Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1928-08-05
BY A. L. WOODBRIDGE.

X YOU'LL find Floyd @. Thayer on
" the second floor Of an unpreten-
tious building in a manufactur-
4 ing district of Los AngeleS~~a
quiet. grazing man who prob
ably knows more secrets about magl-
clans and spifitualistic mediums IMAM
any one else III the world. He builds
those cabinets with the secret panels,
the chests with sliding walls. the cup
boards which produce strange optical
illusions and all those mysterious, enlg-
matte devices the professional magl-
clans use.
He has become the largest manufac-
turer of trick" goods in the world,
principally because he long ago learned
to forget If Floyd Thayer were to tell
all he knows about the methods of Herr
man the Great, Houdini, Kellar and
others whose names have become ia
NOUS. what a tempest 1t would make
But the secrets. he says, are sealed with
him forever.
Houdini, for whom he built much par
aphernalia, laid no claim to supernatu-
raj power His feats, he asserted, re-
suited solely from physical and meehani--
cal efforts scientifically applied and
built to A point of perfection. Floyd
Thayer likewise promptly and unre-
servedly saws a trick or optical illusion
underlies everything the magicians do.
Ninety per cent of these strange *ac-
comnlishments." he says, may be at
tributed to the performers personality.
The remaining 10 per cent lies III his
having in hand of the proper materials
or devices. And the strangest thing
about them all is that most perplexing
and amazing feats frequently are the
most simple and artless in execution"
x
LIE led the way into his Storeroom
and halted before a device which
resembled somewhat the punishment
stocks in use during the days of the
Puritans. It was made of heavy wood,
iron bound. and looked like an instru-
ment of torture.
I'm this" he explained. "a girls heao
and wrists are pinioned while she knees.
In view Of an audience, or, IN fact, oil
any one within three feet. heavy iron
spikes are driven through her neck at
the point where the spinal column joins
the skull. Then spikes are driven
through her wrists-driven with sledge-
hammers until they protrude from the
the other side. The audience may ex-
anime the stock and the spikes and see
the torture closeup.
But the girl energes without
scratch Not drop Of blood Is shed.
A trick? OF course. it's trick. If 1t
wasn't, the girl would be dead and the
operator or magician in Jail"
He went TO a platform on which was
a large chair, across the arms Of which
were two glittering swords.
"On these" he explained, the ma
gician places the head Of a girl, abso-
Iutely severed from her body. There it
rests, nothing beneath it, nothing to
support 1t except the swords. But the
head talks, answers questions, seems to
enjoy perfect comfort. The face Is re-
Iaxed the eyes bright. The touch Of
the flesh is warm and indisputably the
thing is alive. You may stand three
feet away and study the situation, and
you'd never be able to find why this
head was animated. Yet 1t probably
is the simplest trick in all my estab-
lishment. The head really is alive. How
1t 1t done? All! That / shant answer.
Magicians have to eat!"
Here is another trick" Mr. Thayer
continued, which will make an audi
ence gasp as it watches. I call it the
Altar of Fate This is what happens:
The magician brings his assistant. a
young woman, onto the stage and an
nounces that she is to be burned in al
cohol. Incense pots are placed at the
head and foot of the altar an oaken
table. A hush comes over the audience
as the girl lis laid out for sacrifice and
her body covered with sheets soaked In
that fuel which makes very hot, blue
fame.
land now, ladies and gentlemen, the