Card Tricks With Gloves ? They Thought Cardini Crazy

THE BOSTON DAILY GLOBE

November 2, 1948

Card Tricks with Gloves?

They Thought Cardini Crazy

By JULIAN BEAUMONT

A German shell exploding in Ypres early in World War I proved a blessing in disguise for Cardini the magician, because if Cardini and the shell had not connected, he probably never would have embarked on a career of magic.

Born in a small Welsh mining town and christened Richard Valentine Pitchford, Cardini ran away from home and became an exhibition billiard player.

"Then in 1914, I joined Lord Kitchener's Army," the magician began wih the trace of a british accent. He palmed cards while he talked in his suite at the Hotel Somerset and told of his ambition to become a magician.

"It all started, I guess, when I was sitting on the firestep--it was cold and wet in the trenches and I had a deck of cards I'd practice with just to help pass the time.

"But then it got so my hands would get numb, and I'd have to put on gloves. Now it's diffficult enough to try and do card tricks without gloves, never mind with the, but I like magic so much I wouldn't give up.

(picture caption)FIRST, says Cardini, the magician who does all his tricks wearing kid gloves, split the deck of cards and wedge upper half into lower in lower half

"And then I got hit so hard I didn't regain concousness for six weeks. When I recovered I was shaking like a leaf constantly, and doctors in a hospital somewhere in the Northern part of England asked if I had a hobby. They thought something might help take up my mind.

"When I told them a pack of cards would help--and a pair of gloves--they were confused. What good would the gloves be? I guesss they thought I was daft when I said the only way I'd play cards was with gloves on, for in another week, I was transferred to a hospital--a mental hospital, mind you--somewhere in the Southern part of England."

(picture caption)FANNING them into something to cool you off with on a hot day. Where there's a deck of cards, there's a fan--with Cardini around.

Played before King and F.D.R

Eighteen months later, after Cardini consistently refused to train as a plummer, carpenter, or blacksmith, ("when I told them I wanted to be a magician, I guess they thought for sure I was crazy then") the man who was soon to become famous in his field started to climb from small time vaudville rankss to big-time entertaining.

He's played a command performance for the King of England, President Truman has had him at the White House--Roosevelt liked him so much he entertained F.D.R. and family four different times--he was featured seven times at Radio City Music Hall, and was practically a fixture at the famous Palace in New York which booked him for 11 engagements.

"Of course they didn't know so much about occupational thrapy then back in the first World War, but manipulating my fingers with cards amounted to just that, don't you see?

"Lots of magicians have imitated me--it's flattering to be sure. Sometimes they'll turn to me and say, 'Well, how about your name, Cardini. Isn't that a lot like Houdini?'

Wrong Name

"Certainly it is. And I'll tell you how I got it. after traveling all over Great Britain from 1919 to 1922 with not much great success in show business, I went to Australia. I billed myself as 'Progessor Valentine.' 'The Great Pitchford,' and 'Val Raymond at various time and when I introduced myself to an agent in Sydney as Val Raymond'he almost fell over backward in his chair.

(picture caption)NEXT, hold the lower half tightly in your hand. Does it look easy? Yes, but just try and do it. It took Cardini years of practice.

"'why not ?' I demanded.

"'Because there's a 'Val Raymond wanted by the police right now.

"So he suggested I take the name Houdini. I told his there was a Houdini in the United States, and We'd get into all sors of trouble if we used in (sic)abroad

"'I could call myself "Cardini," I suggesed in jest.

"But the agent took me serious. The next day I was booked for a theatre date and I didn't know, at first, who the magicain was advertised outside. There it was in big letters on a lobby display:"Now Playing: Cardini the Mystic/" That was me."

Cardini says that magicians, as a whole, are old-fashioned. The tricks they do were being done 50 years ago.

"Imagine magicians still using wands"--Cardini doesn't -- "in these times. Why, they went out with the women's sufferage movement.

Since Cardini uses no mechanical devices--gimmicks? as the are known as in the trade--he relies soley upon his own skill. And practice still takes two or three hours of his time when he's not working before audiences.

"In the magic business, there are bout 300,000 people who think they are magicians . Most of them are amaateurs and as I heard another performer say not so long ago, every one of them--except about seven--has written a book on magic.

"Have I?" asked Cardini. "No"