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Edited by: F. William Kuethe, Jr. 700 Glenview Ave. S.W. Glen Burnie, Md. The Magic Cauldron is a quarterly, appearing in March, June, October and December. Subscription rate: $2.00 per year (four issues plus supplements).

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The time of the year has come again to wish all the readers and subscribers of The Magic Cauldron a very Merry Christmas and most happy, prosperous and peaceful New Year. I hope the promise of Christmas brings peace and solace to those who have lost loved ones during the year. And may 1967 bring fulfillment of 1966's brightest promises to you. I wish that I had time to write each of you a personal letter but since I don't, and since this is my Christmas card to you as well as being the current Cauldron, let me share my Christmas impressions with you. There is snow on the ground outside, in fact it just stopped snowing. You don't have to have snow for Christmas, but it certainly helps. Beside adding a nip in the air, snow is Nature's way of hiding so many man-made defects on the Earth. The colored lights are out on the streets and the decorations are everywhere. The lights inside people seem to shine more brightly this time of the year than any other. The Christmas cards come from all over the globe, some with magical motifs, others ingeniously personalized like Sid Lorraine's, which gets more clever each year, and Howard Lyon's, whose son is now up to "Three French Hens" and showing real talent. I've saved the first two cards, and in nine more years I hope to frame the entire "Twelve Days of Christmas". The star is already on the top of our Christmas tree, which I slogged through the snow to cut. Store bought trees don't seem as real. Christmas carols are playing. They are too pretty to use just at Christmas time, it seems. Too bad we can't have Christmas carols and the Christmas spirit throughout the whole year. The children have heads full of visions, but you can't buy them off with just sugarplums nowadays. And so from every one at our house: Ricky (7), Marrian (6), Melinda (3½) and Eddie (1), my wife Bev, without whose patience and understanding there would be no Cauldrons at all, and from me, we wish you all the very happiest of holidays. And the girls send special greetings to Susie Lund. Merry Christmas to all



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AFTERTHOUGHTS
The supplement to this issue was kindly supplied by Gene Shelley, who has recently started in business as a magic bookseller. Although there are but few such booksellers, there are not too many bookbuyers either, so I can but wish him good luck in a comparatively barren field. Since I'm not speaking from experience, I may be wrong, but I don't think the book buyers are exactly falling all over each other in their zeal. Pity.


There are several magic magazines that appeared to have suspended publication and then, after various intervals of time have passed, one or two more issues appeared as dying gasps before the magazine finally gave up the ghost for good. One such magazine is the Eagle Magician, the final copy of which is enclosed as a supplement. Collins Pentz, who apparently had a penchant for starting magazines, commenced publication of the Eagle Magician in November of 1915 with Vol. 1 #1. There were a couple of short gaps in publication until June of 1922, when the magazine seemed to die with the issue listed as Vol. 6 # 11. But then, thirteen years later, another issue appeared, the enclosed copy. The Eagle was no phoenix, however, and with this afterthought, the Eagle Magician's published life ended. Pentz did, at least, neatly end the volume, something that cannot be said of many other magazines. Apparently Pentz then turned his literary efforts to the E. M. C. A. Review, and thought no more of his fallen Eagle.
There are several other such "afterthoughts", and I'll deal briefly with a few of the more familiar.


Because of the First World War, Stanyon was forced to suspend publication of his fine magazine Magic with Vol. 14 # 11 dated Aug., 1914. He resumed publication in Sept. of 1919 with Vol. 14 # 12, but publication came to a final halt shortly thereafter in June,1920 with Vol. 15 # 9.
Feisman's house Organ, the Magical Review, had a comparatively short and shaky existence. It started in Oct., 1919 and continued monthly with a few stutter steps here and there. Vol. 1 # 9 combined June and July of 1920, Vol. 2 # 1 combined Nov. and Dec. of the same year, Vol. 2 # 3 was for Feb. and March, 1921, and a combined issue, Vol. 2 # 4-5 represented the period April through October, 1921. The next issue was for Nov., 1921 through Feb., 1922 and then, after an interval of about a year, Vol. 2 # 7-8 came out for April-May, 1923. The next issue, Vol. 2 # 9-10 came out in Nov.-Dec., 1923, and there were no more issues until June 1924 when a copy combining Feisman's Magical Review and Pierce's Magic World came out, calling itself "Vol. 8 # 1".(The previous issue of Pierce's Magic World was Vol. 7 # 10 for Feb.-Mar., 1924.) The moribund merger lasted just the one issue, and then oblivion for eight years, until the late spring or early summer of 1932. An undated issue of Feisman's Magical Review came back on the scene, captioned "Vol. 3 # 1",but with that issue, the magazine did cease.


