's nice. it's strawberries and cream, but I got...
It's like one of those tiny little containers
Kathryn (01:44)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (01:44)
of ice cream that are made for just one serving and I split it into two for this week and last week. So next week I'm
Kathryn (01:47)
Mm-hmm. oh
Gina (01:49)
gonna have to find something different. We'll see what happens.
Kathryn (01:51)
Okay. Were I'm on the edge of my seat.
Gina (01:54)
Yeah, hold on to your butt. How's
Kathryn (01:56)
No.
Gina (01:56)
the... How's the bluebell?
Kathryn (01:57)
Good.
Love Bluebell. This is the same as last week, cherry vanilla with the chunks of frozen cherry in it. I like the texture.
Gina (02:05)
beautiful.
I know that we picked this because slushies remind us of the circus, but I don't think I've ever actually had a slushie at a circus.
Kathryn (02:14)
Also,
Italian ice isn't really a thing at the circus
Gina (02:18)
No.
Kathryn (02:19)
either. I feel like that's more of a no, I don't know what I had at the circus.
Gina (02:24)
popcorn and funnel cakes?
Kathryn (02:25)
Yeah, I don't know.
probably popcorn or a pretzel. I love a soft pretzel.
We had heart shaped giant soft pretzel from Milwaukee Pretzel Company at Coco's birthday party. Listen, I'm
Gina (02:36)
You
Kathryn (02:37)
not ashamed to say I ate like half that thing by myself.
Gina (02:40)
That looks so...
can we talk about Coco's birthday party for a second? Because the pictures looked amazing.
Kathryn (02:43)
Absolutely.
it was adorable. The theme was theme was itty bitty princess kitty. And for those who are confused, it is a book series about a you guessed it, an itty bitty princess kitty.
the food was great. I just like stayed in the kitchen the whole time.
Gina (03:03)
I want Coco's mom to plan all of my birthday parties from here on out.
Kathryn (03:08)
I know me
too. I think I literally told her that.
Burke's birthday parties are always like that too though. We just couldn't make it this year because that was when I was sick. Remember when I was like, yeah.
Gina (03:16)
Oh yeah.
Kathryn (03:17)
his was space jam this year. Did I tell you that? Can you believe it? That's how you know
Gina (03:21)
He had a Space Jam birthday party?
Kathryn (03:23)
I was actually sick if I missed a space jam party. Yeah.
Gina (03:27)
Dude, it never occurred
to me that that could be a theme for a party. That's wonderful.
Kathryn (03:31)
you can have anything be a theme for a party. Do you remember when we were we've talked about this on the podcast before. Do you remember when we were playing in my thirtieth that never was to be? Yeah.
Gina (03:39)
Jesus.
I do think now looking
Kathryn (03:42)
Yeah, I love a good party theme.
Gina (03:43)
back on it when we were planning your 30th birthday party and we were going to do it 1930s Great Depression themed, I think maybe looking back on it that was a bit in poor taste.
Kathryn (03:54)
You know what, but looking
back on
Gina (03:55)
What do you think about?
Kathryn (03:56)
it, weren't we a little bit in poor taste back then?
Gina (04:00)
yes, yes, yes, yes.
And it was so much fun.
Kathryn (04:05)
Yeah, that would have been a great party. Well, honestly, probably
wouldn't have been that great,
the menu would have been like hot dog jello or something like that. I don't know. yeah. A water pie. Have you seen those recipes for water pie? Yeah.
Gina (04:17)
Butter pie or whatever they used to make. have no idea. Water pie. Yes, yes,
I have. There's this one guy that, he always pops up on my Instagram feed that makes uh recipes from yonder times and he made
Kathryn (04:31)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (04:32)
and tried water pie. And I think he said it's not bad. I have not made it, I don't know.
Kathryn (04:35)
That's what
I I mean, I I've never made it, but I've s I've seen videos of people making it and it just looks like sugar, flour, butter, and water. Like it just looks like a regular pie, just minus extra stuff. You know what mean? With just a little extra water? Yeah. Yeah.
Gina (04:47)
Yeah, like a fudge, a fudgy kind of thing. Have
you ever watched Tasting History with Max Miller?
Kathryn (04:54)
No, but you've I think mentioned this to me.
Gina (04:57)
Hmm
Kathryn (04:57)
Someone has, if not you. I've heard of it, yeah.
Gina (05:00)
Very good fun. He, I'm
not sure, I think it's primarily YouTube. That's where Tom and I watch him anyway, but he makes
Kathryn (05:06)
Mm.
Gina (05:07)
recipes from long, long, long time ago. Like he, one that we watched, he made um like the kind of snack food they would have had at the Coliseum back in the Gladiator days. Yeah, and he'll try it
Kathryn (05:16)
Oh that's fascinating.
Gina (05:18)
using like as close to traditional methods as he can get, and then he'll try them and talk through how it tastes and stuff. It's really interesting. He has a cookbook.
Kathryn (05:23)
Mm. Interesting.
Gina (05:27)
of... Yeah.
Kathryn (05:27)
Yeah, there's a lot of
sh like online internet people who have cookbooks that every it's always delightful when I see someone I like scrolled to one day X number of years ago. I'm like, you're like on our Christmas cookbook display this year. That's cool. Yeah.
Gina (05:46)
Yay! Good for them. Maybe
we'll do a cookbook someday.
Kathryn (05:50)
my
god, we should.
Gina (05:53)
Then every recipe in the middle will be like, give up, have a drink. It's not gonna work. Put the bowl down.
Kathryn (05:56)
uh This is gonna taste like garbage. Just pour some wine. Uh
Gina (06:05)
something exciting to share with you.
Kathryn (06:07)
okay.
Gina (06:08)
It's kind of a podcast update, not really kind of, I don't know. So a long time ago, I did an episode on the Loudon possessions, which is, there
Kathryn (06:18)
yeah.
Gina (06:18)
was, uh yeah, that convent in France back in the day when a bunch of nuns became possessed and they had to exorcise everyone and blah, blah. There was a movie.
that they made about that called The Devils
Kathryn (06:30)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (06:30)
that was banned in so many places because it was a very disturbing movie, very graphic, a lot of like, what is it called, blasphemous imagery. uh And
Kathryn (06:39)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (06:39)
it's coming back to theaters in the UK. And by the time this episode comes
Kathryn (06:42)
my god, really?
Gina (06:43)
out, yeah, it will be in theaters by the time uh this episode airs. So it's not available everywhere, but at like,
Kathryn (06:47)
that's fun. Mm.
Gina (06:49)
know, picture houses and artsy places, you can
Kathryn (06:52)
Yeah.
Gina (06:52)
go see it. So Tom and I are gonna try and go to a showing of it.
Kathryn (06:59)
Yeah.
Gina (06:59)
I think it is,
it's in the US, but I think when this airs, it will be done. I think it's just for a weekend, but.
Kathryn (07:05)
Oh, okay. So this is just
an FYI, sorry you all lo losers missed it.
Gina (07:11)
Yeah, yeah, and I, every week for the past like four recordings, I've been like, I need to mention this so people can, you know, go see it if they want to and I've forgotten every time. So sorry, you all have to move to the UK now.
Kathryn (07:23)
speaking of things we need to mention, but haven't yet, we had our first time in the press last month.
Gina (07:31)
We did!
Kathryn (07:32)
Um, we will have mentioned this on
social media, don't you worry. We will be very annoying about it. We're very excited about this, but we're letting you all know now on the podcast that we were featured in the Women Who Podcast magazine. We got the October cover. So you all should go check that out. That was very, very exciting. We had a great time in that interview and working with Kathy. They were really great. So yeah, we'll link that for everyone who wants to purchase a copy and check it out
Gina (08:01)
Yeah, super cool, very surreal.
Kathryn (08:03)
Yeah, it's weird. I'm like I don't know what to say 'cause I'm like
I don't know, someone wrote an article about us. That's weird, right? But y'all should go read it.
Gina (08:10)
It is weird.
Kathryn (08:14)
Yeah,
well, I feel like we've got a pretty big story today. So do you wanna move into into what you have for us? I'm very excited about this and I know that everyone else is as well. This is a good topic. I'm excited for this one. And this was a Patreon voted one too, correct? Yeah.
