The first June meeting took place a few days before Father’s Day, so of course the theme was Father’s Day magic.
Guest Bob Firek started us off, not with an actual effect, but discussing some ideas for a character-driven performance as well as a card effect he came up with that he uses to quiet down any hecklers in the audience. Secretary Jay Jennings was next with an effect that started with a story about his dad, then cards with other “Dad Stories” were eliminated one by one. With only one card left, he ran out of time — but “luckily” the last card magically contained a picture showing the story he told at the beginning.
Chris Berry told stories about his father’s travels as a young man with the Harry Blackstone, Sr. Magic Show, and capped it off by giving everyone a copy of The Tops magazine from the 1930s, from when his father became interested in magic as a kid. President Tank Hanna followed with a card effect called Neo 4 Aces where two fours in the helper’s hands traded places with the two aces Tank was holding. After that Frank Ferrante followed with a two-card effect he called No Solitaire that had a very surprising ending for everyone.
Rich Oliver, one of our older members at 94 years old, told some great stories of how he became enamored with magic at the age of 14 when he walked into Abbott’s Magic in Indianapolis in 1945 and met Duke Stern who became his mentor.
Our next performer, Bill Halmi, took a napkin and showed us the moon and a star, performing Dan Harlan’s Starcle (seeing it is so much better than just reading about it). Past President David Goldberg got us all laughing with his rendition of John Bannon’s No No No No No No No Maybe Yes card effect.
Vice President David Boehm performed Max Maven’s Pocket Nightmare. Andy’s father told him not to do card tricks, so he showed us a card trick. Using some cool-looking sunglasses he was able to find a chosen card using the heat from the helper’s hand. (That quite possibly wasn’t the actual science/magic behind the effect, but it was good nonetheless.)
Fun times, and there were some great stories about our dads.
(Photos courtesy Jay Jennings and Tank Hanna.)