Another noteworthy dealer's magazine was Thayer's Magical Bulletin, which commenced Jan., 1914 with Vol. 1 # 1 and ran fairly steadily until May, 1925, when it apparently ceased publication with Vol. 12 # 7. Some twenty-three years later, Bill Larsen (Sr.) the editor of Genii and then also owner of Thayer's, decided to revive the Magical Bulletin. He issued Vol. 13 # 1 dated June, 1948 and followed with Vol. 13 # 2 dated "Fall, 1948". But these two issues were but an epitaph to a fine magazine that had died 23 years before.


Not strictly an afterthought, but worthy of note, is Al Munroe's Magical Miscellany. The "final" issue, put out by Al Munroe, was #60, dated Jan., 1950. Then in Sept., 1961, using pages that had already been made up by Al Munroe,



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Bob Lund sent out issue # 61.


Bob Lund also has related the tale, in Abra, of how he had his file (Vol. 1 # 2 thru 6) of Senator Crandall's pink Sheet bound and sent to the Senator to be autographed. Back came a note saying in effect "Too bad you didn't wait until you had a complete file" and a copy of Vol. 1 # 1.


Although not in a class with Aesop, I can't help but point out the moral to this story: If you collect magic magazines, don't be in a hurry to get them bound.

ANDERSONIANA by J. B. Findlay

In this same year Professor Anderson opened his famous but ill-fated City Theatre in Glasgow Green and hardly a mile away from where his erstwhile mechanic had his premises.


We now take a gentle leap ahead to March, 1857, when, long after Anderson had suffered severe losses from the effects of his City Theatre fire and was trying again elsewhere, there came to Glasgow Signer Eugene Bosco. The portrait on the front cover of the book of Conundrums published by Bosco shows him as being a rather sallow complexioned gentleman. He was playing the Prince's Theatre in the city and like Anderson favored the audience participation notion of the Conundrum Book. Not only were the members of the audience charged threepence for the book but the performer managed to get innumerable business people to advertise in it. This it will come as no surprise to find "John A. Mann, Musical Instrument Maker, 7, Argyle Street" amongst the number supporting the conjurer. One wonders if Mann had had a pre-view of the contents of the 1165 conundrums and had read as to why an Anderson audience was like the moon - because it was only half-full: would his loyalty to his old friend make him refrain from patronizing a foreign magician.


The actual title of Bosco's book is "LIST OF CONUNDRUMS" and this writer had two copies, one of which went to his friend Stanley Collins 25 years ago.



page 95

A FEMALE CHARLIER

by Robert Lund

Her name was Gloria Minoprio. She was a handsome woman, in the manner of Rosalind Russell, the actress, and apparently had money. At various times she was active in professional golf, horse racing, sheep farming and conjuring. Golf and horses are stock pastimes for women of wealth. But sheep farming and sorcery?


Miss Minoprio became interested in magic about 1935 and issued her lavish brochure--it is too grand a production to be labeled a booking folder, although that's what it was--a few years later, circa 1938 or '39.


The brochure was limited to 100 signed, numbered copies. According to Las Lavante, one of Miss Minoprio's teachers, the cost of printing the pamphlet was 100 pounds, $5 a copy in those days.