Gina (08:32)
Yes, yes. So thank
you to our Patreon members for helping me decide what to do this episode about. I am so excited that you guys picked Houdini. So, spoiler, I'm talking about Houdini. I say spoiler
Kathryn (08:43)
Ha ha
Gina (08:43)
as if it's not in the episode title, but...
Kathryn (08:45)
I know, I always forget whenever
we're talking about the topic, I always forget that people know already what it's about. I'm like, guess what? Today's episode
Gina (08:50)
Yeah.
Kathryn (08:53)
is like not that dramatic. Yeah.
Gina (08:55)
We've read and seen it, yes, thank you very much.
Well, today I am going to be telling you about a man who made his name in trickery and yet was obsessed with honesty. A man known for his mystifying feats and daring escapes for whom thousands of seances have been held. I am talking of course about Harry Houdini, magician and escape artist extraordinaire. But long before he became Harry Houdini,
Eric Weiss was born on March 24th, 1874 in Budapest. Well...
Kathryn (09:28)
I did not know that. Sorry, right off the
bat, no idea.
Gina (09:33)
Part of that might be because Houdini often lied about where he was born.
Yeah, so he was born in the Austria-Hungarian Empire. He was the fourth of seven children. And I love the fact that he was such an aggressively middle child, because becoming a
Kathryn (09:47)
Ha.
Gina (09:48)
magician is a very middle...
child-coded thing to me? I say that as someone who's not a middle child. But it seems like it is.
Kathryn (09:52)
Totally. Oh,
it absolutely is. Yeah. I love it.
Gina (09:57)
Yeah, my mom is a middle child and she listens to this podcast, so Gayle if you're thinking about picking up some magician tricks, let me know.
Kathryn (10:04)
Yeah, Phil's a Phil's a middle
child. feel like Phil gives magician a little bit. I could see it.
Gina (10:09)
I would totally
go to Phil's magic show.
Kathryn (10:13)
I might I would be a little scared too.
Gina (10:16)
yeah,
yeah. Like if horror magic is a genre, that's what he would do.
Kathryn (10:20)
Yeah, I was gonna say
his would be like a I'm gonna saw these two people in half and you have to guess which one I actually saw it in half. Yeah.
Gina (10:31)
Yeah, yep, that would be it and I would buy every ticket. would go broke selling him out every night.
So yes, Eric Weiss was born into a Jewish family. His father was a rabbi. And I bring that up because his family suffered a lot of anti-Semitism where they lived in Europe. So much so that when Eric was just four years old, the family packed up and they moved to America. That did not
completely fix the anti-Semitism problem though, there was still a lot of prejudice against him, but Eric's father was able to get a job as a rabbi. So the family was able to settle down and restart their lives in Appleton, Wisconsin.
Kathryn (11:12)
So that's the part I knew. Yeah.
Gina (11:16)
didn't know that Houdini was
from Appleton. I had no idea.
Kathryn (11:19)
Yeah, he's the pride of Appleton.
I'm like kinda bummed because that's like a
big claim to fame and he's not even actually from there. Emotionally,
Gina (11:27)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Kathryn (11:28)
emotionally we we I say we, I don't live in Appleton. Wisconsin can still claim him.
Gina (11:34)
In his formative years, mean, Four is very young. I don't remember being younger than Four. So for all intents and purposes,
Kathryn (11:36)
Mm-hmm. That's true. That's fair.
Gina (11:42)
he grew up in, well, he did grow up in Wisconsin. They
Kathryn (11:45)
Yeah, yeah, that's true.
Gina (11:47)
lived on Appleton Street, which is now known as Houdini Plaza. Uh-huh. And it is here that myths about his interest in escapism kind of started to take shape. And I say myths.
because there are so many stories claiming to be the quote true story of how Houdini learned to escape handcuffs and things like that. His skillset is very mysticized. It's very mythologized. And so we don't really know for sure how he got his start in all of that stuff. But most of the stories do come back to his childhood in Wisconsin. One story goes that while he was apprenticed to a locksmith, he was asked to unlock a pair of handcuffs without the key.
because the key had been lost, so they had to figure out a way to get these handcuffs open. Another story, and my personal favorite, goes that he learned how to pick locks so that he could get a slice of pie that his mom had locked in a cabinet.
Kathryn (12:43)
That's fantastic. Honestly, I love that. That's great.
Gina (12:46)
I
know, right? It's such a good reason to learn how to pick locks.
Kathryn (12:50)
Yeah.
Gina (12:51)
So we're not really sure what's true and what's not. But allegedly when young Eric got bored, he would just walk around the house picking locks on drawers and closets, anything he could find. And some say that when he ran out of locks to pick at home, he would just go out in the town and lockpick his way down the street. The family didn't stay in Appleton very long.
Just a few years after arriving, Eric's dad actually lost his job as a rabbi, and so the family decided to relocate to Milwaukee.
Kathryn (13:22)
Okay, that one I didn't know. I knew that he lived in Appleton. I didn't know he lived in Milwaukee too. Okay, I can claim him then. Yeah. ah
Gina (13:29)
Yeah, you absolutely can. They had a horrible time in Milwaukee though, very, very bad time.
um They did fall into absolute poverty there. And Houdini would
Kathryn (13:38)
Mm.
Gina (13:39)
later say, quote, such hardships and hunger became our lot that the less said on the subject, the better.
And with the family struggling for money so much, it fell to everyone to bring home whatever money they could, including the kids. And so at nine years old, Eric made his circus debut as a trapeze artist called Eric the Prince of the Air. And this was at Milwaukee-based circus. think it was like a five cent circus.
Kathryn (14:04)
that's cool.
Gina (14:05)
But even with the extra money, life was still really, really hard for Eric and his family. It wasn't like he was raking in the big bucks yet. In fact, quite the opposite. Every day was a struggle. He relied on his mother, Cecilia, a lot for comfort during this time. My impression is that Cecilia was just like an incredibly compassionate, loving mother. I'm hesitant to call her the glue that held everyone together because it seemed like they were all close just as a family. It wasn't just her holding them up.
but she definitely
Kathryn (14:36)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (14:36)
was a pillar within their family. She was a very, very beloved woman. And Eric in particular was incredibly close with her. And his relationship with his mom is one of the most defining relationships of his life. He was a total mommy's boy, like 100 % through and through total mama's boy. And that will come back a little bit later on. But when Eric was in his kind of tween early teen years, he and his dad actually left the family to move to New York.
And the idea here was that there were more opportunities to find out there. Like they could get more money if they moved to New York. There was just more work to be had. And so the plan was they would go to New York, make some money, and then once they found a permanent place to live, they would bring the rest of the family over with them. Eric started doing any and every job he could find to bring in some cash.
He shined shoes, he hawked newspapers on the street, he worked as a delivery boy, just like any odd random little job he could find. And it's also around this time that he dropped out of school. So the Houdini that we know never received what we would consider to be a formal education. Eventually, the rest of the family did join them. And with a little bit more free time on his hands, Eric was able to start spending time on his passions,
He was super into physical fitness and he had been fascinated with magic tricks ever since his time in Wisconsin where he saw a traveling magician for the first time. started practicing magic with a friend at the local athletic club and he read an autobiography of a man who was often called the father of modern magic. Get ready for a French name. I did practice this. Jean Eugene Robert Houdin Oh, merci Kathryn.
Kathryn (16:15)
Wow, good job. Uh
huh.
Gina (16:18)
Uh, yeah,
tis a French name. And if you think the last name Houdon sounds familiar, it's because when Eric later became Harry Houdini, he named himself after Houdon. That's how much this autobiography inspired him.
Eric would later find out that large portions of that autobiography were fabricated. And he got really, really angry about it. And he kind of wound up launching like this whole crusade against the memory of Houdon. But for now, when he's like in his teen years, he's just lalala inspired by this guy. And his passion for magic grew and grew and grew until finally at the age of 17, Eric announced he was going to quit his job and become a professional magician under the name Harry Houdini.
Problem was, it wasn't easy to break into the entertainment industry. Much like today, when you don't have a family with connections or wealth, it can be a really difficult mountain to climb. He was the farthest possible thing from a nepo baby. So once again, he started taking any job he could find. He started performing at kind of like sideshow-esque attractions, doing card tricks. He did stints here and there in the circus. Sometimes he was part of an act with a strong man.
And sometimes he was a quote wild man, where he would basically like pretend to be feral for people's entertainment. He would like eat raw meat and stuff.
