50-Cent Colection of DeLand's Famous Card Tricks

As much as I love the awesome artwork of some of the ads, I always enjoy it when I pull out an advertisement that just makes me laugh. I admire their thriftiness- instead or reprinting the flier or renaming the collection, they simply purchased a few red stamps and went to work!

Here is a close up, in case you don't want to click on the picture to enlarge it:
Anyhow, this revised ad is for the collection from DeLand- and I wasn't able to find an online source of this complete set, but I found this deck & guide, which looks to be similar (if only adjusted for inflation).

A Letter From Alexander

This was a great thing to unfold- the colors on the logo are still so vivid! I wouldn't even suspect it was that old if it wasn't for the second page being so frail. This looks like a follow-up letter to the advertisement we viewed earlier this week.... and I really have to wonder if Alexander (or the company) was really employing people to type these, or did they mass-produce them to look that way? Also, I am going to have to do some digging for the "enclosed circular on Crystal Gazing,"- it sounds intriguing!
I have looked at this so closely, and I cannot figure out if the signature on the second page is printed or actually signed. Everything has just settled so much with age. I'm afraid to try any CSI ridiculousness, but if anyone would like to comment on if this was his actual signature, that would be appreciated.

Mini Spirit Slates!

I learned about Spirit Slates at the end last month, and I guess it is a good thing I stumbled upon the ad first, or I would have had no clue what I was looking at when I found this:

It is just a little bigger than 4x6. I can see the chalk markings of where someone had once used it. The little secret take-away panel comes out a lot easier than I thought it would.

Between the panels, I found this typed description:

No. 58 The Mysto Spotter Card Trick

I am excited to show you this today- the complete trick packet was there and intact!

So, what we have are 6 cards. They all look like this on the back, with the strange little dog staring you down:If you hold the cards correctly when showing the deck to the audience, they look like this:
You would then shuffle the deck and place them down, and have someone roll a dice- you would promise them that no mater where the ace was, the dice would correctly predict it's position. You could lay the cards out flat, or hold them in your hand.

The trick is that all of the cards, with the exception of the ace, all really look like this:
If you hold the card correctly when you reveal, it will look like the dice found the ace every time!

Here are the full instructions:

Miracles in Modern Seership and Duck Vanish (Dr. Q Ad part 4)

First we have one of those iconic images of Claude Alexander Conlin, also known simply as "Alexander"..... before I even opened these boxes, I loved vintage magic posters, and his creepy and mystical face has always been one of my favorites. It is funny to me that magicians back then were always inventing new personas for themselves- in my research of these ads I learned that Alexander created the Dr. Q character to announce newly invented tricks.

So what about the Original Duck Vanish!? There is that sad scene in The Prestige where the magician makes the bird vanish, only to discover it was simply crushed to death by the cage.

I found this video of Magician Michael Barron performing a similar trick, but could not find any exact description on making the ducks vanish. I hope Alexander figured out how to do it without killing the ducks.

Mysterious Dr. Q Materialization of a Living Human Being (Dr. Q Ad part 3)

While I could not find the exact method for the trick described in this ad, the picture of the hands coming out & ringing the bell, tambourines, etc., made me think of one of my favorite Penn & Teller routines:



I think they took the original idea and made it much more entertaining.