Howard Thurston

Howard Thurston
1914 promotional poster
Born	(1869-07-20)July 20, 1869 Columbus, Ohio, United States
Died	April 13, 1936(1936-04-13) (aged 66) Miami, Florida, United States
Cause of death	Pneumonia
Nationality	American
Occupation	Magician

Howard Thurston (July 20, 1869 – April 13, 1936) was a stage magician from Columbus, Ohio, United States. His childhood was unhappy, and he ran away to join the circus, where his future partner Harry Kellar also performed. Thurston was deeply impressed after he attended magician Alexander Herrmann's magic show and was determined to equal his work. He eventually became the most famous magician of his time. Thurston's traveling magic show was the biggest one of all; it was so large that it needed eight train cars to transport his road show.

Howard Thurston was born July 20, 1869, in Columbus, Ohio. He was the middle son of William and Margaret Thurston. His father William Henry Thurston was a wheelwright and carriage maker who served briefly as a private during the Civil War in the Third Ohio Regiment. His mother Margaret (Cloude), was the daughter of an Ohio farmer. He attended Mount Hermon School for Boys in Northfield, Massachusetts, class of 1893. Among his fellow students were Lee de Forest, "The Father of American Radio," and musical humorist Charles Ross Taggart, "The Old Country Fiddler."

He is still famous for his work with playing cards. According to legend, a Mexican magician appeared at a magic shop owned by Otto Maurer in New York City. The enigmatic magician demonstrated how he could make cards disappear, one by one, at his fingertips.

Maurer showed Thurston the move, which he would later feature in his act. He added the "Rising Cards" trick from Professor Hoffman’s Modern Magic, the book from which Thurston had learned the rudiments of magic. For this trick, he would walk into the audience and ask several people to choose cards from a deck of cards. The deck was shuffled and placed into a clear glass. Thurston would then call for the chosen cards. One by one the cards would rise up to the top of the deck.

Thurston arranged an impromptu audition with Leon Herrmann, nephew of Alexander Herrmann. His performance fooled Leon. From that point on he called himself "The man that fooled Herrmann" and used the publicity to get booked into top vaudeville houses in the U.S. and Europe, billing himself as the King of Cards.