Kathryn (17:37)
The wild man
sideshow thing is like super gross to me. Like
Gina (17:44)
Yeah.
Kathryn (17:45)
well, that's like a whole and not because of the man himself. I feel like a lot of times that was like sketchy. Have
Gina (17:52)
I didn't know about them until what's that movie Bradley Cooper did. You know what I'm talking about?
Kathryn (17:55)
Yeah, it was um
I do. It was a remake. Um I think the original was from like the forties or something like that.
Gina (18:02)
But he was a geek in it. That's what they called it.
Kathryn (18:03)
The geek, yeah.
Gina (18:04)
So Houdini
did that, but he turns out okay.
He's fine.
Kathryn (18:07)
Good.
Gina (18:10)
yeah, he did anything and everything that he could to get his name out there, including starting a double act with his brother Theodore, who went by Dash.
Houdini on stage. They debuted as the Brothers Houdini and they actually performed at the Chicago World's Fair in 1893.
Kathryn (18:28)
my god, no
That's cool. It's one this is one
Gina (18:31)
Yeah.
Kathryn (18:32)
of those things it it makes sense, but timeline of it sounds fake to me. Do you know what mean?
Gina (18:41)
Yeah.
Kathryn (18:42)
I understand the timeline he lived in and the timeline all the other
World's fair stories take place in, but they're separate stories. So I can't like rectify that they all happened together.
Gina (18:54)
Yeah, like
the fact that Harry Houdini was on stage doing card tricks while H.H. Holmes was over there doing, very odd to picture them in the same city at the same time.
Kathryn (19:00)
Yeah. It's like I n yeah,
I know all of these things in their own compartments, but
Gina (19:08)
Yes.
Kathryn (19:09)
I can't think of them together. That's not the same movie. You know, you
Gina (19:13)
No!
Kathryn (19:15)
get it. You know what I'm saying?
Gina (19:18)
In HH Holmes is actually short for Harry Houdini Holmes.
Kathryn (19:20)
Just
Gina (19:22)
Same guy.
Kathryn (19:23)
Stop. New theory new theory just dropped.
You heard a hero first.
Gina (19:30)
Yeah, we haven't started a rumor in a while, why not? Let's do it.
Kathryn (19:32)
I feel like we literally started a rumor last episode.
It's been a couple weeks.
Gina (19:36)
It's been forever.
But yeah, so they performed at the Chicago World's Fair. Their act included a variety of escapism and illusion stunts, but it failed to make a lasting impact. And pretty soon after the World's Fair, they were right back in New York working for what they called near starvation wages. But still life went on and the following year,
Houdini met his brother's new girlfriend, Wilhelmine Beatrice Rahner AKA Bess. Just like Houdini, she came from a European
immigrant
family and she also had a love for the stage. When they met, Bess was actually working at Coney Island in a song and dance act called The Floral Sisters.
Kathryn (20:27)
Oh wait, I love that. Yeah, that's
Gina (20:29)
Cute, huh? Yeah.
Kathryn (20:31)
adorable.
Gina (20:32)
I don't know what they did. I'm assuming sing about flowers and stuff, but maybe not.
Kathryn (20:35)
I was gonna say
probably just yeah, I'm imagining I don't know. Honestly, I'm not imagining anything that actually happened. I'm imagining like a Fantasia cartoon flowers dancing around singing. I know that's probably not what it was, but that's
Gina (20:46)
Oh yeah.
Kathryn (20:49)
adorable.
Gina (20:50)
You know, I was picturing that em Saturday Night Live sketch with Kristen Wiig where she has like the really small hands and every time it's her turn to sing. Yeah.
Kathryn (21:01)
Yeah. That's funny.
Gina (21:05)
So yeah,
Dash had taken Bess on a few dates before introducing her to his brother, but apparently once Bess and Houdini met, they only had eyes for each other. They quickly got together and just a weeks later they got married and she replaced, yeah, and she replaced Dash in the Brothers Houdini Act, which rebranded as just the Houdinis.
Kathryn (21:27)
Bess, my goodness. Okay. Wow.
Gina (21:28)
I know, drama. I couldn't find
any record of Dash being hurt or angry about this in any way. And he did go on to have like a very successful magic and escape artist career in his own right. So like,
Kathryn (21:41)
Hm.
Gina (21:42)
on the surface, it seems like he wound up okay, but damn.
Kathryn (21:46)
Oh yeah, that that's that's loaded though, 'cause well, whatever. Yeah, keep going. Interesting. uh
Gina (21:52)
ah
And meanwhile, Bess and Houdini were madly in love. There's a story about the early days of their marriage that I really like, and it goes that one day they were just talking to each other because, you know, they got married after a few weeks, they're still getting to know each other. And Houdini
Kathryn (22:10)
Yeah.
Gina (22:11)
was basically like, I can't believe I don't know your father's name. Like, that's so wild that I don't know your dad's name yet. But you know what? Don't tell me what it is.
write it down on a piece of paper for me. And so Bess did, she wrote it down. And then Houdini told her to not show it to him, but to throw it in the stove, like the fire in the stove, crumple it up and throw it in there. So she did. And then Houdini proceeded to take the ashes from the stove, rub them on his arm, and where he rubbed, her father's name appeared. And Bess,
freaked the hell out. She was like, you are the devil, ran out of the house screaming, being like, how the hell did you do that? And Houdini
Kathryn (22:53)
my god.
Gina (22:53)
got like a massive kick out of it. He chased after her and to comfort her, he like explained how he did the trick and it became like
Kathryn (23:00)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (23:01)
a funny story they would tell people about the early days of their marriage.
Kathryn (23:05)
Wait, how'd he do the trick?
Gina (23:07)
I don't know if he ever revealed that one.
there are quite a few Houdini tricks where we know how they were done now. I'm not sure if
Kathryn (23:12)
Mm.
Gina (23:13)
that's one of them,
Kathryn (23:14)
Okay. That would scare me.
Gina (23:19)
dude, and imagine like this is
after you marry the person and you're like, okay, you're a demon. m
Kathryn (23:22)
Yeah. So whoops, and also, hmm, interesting, intrigued.
Gina (23:30)
So Bess and Houdini started touring together with a circus and they did a variety of different acts. And Houdini quickly realized that...
While there wasn't much money to be made in the circus, it was a good opportunity to learn from his fellow performers. And so he started spending as much time as he could, asking everyone questions about their acts and learning any tricks of the trade they might be willing to share with him. For example, there was one circus performer that he worked with who didn't have any arms and he helped Houdini work on his dexterity with his feet, which...
Kathryn (24:03)
Hmm.
Gina (24:03)
came in handy later when Houdini would do escape stunts where his hands would be handcuffed or like not available to him. He also learned other tricks like, this one freaks me out a little bit. He would put a needle and thread into his mouth and then thread the needle while it was still in there. And
Kathryn (24:21)
Who the earth?
Gina (24:23)
he, I know, yeah, that one freaks me out. And he would use, he used that for like so much of his career. That would become a thing he did on stage.
And he also started incorporating more handcuff escapes into his act at this point. The circus really is where he honed a lot of the skills that would later make him famous. But still, it wasn't very much money, and so the Houdinis did whatever they could to make their act one to remember, hoping for a big break. And that is how they started doing fake mediumship. That might come as a surprise, because Houdini is pretty well known for hating fraudulent mediums.
And that distaste began at this point. Like he started hating
Kathryn (25:04)
Mm.
Gina (25:04)
it because of his own act. When the circus would go to a new town, Houdini and Bess would go to a local cemetery and they would look around for where the freshly dug graves were. And they would take note of the names that were on those graves. And then in their act, they would pretend that that person had come back to communicate with the living. And it always got a really big reaction because a lot of these places were
you know, pretty small towns where most people, if not everyone, knew the person who died. And even if they didn't, even if it was a bigger town or a city, the reactions of the people who did know that dead person were enough to wow the rest of the audience. The Houdinis would deliver kind of like generic messages from the quote other side, using like typical mentalist tricks to discern what people wanted to hear before they said it, like cold reading kind of stuff.
And pretty quickly, Houdini realized that he hated it. He felt immensely guilty about manipulating people in this way. And in his mind, it was kind of like, yes, he loves magic and magic tricks are also a type of lie, but it was different because the audience knows that a magic trick is just a trick. You tell them outright,
Kathryn (26:18)
Yeah.
