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Harry Houdini, often described as one who "danced with death, played with punishment and toyed with madness", was born on March 24, 1874 in Budapest. His real name was Ehrich Weiss. He was born to the couple Mayer Samuel Weiss and Cecilia Steiner Weiss. Mayer Weiss, his father was a Rabbi. 
From very early on, he was an excellent swimmer and a great athlete. He had incredible strength and agility and would practice for hours. All this aided him in his vanishing acts and stunts that he performed later on.
He loved magic since childhood. He joined circus at a very young age and performed magic tricks in front of the audience.
Driven by an insatiable curiosity, he read everything possible, about magic. Two books – "Revelation of A Spirit Medium" and "The Memoirs of Robert Houdin", influenced him to a great extent and proved to be the turning point in his life and career. He was specially influenced by Robert Houdin and considered him as his ideal. He was so much obsessed by Houdin that he adopted his name by adding an ‘i’ to it and called himself Houdini; and imagined the day he would become as great as him.
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Ehrich had a very humble begining. Being born in a not very well to do family, he and his siblings had to work at a very early age. He initiated his career with selling newspapers, and went on to work as a shoe-polish boy. At the age of 12, the master of escaping made his first escape as he left home to pave his own way in the world and reached America.
In his own words, "the greatest escape I made was when I left Appleton, Wisconsin."
Upon reaching America, he called his brother, Theo, to perform little magic tricks with him. The two brothers performed at several places like restaurants, beer bars, etc. but failed to make a name for themselves.
Initially, his shows consisted of plain card tricks and other simple magic where a rabbit would pop out of the hat and several silk handkerchiefs of various colors would turn into a long black silken cloth. These shows failed to evoke interest and were rejected by the public. |
Meanwhile, Houdini got married and his wife, Bess, started assisting him in his shows. Success was still a fleeting entity and they had to continue working at beer halls and circuses. Then they ventured into a burlesque traveling troupe called ‘ The American Gaiety Girls’, which led to bankruptcy after some months. He was in such a state of penury that at one point they had to sleep in a hallway. Their meals were irregular, that too at the generosity of others.
Soon this contortionist and trapeze artist contemplated innovating something that was totally unheard and unseen of. He dwelt upon the idea and came up with escapism.
An incident, otherwise insignificant, paved the way for this great act.
One day, a person approached Houdini to have his handcuffs cut. Houdini was, at that time, working with a locksmith. Houdini tried to cut-off the cuffs but the steel was very hard. Failing to cut with all the available resources, he tried opening it by working on the keyholes. He was surprised himself when he succeeded. The idea of unshackling handcuffs was born.
Later in life, he worked on the same principle each time he freed himself from handcuffs.
His release, at this stage, included freeing himself from handcuffs and ropes; all of which were simple.
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