Harry Houdini: A Biography

Harry Houdini is one of the most famous and well-known magicians of all time. Almost any person, whether he or she is interested in magic or not, is well-aware of who Harry Houdini is. Harry Houdini is a truly interesting person to learn more information about, as not only was he one of the greatest and most well-known magicians to ever live, but he was also a fairly big skeptic of supernatural occurrences and tried to discredit people alleging supernatural activity of the sort, which he believed to be fraudulent. Harry Houdini has a very interesting life, which is extensively documented on the website magiciens.biz .

Harry Houdini was born in Budapest in Hungary in the late nineteenth century. He was born by a different name, but later changed his name to Harry Houdini once he moved to America and became very interested in magic, as he was inspired by a fairly famous French magician, who had a similar name. He was one of seven children and his father was a rabbi.

Harry Houdini came over to America with his family in 1878 when he was just a four year old boy. Harry Houdini and his family moved from Budapest in Hungary to Wisconsin in the United States of America.

Harry Houdini's interest in magic began in the very late nineteenth century, around 1891. At the beginning of his run with magic for the most part, focused solely on card tricks ad that is what his main draw as in all of his small time magic shows. As time went on, however, he began to get bored with the card tricks and, wanting something more complicated, began to carry out trials dealing with escape acts.

At the beginning of his career he worked with his brother and their act was known as the Houdini brothers. After marrying his wife, Harry Houdini started doing shows with his wife instead of his brother, renamed the act The Houdinis and that is what his show was for the rest of his magic career.

Harry Houdini's big break came to him in the last year of the nineteenth century as he got an agent and then subsequently, after a few failed interviews, got a six month long performance deal at Alhambra Theater in London. He quickly gained popularity and notoriety as the "Handcuff King" as that was his biggest act, escaping out of heavily armed and manned jail cells. This was just the beginning of Harry Houdini's extremely successful and financially beneficial career. He made a lot of money and developed quite a following.

In the early twentieth century he moved back to the United States of America, except this time he moved to Harlem in New York. He experienced extreme success in America as well as he escaped from jail cells, handcuffs and straight jackets, just to name a few.

Harry Houdini's most famous act and most revolutionary was the Chinese Water Torture Cell. For this act, he would be suspended upside down and locked in a glass and steal cabinet that was full of water. He would then escape from the tank after having held his breath for about three minutes.