Gina (26:18)
this is not real magic, but I'm going to amaze you anyway. Whereas the fake medium stuff,
was just point blank deception. And that was also taking advantage of people's pain and vulnerability rather than distracting them from it with some amazing illusion or magic trick or something like that. And so despite the big reactions they were getting, the Houdinis did away with that act pretty quickly and they went back to their kind of normal magic and escapism schtick. Cut to 1899. By this point, Houdini was in his mid-twenties.
and he had been performing and touring tirelessly for six years and he didn't have a whole lot to show for it. He had been in a few papers and he even got a front page mention in the Chicago Journal when the circus went there, but he was really far from a star. But all of that changed after he performed at a beer hall in St. Paul, Minnesota. The Midwest plays such a big role in Houdini's story and I had no idea.
Kathryn (27:17)
My god, I love this. feel yeah, I feel
Gina (27:19)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (27:19)
like we've been spending a lot of time in the Midwest last several episodes.
Gina (27:23)
Houdini also winds up dying in the Midwest too. I'll get to that way later. But yeah, he
Kathryn (27:28)
Okay.
Gina (27:30)
wound up dying in Michigan. In Detroit, actually. Anyway, sorry. Jumping way ahead here. Yeah.
Kathryn (27:34)
think I knew that. We'll we'll get there. We'll get there. Spoiler.
Gina (27:38)
Yeah, right? So sorry, guys. So he is dead.
I ruined everything. So yeah, he performed in St. Paul, Minnesota.
And it's there that he finally got the big break he had been waiting for.
That night, he met a guy named Martin Beck, who was this vaudeville booking agent who was kind of on the rise in his own right. It was like two rising stars kind of collided and then helped each other grow their careers. Martin told Houdini that he was impressed with his ability to escape from handcuffs without a key.
and he told him that that is where the money is. He should play more to his strengths and make these wild, crazy escapes rather than devoting so much time to kind of illusory magic and things like card tricks that people could see kind of everywhere. Martin was like, no,
Kathryn (29:29)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (29:30)
you gotta focus on this escape stuff. You're really good at it. And to get him started, Martin booked Houdini on the Orpheum vaudeville circuit.
which was a very big deal at the time because the Orpheum chain of theaters was huge in American entertainment. I do not know much about showbiz, but in my brain, it seems like it's similar to like getting your show on Netflix in that it doesn't guarantee success, but it comes with a pretty much guaranteed audience. Like you have a fighting chance if you're putting the Orpheum theaters.
And Houdini knocked it out of the park. Within months, he was performing at the top vaudeville houses in the country. And pretty soon after that, Martin arranged for him to go to Europe, where he was offered a six month run at the Alhambra Theater.
in London. We're not entirely sure how Houdini got that run at the Alhambra. It was not arranged ahead of time by Martin or anything like that. But there's a very popular story that I like a lot, which is that shortly after Houdini arrived in Britain, he approached the Alhambra Theatre to try and perform there. Like, hey, I think I'm really good. You should let me have a stage show here.
The theater was not too impressed with his escapism act. So they were like, look, if you want to prove yourself, go to Scotland Yard and escape from their handcuffs. And for context, the Scotland Yard is another name for the headquarters of the London Metropolitan Police. So the idea was like, their handcuffs are the real deal. If you can escape from those, come back and we'll talk
Kathryn (31:00)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (31:01)
Never one to turn down a challenge. Houdini gave a demonstration to Scotland Yard.
who were shocked and amazed at how quickly he was able to escape from their handcuffs, which led the Alhambra to reconsider their position and offer Houdini what would become a career-making run at their theater. His show was an immediate hit, and pretty soon he started raking in about 300 bucks a week, which today would be like $12,000 a week
Kathryn (31:27)
Damn Holy moly
Gina (31:31)
Yeah, dude, it's so much money.
Kathryn (31:33)
man I
Gina (31:33)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (31:34)
wanna be an escape artist.
Gina (31:37)
Look, I wish they had offered that as an elective in high school because I could be on a very different career path right now.
Kathryn (31:45)
damn, that's cool.
Gina (31:46)
But I also,
I understand why they didn't offer it as an elective in high school. It'd probably be bad.
Kathryn (31:53)
Yeah, that's fair.
Gina (31:54)
It does sound very cool though. uh Yeah, he became one of the world's highest paid entertainers. He toured across the Netherlands, Germany, France, Russia, all over the place, doing illusions, card tricks, and of course, escape acts. And to drum up publicity, every time he went somewhere new,
He would challenge the local police to chain him up and lock him in one of their jail cells. And every time, he was able to escape and no one could ever figure out how he did it. Most police departments would search him ahead of time to make sure he wasn't like sneaking a lockpick in with him or something like that. And a few
times they
Kathryn (32:30)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (32:30)
even made him do the entire thing naked just to make sure. Yeah, and still he never failed
Kathryn (32:34)
Goodness. Okay.
Gina (32:36)
to escape, even fully in the nude. He was like, fine, yeah.
I don't think I would want to do that. No,
Kathryn (32:42)
I know that I wouldn't want to do that.
Gina (32:45)
no, but Houdini did. And while
Kathryn (32:48)
Hmm.
Gina (32:48)
he was doing something similar in Cologne, a police officer started claiming that, he must have bribed someone to help him escape. There's no way he's doing this by the virtue of his own skills. And in return, Houdini used his newfound money to sue this guy.
and he won. He's American in spirit, if not in his passport.
Kathryn (33:06)
my goodness. Yeah. That's why I thought he was from Appleton.
I knew he was petty as fuck like that. That I know. Yeah. Yeah.
Gina (33:14)
my God, so petty. Yeah. And this
kind of this era is when that pettiness and that ego are starting
Kathryn (33:19)
Okay.
Gina (33:20)
to grow. Yeah.
Kathryn (33:21)
Okay. Yep, this this makes sense.
Gina (33:24)
Yes, and so that case where he sued that police officer, he won when he was able to prove his skills by opening the judge's safe.
Kathryn (33:34)
My goodness Harry Houdini wow.
Gina (33:38)
I know. He would later say that the judge had just forgotten to lock it and he didn't actually break into it, but...
Kathryn (33:44)
Wow, did you see
I'm that was the most impressive thing that I had heard thus far. Okay, so what I'm hearing is Harry Houdini is a faraud and a liar. god. Okay.
Gina (33:57)
He's a magician at magic! The Houdinis were finally seeing their hard
work pay off. And for Houdini in particular, this meant that he finally got to put an end to his family's financial struggles. And not just that, but he got to give them the life of luxury that they had only ever dreamed of.
At one point he threw this big party to celebrate that legal victory over that police officer, but also just to celebrate in general because times were kind of awesome. And he bought this dress that was said to have been originally made for Queen Victoria and he gave it to his mom. And then he, yeah,
I know.
Kathryn (34:36)
Well
Gina (34:37)
And then he presented his mom to everyone at the party in this like gorgeous queenly dress. And he would later say it
Kathryn (34:42)
Wow.
Gina (34:43)
was one of the happiest days, it was the happiest day of his life.
Kathryn (34:47)
That's awesome.
Gina (34:48)
In 1904, the Houdinis returned to America. By this point, Houdini himself was in his early 30s and Bess was in her late 20s. And the world was their oyster. They could do pretty much whatever they want. So they bought a house in Harlem. And now that Houdini didn't have to worry about money so much, he turned some of his attention to other passions. He continued performing, of course.
but he also launched his own magazine called Conjurer's Monthly Magazine. It was ostensibly a magic magazine, but really it was kind of just a microphone for Houdini to say whatever he wanted. And what he wanted to say was that he was amazing and his rivals were dumb and stupid.
Kathryn (35:31)
That's funny.
Gina (35:32)
It was incredibly self-serving, which...
is partially why only two volumes were ever released. It was not a popular publication. People were like, what the hell are you saying, man? Sit the fuck down.
Kathryn (35:43)
That's so funny.
Gina (35:45)
I know. But it's also interesting to me because it's such an artifact of his ego, which by this point,
Kathryn (35:51)
for sure.
Gina (35:52)
like, was definitely massive.
this is where we see Houdini becoming the kind of person who's comfortable using his fame to knock others down a peg or two if he thinks they deserve it.
Kathryn (36:03)
Mm.
Gina (36:04)
But before we go down that rabbit hole, and it is a whole rabbit hole, I wanna tell you about some of the tricks that he used to do on stage because we haven't talked much about that yet
Kathryn (36:11)
yeah.
