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Dai Vernon

Dai Vernon
ProfessorandLarryJennings.jpg
Portrait of Dai Vernon (right), along with Larry Jennings (left). Image drawn in 1989 by Sylvester the Jester
Born David Frederick Wingfield Verner
(1894-06-11)June 11, 1894
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Died August 21, 1992(1992-08-21) (aged 98)
Ramona, California, United States
Occupation Magician

Dai Vernon (pronounced alternatively as DIE or as DAY as in David) (June 11, 1894 – August 21, 1992), a.k.a. The Professor, was a Canadian magician. His expert sleight of hand technique and extensive knowledge garnered him respect among fellow magicians. His influence was considerable in the magic world, and he was a mentor to numerous famous magicians. He lived out his last years at the Magic Castle.

Vernon was born in Ottawa as David Frederick Wingfield Verner. While performing, he often mentioned that he had learned his first trick from his father at age seven, adding that he had "wasted the first 6 years" of his life. His father was a government worker and an amateur magician. Vernon studied mechanical engineering at the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario, but by World War I he had moved to New York City.

Vernon first fell in love with magic when he was seven years old after his father took him to see a magic show. The first real magic book he ever owned was an early edition of perhaps the most famous card book of them all, The Expert at the Card Table, by S. W. Erdnase. By the time he was 13 he had memorized the contents of the book. He also had a famous encounter with another up-and-coming young magician from his town, Cliff Green, who asked Vernon, "What kind of magic do you do?" Vernon responded by asking the boy to name a card. Upon pulling a pack of cards from his pocket, Vernon turned over the top card of the deck to reveal the named card and replied to the speechless Green, "That's the kind of magic I do. What kind of magic do you do?"

As a young man, Vernon moved to New York where, in the back room of Clyde Powers' magic shop, he found favor among many of the great magicians of the era, including Dr. James William Elliott and Harry Kellar.

He began to use the first name "Dai" after a newspaper used the name in place of "David"; the paper actually was using the Welsh nickname for David. When Verner first moved to the United States, the male member of a popular ice-skating pair had the surname Vernon; Americans continually mistook Verner's last name to be the same as the popular ice skater, and eventually the magician became fed up with correcting people and simply adopted "Vernon" as well.


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