Gina (36:12)
and it's really fun. I love a good magic trick. That's part of the reason why I
wanted to do, yeah man, that's part of the reason why I wanted to
Kathryn (36:16)
Me too. Yeah.
Gina (36:19)
do circus as a whole month. It's just so much fun. So around this time after he had moved back to America, he started inviting the public to come up with ways to test him and then he would do the tricks that they suggested.
One of these was he would escape from packing crates that had been nailed shut and lowered into the water. He,
Kathryn (36:38)
my goodness.
Gina (36:39)
I know he, okay, so this next one, I feel like would be so difficult. He would wiggle his way out of wet sheets that had been tied around him. You know how like wet fabric is so hard to like, the knots are so hard to undo? Yeah, and he did it.
Kathryn (36:48)
my god. Ooh. I yeah,
I don't like that. That would make that's like made me feel like claustrophobic.
Gina (36:59)
I'm about to say one that will make that claustrophobia even worse. You can plug your ears if you want.
Kathryn (37:02)
Okay.
Gina (37:03)
It's also content warning because this one's really gross and I think it's animal abuse, but the animal is dead. He was... Yeah, sorry. Content warning,
Kathryn (37:13)
Okay, content warning, content warning.
Gina (37:15)
content warning. He was once sewn into a dead whale and he managed to escape. Yep. Yeah, it was real. No, it was real.
Kathryn (37:20)
No, that was real? I thought that was fake. my god.
Gina (37:28)
He also did various buried alive stunts.
Kathryn (37:32)
Mm.
Gina (37:34)
My worst fear, one of my worst fears.
Kathryn (37:35)
Yeah, I was gonna say not
my reality, he didn't. I'm gonna choose to ignore that.
Gina (37:40)
Well
the first time he did it he it was like seriously He almost died He was buried
Kathryn (37:46)
Yeah.
Gina (37:46)
in a six foot deep pit without a casket or anything like between him and the it was just Houdini in the dirt That was it
Kathryn (37:54)
Oh my god,
Gina (37:55)
He managed to get his hand above ground like he did break through the dirt, but then he passed out and his assistants wound up having to pull him out of the ground because he couldn't do the rest of it himself.
Kathryn (38:06)
my god.
Gina (38:07)
second time he did use a casket, so he learned from the first time, and he explicitly did it the second time to discredit a fellow performer named Rahman Bey. Rahman Bey had done a stunt where he stayed inside of a sealed casket for an hour, and he claimed that he was able to do this without suffocating because of his supernatural powers. This
Kathryn (38:29)
Mm.
Gina (38:30)
triggered Houdini's hatred of outright lies,
And so Houdini did the same trick with the casket submerged in a swimming pool, and he stayed in there 30 minutes longer than Rahman Bey had.
Kathryn (38:42)
Wow.
Gina (38:43)
And when Houdini would talk about the stunt, he would say that he didn't have any supernatural powers, he just controlled his breathing. But of course, Houdini did more traditional style magic tricks as well. He continued doing the needle and thread thing that he had learned in the circus. And when he did it, he would do it with like a bunch of needles and lots and lots of thread at the same time. So it would be like you pull this thread out of his mouth and there's like hundred needles hanging
from it.
Kathryn (39:06)
Oh, okay.
Gina (39:07)
He also had
Kathryn (39:07)
my god.
Gina (39:08)
one where he would appear to walk through a brick wall that was built in front of the audience on stage. And of course, in one of his most famous tricks, he managed to make a live elephant named Jennie disappear.
So
by the 1920s Houdini had become a worldwide sensation and the timing of this is very important because it coincides with a sharp rise in spiritualism.
Kathryn (39:32)
Mm.
Gina (39:33)
For context, by this point in history, the world was still learning to cope with the millions of deaths caused by the Spanish flu and World War And in times of mass tragedy, people very often go looking for answers from the other side. And this demand gave rise to fraudulent mediums who claimed they commune with the dead for a fee, when in reality, they would use like parlor tricks and cold reading tactics to manipulate people in need.
Helen Duncan is an example of this, we talked about her in episode 49. Kind of a fascinating slice of history, but also deeply depressing at the same time. And in 1920, Houdini turned his energy towards debunking as many of these fake mediums as he could. Interestingly, that same year, he became friends with one of the most well-known spiritualists of the time, Sir Conan Doyle of Sherlock Holmes authorship fame.
Kathryn (40:26)
My god, I forgot about this chapter.
Gina (40:29)
Their friendship is fascinating. There have been entire books written about their
Kathryn (40:33)
Yeah.
Gina (40:33)
friendship. Really, really interesting because Arthur Conan Doyle was kind of like this stuffy, well-educated, doctor, professor, intellectual type, whereas Houdini was like this kind of scruffy, rags-to-riches, really
Kathryn (40:48)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (40:49)
bootstraps kind of person. And so they came from completely opposite walks of life. They had...
pretty differing beliefs about certain things, but they still were so fascinated with each other. And also they bonded a lot over a shared interest in spiritualism. A lot of people
Kathryn (41:04)
Yeah.
Gina (41:04)
think that Houdini hated spiritualists, and that's not really true. He hated the amount of fraud prevalent in spiritualism. He actually desperately wanted spiritualist beliefs to be true, especially the ability to communicate with the dead.
Because about 10 years earlier, Houdini's beloved mother had passed away after having a stroke and he desperately wanted to be able to talk to her again. And so when he came across people who used trickery to make it seem like that was happening when it really wasn't, he would understandably get really furious with them.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, he didn't like the amount of fraud either, but he lacked Houdini's experience with things like spotting sleight of hand. Because of Houdini's magic career, it was so easy for him to tell when people were trying to trick him, because really a lot of the tactics they would use in these fake seances were just like sleight of hand tricks, like the standard stuff you might
Kathryn (41:59)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (42:00)
see on stage, except instead of it being like the powers of the magician, it's like, oh, the spirits are telling me that the number you picked is
six or something like that, you
Kathryn (42:10)
Yeah.
Gina (42:11)
But Doyle didn't have that kind of experience and so more often than not he would vouch for mediums who Houdini knew or suspected to be fraudsters and that did eventually lead to them butting heads. Doyle's wife, Jean, was also a self-proclaimed medium and a few years into Houdini and Doyle's friendship she offered to host a séance for Houdini's mom.
And Houdini was like, yeah, sure, I'll do it because for all he knew, like, Jean might be the real deal. You never know.
Kathryn (42:39)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (42:40)
And during the seance, Jean appeared to be making contact with Houdini's mom through automatic writing, which if you're not familiar is basically when a spirit takes control of your hand and writes down a message. And over the course of 15 pages, Houdini's mother appeared to communicate how happy she was on the other side, how lovely heaven is kind of just like a
I'm okay, I love you, death is awesome kind of message. I can't
Kathryn (43:10)
You're gonna love it.
Gina (43:13)
wait till you're here. Houdini smiled and he thanked Jean for the seance, but he knew that something just wasn't right. For one thing, the letter had started with the sign of a cross, which was weird because Houdini's mom was Jewish. Secondly, the letter was written
Kathryn (43:29)
Mm.
Gina (43:30)
entirely in perfect English.
And while Houdini's mom knew five languages, English was not one of them. And there was nothing in
the letter that only a mother would know. It was all just kind of generic stuff that you could assume any mom would say to their kid.
Kathryn (43:49)
Interesting.
Gina (43:50)
yeah, and this is actually how Houdini called out a lot of mediums who claimed to make contact
Kathryn (43:54)
Yeah.
Gina (43:54)
with his mom is that the messages would always be in English when they spoke to each other either in Yiddish or German his entire life.
Kathryn (44:00)
Okay,
Gina (44:02)
Houdini was too polite to call out Jean then and there. So instead, his petty ass published an article in the New York Sun saying that he had never seen anything that could convince him it was possible to communicate with the dead.
Kathryn (44:16)
Uh
Gina (44:18)
Doyle saw this article, of course, and he wrote to Houdini being like, hey man, what the fuck? I thought we all had a lovely time talking to your mom. Like, what is this I'm seeing you write in the newspaper about it?
Kathryn (44:28)
Mm.
Gina (44:28)
But Houdini didn't back down.
and he started calling out fraudulent mediums left and right. And it became such a big part of Houdini's life that he started incorporating it into his stage shows. Like he would do some magic, he would do some escape acts, and then at the end he had a section called, Do Dead Come Back? Where he would blast local mediums that he considered to be frauds.
Kathryn (44:51)
my goodness.
Gina (44:52)
he became kind of obsessive about it, and this created a lot
Kathryn (44:55)
Yeah.
Gina (44:55)
of friction in his friendship with Doyle, to say the least. But their friendship really and truly crumbled when Houdini turned his attention towards a medium called Mina Crandon. At the time, the Scientific American magazine was offering a cash prize to anyone who could prove supernatural phenomena in front of their panel of investigators.
And by investigators, mean like academics, not detectives or anything like that. Houdini was of course part of this investigation because he inserted himself into anything having to do with that kind of thing. So he attended one of her seances and according to him, he saw evidence of fraud. Like for example, one of Mina's big things is that during her seances, spirits would ring bells and kind of make sounds
But when Houdini went to a seance, he was like, she's just ringing the bell with her feet. Like, what are you talking about? You know? Mm hmm.
Kathryn (45:48)
Oh yeah, he gets it.
Gina (45:52)
The things like that. Exactly. Like he knows this stuff because he's done this stuff.
Kathryn (45:56)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Gina (45:57)
Mina did not get the cash prize and Doyle was
furious about this. lot of spiritualists were, actually, because Doyle, along with many others, still considered Mina to be the real deal, and in their minds, Houdini had ruined one of spiritualism's best chances to gain credibility. This caused the two men to become openly antagonistic towards each other, with Houdini saying that Doyle was old and easily fooled, because he was quite a bit older than Houdini.
And Doyle said that Houdini was not successful because of his practical skills on stage, but because Houdini actually had supernatural powers. Yeah, not, perhaps not the strongest argument, but he also insisted, Doyle insisted that Houdini was using his supernatural powers to weaken the mediums that he was quote, debunking. He picked kind of a
a big old hill to die on, but
Kathryn (46:54)
Yeah.
Gina (46:55)
that's what he said. And that belief was shared by many people. And to be honest, I think that's one of the reasons why Houdini hated fraudulent mediums so much and why he had a bit of distaste towards that branch of spiritualism is because a lot of people did say, Houdini, he's got these like superpowers. And I think that pissed him off because he's like, no, I worked for this shit. Like this is not, I didn't wake
Kathryn (47:14)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Gina (47:16)
up one day able to do it. Like I spent decades of my life.
working really hard every day to be able to. I swallowed needles for this, you know?
Kathryn (47:23)
Yeah.
That's so funny because that's like the total opposite of how it usually goes. Usually people are like, No, I was, you know, I was born a witch. I'm from a long line of, you know
People with gifts and blah blah blah blah and it's like he's out here like, No, I wasn't Yeah.
Gina (47:42)
Put some respect on it.
Yeah, exactly. So yeah, he and Doyle have this very dramatic, very high profile falling out. Like I said, entire books have been written about this. It's actually very, very fascinating to learn about their relationship. And through it all, Houdini kept on performing. In the autumn of 1926, when Houdini was in his early 50s, he left on a five month long coast to coast tour.
with an incredibly grueling schedule. This is another thing about Houdini. He has like a crazy work ethic. He is not good at taking breaks. He's not good at prioritizing himself when he needs to. He is work, work, work all the time. He even broke his ankle at one point during this tour and he kept going. Like he didn't cancel
Kathryn (48:29)
Gosh.
Gina (48:29)
shows or anything for it. He just kept pushing himself through show after show. And one night he was hanging out in his dressing room, laying on the couch because he had a broken ankle.
and was getting his portrait drawn by an artist when a guy named Jocelyn Gordon Whitehead entered the room. Now Jocelyn was a student who had borrowed a book from Houdini and he was there to give it And Jocelyn started peppering Houdini with all of these questions. At one point, Jocelyn asked if it was true that Houdini was so strong you could punch him in the stomach and he would be just fine.
Cause that was another one of Houdini's whole things.
Kathryn (49:03)
Mm.
Gina (49:04)
He was one of those guys that would be like, oh, feel my muscles, feel how strong I am, punch me in the stomach as hard as you can, I'll be fine, you know. You know those guys. That
Kathryn (49:11)
That's kinda like it's kinda like me. I do that.
Gina (49:16)
is a bit like you with arm wrestling. I love it so much,
Kathryn (49:17)
Yeah, no I do do that. Wow, so Houdini, drunk Kathryn.
Show me the difference. I can do a lot of the stuff you're talking about as long as I'm drunk.
Gina (49:31)
I, once again, I'll go broke paying for that. I will take out loans to fund your one woman show. my gosh, yes please. Hey, we are looking for
Kathryn (49:40)
It's just me arm wrestling everyone who comes to my show.
Gina (49:45)
activities for guests to do at our wedding if you're offering arm wrestling services. That'd be so good. Yeah, let's do it.
Kathryn (49:49)
my god, wait, that'd be so funny. An arm wrestling table. Okay, I'll email you my rates.
Gina (49:56)
Okay, excellent. I will email them to Tom.
That could be his problem. I'm an immediate yes.
Kathryn (50:05)
Ha ha ha
Gina (50:06)
So this student is basically asking Houdini like, is it true? Can you take punches in the stomach and still be fine? Whatever. And Houdini, course, was too proud to say no. So Houdini went to stand up, you know, balance on his one foot so that Jocelyn could have a go at hitting him. But before Houdini could even move from the couch, this guy just started wailing on him like punch after punch after punch to his stomach.
And Houdini, I mean, he was still lying down. He didn't have a chance to brace himself or absorb the impact or prepare or anything. It was like a sucker punch, sucker punch, sucker punch situation. The artist stepped in and Houdini quickly signaled like, Hey, hey, hey, hey, I've had enough. And Jocelyn stopped. But by nighttime, Houdini was experiencing horrible pains in his stomach. A doctor took a look at him and informed Houdini that he should immediately have surgery for appendicitis.
But Houdini had shows to perform, and so he ignored medical advice and kept going and going and going. And when he gave what would be his final performance, Houdini had a fever of 104.
Kathryn (51:13)
Hi.
Gina (51:15)
He even passed out during that show and he had to be woken up before he could keep going. And he did keep going. He,
Kathryn (51:20)
Yikes. my God.
Gina (51:23)
I know, he was hospitalized afterwards, but it was too late. And on October 31st, Halloween 1926, Eric Weiss,
Kathryn (51:32)
yeah.
Gina (51:33)
AKA Harry Houdini died at the age of 52. But his story
does not end there.
Like I mentioned, Houdini desperately hoped that there really was a way to communicate with people after death. And so before he died, he told Bess that if it were really possible, he would find a way to communicate with her. And so after his death, Bess announced a cash prize for anyone who could give her a message that she recognized as having come from her husband. something that could only come from him.
And just over two years after his death, it happened. A medium, oh yeah, I didn't know this story. I think it's really interesting. A medium named Arthur Ford delivered a message in a secret code Bess and Houdini had come up with themselves during their circus days.
Kathryn (52:23)
My
goodness. Wow.
Gina (52:25)
It was something they used to use when
they needed to communicate something to each other on stage, but they didn't want the audience to know what they were saying. It's a form of code that still gets used in shows like this today, where basically like you pick a word and that word corresponds with a number. So like, for example,
Kathryn (52:39)
Mm.
Gina (52:40)
if you and I had a magic show and we decided that when I say the word tell, that means the number six, I could be in the crowd getting someone to write down a number.
and then I could call up to you on
Kathryn (52:51)
Yeah.
Gina (52:51)
stage and say, Kathryn, tell me what the number is. And because I said tell, you would say six, we would blow everyone's minds, become millionaires.
Kathryn (52:59)
Okay, I'm gonna
keep this in my back pocket.
Gina (53:05)
Well, when your one-woman show becomes a two-woman show, I mean, we can start doing this.
Kathryn (53:08)
Yeah. I'm just gonna walk around with this code, no
one knows what any of it means. Just like aha
Gina (53:14)
You're just mumbling to yourself.
So Houdini and Bess did a version of this, but instead of the words only corresponding with numbers, they could also correspond with letters of the alphabet or even other words, which would allow them to communicate really complex messages to each other in front of an audience without raising suspicion. And this Arthur Ford guy gave a message in that code.
that spelled out the words, Rosabelle believe. Rosabelle was Bess and Houdini's song. It had been ever since
Kathryn (53:51)
Hmm.
Gina (53:51)
they'd met.
and believe was of course Houdini telling Bess to believe it was really him. And it blew everyone's minds. People were like, holy shit, life after death is real, oh my God. But upon closer inspection, Arthur Ford started to look a little bit suspicious. For one thing, it, I know, yeah, I had the same reaction.
Kathryn (54:15)
was like
I didn't know this part of the story.
Gina (54:18)
Like it still
could technically be true. It's it's possible it could have been a real thing. Don't know. I'll tell you why we're suspicious of Arthur Ford though. For one thing,
Kathryn (54:20)
Yeah. Oh, okay. Oh. Okay.
Gina (54:27)
it was not a secret that Rosabelle was their song. Like I said, it had been their song ever since they met. It was like, you know, it's not like they told everyone they knew, but it wasn't a secret
Kathryn (54:35)
Yeah.
Gina (54:35)
they were keeping. And that super secret code that they had come up with had actually been published in a biography of Houdini a little while earlier.
So it could be that Arthur Ford just read this book and learned the code himself, because again, there was a cash prize for anyone who could deliver a message for Houdini. So there was kind of an incentive to leave no stone unturned So not sure about Arthur Ford. Could have been the real deal. Maybe not. That didn't stop Bess from trying to contact her husband. And every year for 10 years after Houdini died, she held annual seances
to try and get in touch with him to no avail. Her final seance was held at the Knickerbocker Hotel in Hollywood in 1936, and when it ended, she blew out the candle next to Houdini's photograph. And she would later say, quote, 10 years is long enough to wait for any man.
Kathryn (55:30)
Yeah, that's fair.
Gina (55:31)
And that's where I'm gonna leave it. That's the story of Houdini. The life and the death and the after death.
Kathryn (55:36)
my gosh, I really thought you were gonna tell me that someone got it. I was so excited. Cause I knew that he had left, you know, well, not left a message for her, but you know, it was known that if people can come back, I will come back and try
Gina (55:50)
Yeah.
Kathryn (55:51)
talking to you. And I was like, I didn't know that people well, I guess it makes sense that people would bib. I definitely don't believe if that code was public, I don't believe that that's true. If it wasn't, I'd be absolutely sold.
Gina (56:05)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. And to be fair, like, it could have happened. There people still hold seances
Kathryn (56:10)
Yeah.
Gina (56:11)
for Houdini to this day. Like, if you just Google Houdini seance
Kathryn (56:13)
Oh, for sure.
Gina (56:14)
near me, there'll be some theater or group that's, like, doing one. It happens every year. There's a
Kathryn (56:18)
I bet.
Gina (56:19)
bajillion of them. So maybe at some point
Kathryn (56:21)
Yeah.
Gina (56:21)
it's happened. I don't know.
Kathryn (56:23)
That'd be so funny if everyone's contacting him on accident but like
Gina (56:27)
Ha ha.
Kathryn (56:28)
everyone's just out here doing it for fun, so no one knows that the messages coming through are really him. It's it's just
Gina (56:32)
Yeah. He's like, my god.
Kathryn (56:35)
like a cheesy like Houdini themed tour or whatever, and he's like, Hello, can you hear me? Oh
Gina (56:40)
Please for the love of God!
Yeah!
Kathryn (56:45)
That's
so interesting. I, you know what I've gotten obsessed with that I was thinking of while you were talking about the code? the when I was working the Murdle event, the Murdle junior event at schools, um, he was teaching the kids slash therefore by second hand me uh the code. it's like um, it's just an alphabet code where like,
A is Z, B is Y, you know what I mean? So you just can do secret messages for that.
Gina (57:12)
I there was, huh.
Because whenever, I can only do Murdle online I don't have any of the books, and there's a
Kathryn (57:18)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (57:18)
button to decode it, and so I always just decode it. I didn't know there was a, I just assumed it was unbreakable. An unbreakable code. no, don't apologize,
Kathryn (57:22)
Oh, yeah. Oh. Sorry. Yep, that's the code. Well
Gina (57:29)
because now I can do it.
Kathryn (57:31)
and I should say that's the Murdle Junior code. I don't know if there's a different code for the grown-up books or whatever. Maybe not. I mean he was teaching it to everyone. And he would like write a little code in everyone's books that he was signing. I don't know what he was saying. I think he
Forgot what he was saying halfway through. Anyway, all of this is to say I'm like trying to I'm trying to learn it so that I can but see this is the part I keep forgetting. I have to tell someone else the code once I learn it. That's a part
Gina (58:01)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Kathryn (58:03)
that I I'm gonna forget. I'm just gonna be writing messages and people are gonna be like, Kathryn's stroking out again. Just like
Gina (58:09)
does she mean?
Kathryn (58:11)
Please for the love of God, what do you want for dinner? Write the code.
Gina (58:16)
mean, I would say that we should come up with a code, but given our history of saying we should come up with like secret passwords and stuff and then not, I don't know if we actually will. No. What is it?
Kathryn (58:23)
Do you remember our secret password? No, I know
me either.
Gina (58:30)
no clue. I remember the conversations
Kathryn (58:31)
Man.
Gina (58:32)
about it. I remember what the suggestions were. I don't remember what we decided.
Kathryn (58:34)
wait, I remember it now.
I remember. I do remember. It's well no, we need to come up with a new one because the one we have makes me look bad. It's if I am ever calm, that means something's wrong. Do you remember that? We need a new one. It's okay.
Gina (58:47)
Oh, I remember that, I remember that, yeah, yeah, yeah.
yeah,
Fun fact
about Houdini though, while we're talking about codes, so it's not just Bess that he made a code with, he made codes with lots and lots of different, like separate codes with lots of people to be like, if,
Kathryn (59:01)
gosh.
Gina (59:05)
yeah, if I come back, it will be in the code that only you and I have. And so that's how you'll know. like dozens of people.
Kathryn (59:12)
what if every time someone is using a Ouija board and it starts just writing nonsense? What if that's Houdini's code?
so for example, me here in Wisconsin, I am closer to Milwaukee where whoever, you know, in his like his he had a code with his brother and let's say his brother was here in Milwaukee, so he's gonna reach out to me with that code trying to reach his brother, and it's like, This is just gibberish, man. I don't speak your code.
Gina (59:43)
Tuna fish, flour, mango tuna, what does this mean?
Kathryn (59:47)
Yeah, I bet that's it. I bet
we're all constantly talking to Houdini and we don't even know it.
Gina (59:53)
that poor guy. Well, he should have made it little bit simpler for himself, maybe.
Kathryn (59:55)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. That's fascinating. That's definitely one that like he is so I mean this goes without saying, but he's so infamous that I feel like knowing the details of everything are just weird. It's just weird to think that like Houdini's a real person to begin with. Like doesn't he feel
Gina (1:00:14)
Yeah, he's just a guy.
Kathryn (1:00:16)
like yeah, he feels like a character.
Gina (1:00:19)
Very large of it. It's like when people talk about Teddy Roosevelt. I know he was a person, but...
Kathryn (1:00:25)
You could have
said anything literally anything. Why d why does Teddy Roosevelt feel fake to you?
Gina (1:00:32)
He's the reason we have the national parks that we have. That's massive. That's crazy that
Kathryn (1:00:35)
Yeah, that's true.
Gina (1:00:36)
one per- well I know it wasn't just one person, but like larger than life kind of figure that made such a big impact and has such
Kathryn (1:00:41)
Yeah.
Gina (1:00:43)
a lasting legacy that I'm like, you were just one guy. That's kind of crazy. Anyway, that's enough of- that's enough-
Kathryn (1:00:46)
Yeah. That's hilarious. How name came out of left field. I was like
I don't know. I don't know what I was expecting you to say was not Theodore
Roosevelt.
Gina (1:00:59)
good old Teddy. Well, do
Kathryn (1:01:03)
Um
Gina (1:01:03)
you have, perchance, a scary on top for me?
Kathryn (1:01:07)
I do.
So this is a spooky story from the No Sleep Reddit subreddit. And do you ever read the No Sleep stories?
Gina (1:01:16)
When I'm feeling brave I do, yeah.
Kathryn (1:01:18)
Yeah, there this is a pretty mild one, and I I edited out there were some gross bits, but it was pretty long, so I edited out the grosser parts. But yeah, so no sleep. Um there are fictional stories. Don't worry, this is allegedly not real for anyone out there. Um, but yeah, it is called Does Anyone Else Remember a Circus Like This? Mm-hmm.
Gina (1:01:43)
Ooh.
Kathryn (1:01:46)
It was in the mid-70s. I was a kid in a small town, and we had a circus fair come by once. It only came through town one time. I had never heard of it again after that, and very few people from my little town remember it at all. I don't remember what it was called. No one else had heard of it either.
It just looked like a regular fair. The poster had a pig and a magician suit, a monkey fortune teller, you know, that type of thing. I begged my mom for some coins so I could go with some of my friends.
I promised I would be back before sundown, and my friend Timmy's older brother John was coming along with the five of us kids, so it was all good, or so we thought. When we were walking in, there was a creepy dear lady in a nurse costume ushering us into the fair. Something about her smile looked very unsettling, but not one to put on a scared face in front of my friends, I rallied on.
We wanted to see the weirdest exhibits first, and we did. Some of the creepiest things I have ever seen on the internet since then does not even hold a candle to what I saw that day. There was a guy in a cage walking on all fours, his hands extraordinarily long, and he walked on his toes and fingertips. His head was much smaller than a newborn baby's. Think about the size of a large orange. He wore black overalls Okay, right? Okay, what is
Gina (1:03:12)
Wait.
Kathryn (1:03:13)
What is this reminding me of? There's like a movie or something with someone with like a shrunken head. Am I making this up?
Gina (1:03:23)
thinking about the Russian sleep experiment picture until you said the thing about the head. Then I was like, what?
Kathryn (1:03:28)
Oh yeah. I was like, no, he does not have a tiny
hat. Yeah. Yeah, that ooh yeah, that's a scary picture.
Gina (1:03:37)
I don't know which one, what movie someone had a teeny tiny head in.
Kathryn (1:03:41)
I thinking of Beetlejuice? Does that happen in Beetlejuice where his head gets really tiny?
Gina (1:03:44)
Yeah, he does get a, yeah, he gets a really weird tiny head at one point, yeah.
Kathryn (1:03:48)
I think that's maybe what I'm thinking of. I don't know. So imagine imagine
Gina (1:03:50)
because that is really freaky.
Kathryn (1:03:52)
Beetlejuice walking on all fours in a cage. I don't know. That's
Gina (1:03:55)
Okay, sounds awesome.
Kathryn (1:03:58)
That's less way less scary. I don't know. but he wore black overalls that made his pale hands, toes, and face look almost white.
The cotton candy booths were manned by two men with rabbit faces and full white fluffy translucent coats, almost like the cotton candy was made out of them themselves. Their eyes were all red like a bunny's and were creepy as hell. John bought all of us cotton candy so we would not be so creeped out, though we could tell that even he was just mouthing his nervous laugh at each exhibit. Then we saw a bunch of kids playing with ventriloquist dolls that looked
Just like each other. We kept moving on and saw a central tent where the main quote attraction was going to be as we were walking toward it through a row or lane lined with cages and quote shops and tents lining each side. Thoroughly creeped out at this point, John dragged all of us out and back home even before lunch had begun. Though
We were a bit disappointed that the day was cut short because John was clearly scared about what was going on. We were all secretly glad that we made it out of there. The next day, my mom woke me up with a tight hug and told me to wake up. All the parents of the town were very restless and they all met at my house. I was surprised to see my friends, along with their parents, in my house so early in the morning. They were congratulating John for bringing us home when he did. Apparently,
at exactly 6 p.m. right when the circus was about to close and right after we had left the people exiting the main tent got caught in a collapse and three kids from my town Randall Justin and Anne Larie completely vanished without a trace. Before the townsfolk could even realize they were gone, the circus had disappeared.
never to be seen again. The police showed up, but nothing came of their search. They were gone as fast as they had come. My parents and my friend's parents were happy we were home and helped the grieving parents by helping to search for their kids. But we were too young to have known much. I was only ten. Now that I'm older, I wonder what really happened to those kids, but I know
They will never be found.
Gina (1:06:19)
Ooh, that gives me it energy, kinda.
Kathryn (1:06:24)
Yes. Also, did you ever read or see? I it's a movie too. Something wicked This Way Comes. Did you ever read
Gina (1:06:30)
No.
Kathryn (1:06:31)
that? Okay. It's giving like a grotesque version of that for me. It's literally
Gina (1:06:37)
What was it about?
Kathryn (1:06:38)
the I mean, it's literally this story. This like weird, spooky carnival circus fair type thing comes to town and like
Gina (1:06:44)
Mmm
Kathryn (1:06:45)
snatches up all the it's from like the sixties. It's
Gina (1:06:47)
Okay.
Kathryn (1:06:48)
by Ray Ray Bradbury wrote it. Yeah.
Gina (1:06:51)
Okay, I do love
the trope of a creepy circus that appears and then disappears. I like that a lot. Yeah Yeah,
Kathryn (1:06:56)
Yeah. Yeah. Never to be seen or heard from again. Yeah.
Gina (1:07:00)
yeah, it also made me think of did you ever read the series of unfortunate events books? There was one where I think they uh Linked up with either. It was either like a
Kathryn (1:07:09)
Yeah.
Gina (1:07:10)
circus or like a freak show situation I can't remember but that was always my favorite one
Kathryn (1:07:15)
I don't r that's one of those series that I do not remember if I ever read them or not.
I feel like I read them, but I don't remember them. But
That's a good there's a lot of good, like, spooky carnival kid books out there.
Gina (1:07:31)
If I had any circus talents, I would run away with the circus.
Kathryn (1:07:34)
Girl, I will never stop talking about that. I wish I could be a circus person so bad. Remember the guy at the International Clown Hall of Fame and Research Center told me that I still could. It's not too late. I think about that every day. I think about that every single day. I wake up in the morning
Gina (1:07:45)
Yeah, yeah, you did, yeah. I you should.
Kathryn (1:07:49)
and I'm like, I could go be a clown. This could all be behind me. I could go be a clown right now. Nothing's stopping me. God, I feel
Gina (1:07:55)
You'd be a hilarious clown. You'd be very moving.
Kathryn (1:07:58)
like I think I would be a terrible clown. That's why I haven't done it.
Gina (1:08:00)
No! You'd be great!
You have great facial expressions,
Kathryn (1:08:02)
I think it'd be awful.
Gina (1:08:03)
a wonderful physical comedy. You could
Kathryn (1:08:06)
my god, thank you.
Gina (1:08:07)
have one of those horns that goes,
Kathryn (1:08:10)
I always wanted
Gina (1:08:10)
It's always a good trick.
Kathryn (1:08:11)
to be when I was little, I really wanted to be a tightrope walker. To the point, to this day,
Gina (1:08:16)
you
Kathryn (1:08:17)
when you see me out walking my dog and you see me walking on the curb, that's what I'm doing. It's like muscle memory now. Cause I did that so much as a kid because I was practicing for the circus. Now anytime I'm on a curb, I'll like spend a few steps, like stepping on like walking along the curb before I cross the street. I like still do that to this day, just because I'm so used to doing it from when I was little.
Yeah, you'll notice it now that I bring it up. Yeah.
Gina (1:08:41)
love
that that brings some whimsy into everyday activity. I do enjoy that. That is very nice.
Kathryn (1:08:44)
Yeah, I'm so I'm still
holding out hope the circus will come and I'll get discovered and I can walk along my rope. Yeah. That'd be so cool.
Gina (1:08:52)
Walking on a curb, yeah. Oh man, that would be so awesome.
Kathryn (1:08:57)
Anyway, until I get discovered and run away with the circus, um, we would love to hear some stories from you. Feel free to send them over to iscreamyouscreampod@gmail.com
Huge ginormous shout out to Clobear Money Coach for sponsoring this episode. If you want to get started in investing, go hit the link in show notes. friendly reminder to go and join us on Patreon. And if you are not, I was gonna say in the mood for that. Um, if
Gina (1:09:24)
laughs
Kathryn (1:09:24)
you don't fucking want to, please, uh it would really
Gina (1:09:28)
It is kind of like that.
Kathryn (1:09:29)
yeah, it would really help us out if you left us a five star review wherever you listen.
but yeah, until next time, Lil Spoons, keep it cool.
Gina (1:09:38)
Keep it creepy.