The booklet measures 7 7/l6ths by 10 1/8th inches. The cover, a cream colored stock, is decorated with the monogram GM printed in gold and arranged in a repeated pattern, back and front. The cover and pages are tied together with a gold string.


The text consists of 24 unnumbered pages, a few of them blank. The first four pages are in the form of letters from Miss Minoprio's teachers--Messrs. Levante, Jasper Maskelyne, Grahm Adams and Val Duval- testifying to her prowess as a magicienna. There are four full-page photographs of Miss M and another full-page illustration of her hands. Five pages are devoted to newspaper excerpts on her career as a golfer.


The brochure was distributed in a silk-lined case. Covered in a blue fabric with a narrow border of gold on the front cover, the case has no outward identification on it. The probable object here was to arouse the curiosity of recipients of the booklet, so they could not discard the piece unopened.


So much for the physical description of one of the most lavish and now one of the rarest pieces of promotion material ever issued by a magician. Who was Gloria Minoprio and why did she produce the brochure?


Bert Pratt suggests Miss M qualifies as a female Charlier. Where did she come from? Where did she go? Is she still alive today?


Those questions will go unanswered. I have talked with two magicians who knew Gloria and Bert Pratt talked to a third. I have posed my questions about her in Abra and have written several sorcerers who might have known her. All inquiries have drawn a blank.


Here, in the words of Les Levante, Graham Adams and Bert Pratt, are some pieces of the puzzle:

Levante: "This lady, now deceased (Las believes, but not confirmed) played golf for England, using one club only. She was about six feet tall and felt she was out of the picture in society, so she decided to learn magic. She paid me handsomely to teach her and became so adept that I called in Graham Adams. He hit her with Erdnase."


"When I tell you that within six months she had mastered Erdnase, you will probably think I am romancing. She sent her brochure to the Rajahs of India with the idea of giving shows in their palaces to raise money for the Red Cross. Unfortunately, the war broke out and this venture had to be cancelled."


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Adams: "About 1935 I had a phone call from Southport from a Mr. Gavin, whose niece was playing in the ladies open golf championship. Levante had suggested I give her some lessons, and Mr. Gavin asked if I would meet them.

"I taught her Hoffmann's passe-passe coins, a four ace routine by Bertram and Stanley Collins, table shuffles and cuts out of Erdnase, a bottom deal, lap routine, memory tricks with cards and other objects, the sympathetic silks, the card pass, and some other things by Bertram and Leipzig. I supplied her with some coins and other pieces.


"I met them later in London and they came to see me perform at The Magic Circle. After that they went to India for golf as the guests of one of the Rajahs, perhaps Johore."

Adams' story is picked up by a source who prefers to remain anonymous: "Miss Minoprio returned from India and sold her props to Davenport. She reportedly told Davenport she and Mr. Gavin had married, but they were separated. I read an article that she was sheep farming in Cotswold. I don't know if she is still living.


"She was a beautiful, immaculate woman. She and Gavin were very nice people. I understand Gavin once owned The Spectator, but this I cannot verify."

Pratt: "My knowledge of Gloria Minoprio was obtained from Val Duval a year or so before he died, so the scraps that follow are really his.


"She was one of the world's most beautiful women, as her brochure rightly shows. She came of a rich family and when Val Duval knew her, she was staying in a princely suite at the Park Lane Hotel, Piccadilly, with her Uncle, who was a race horse owner. Val believed the entire family were noted race horse owners in those days.


"She was a brilliant golfer, going around with very low scores, using nothing but an old driver and a putter. This was due, apart from obvious lessons by an expert, in great part to her having a keen eye and razor-edge reflexes.


"I do not know how she became interested in conjuring. Levante, Adams, Maskelyne and Duval had letters or phone calls from her for lessons in conjuring. When Val heard what she offered to pay for lessons, he couldn't believe his ears.


"As far as Val knew, she never gave a public performance. Her idea was to travel around the princely palaces of India performing before the nabobs to raise money for her favorite charities. The brochure was prepared with this in view.


"Val Duval said she was taken ill in Egypt on her way to India and returned to England. It was his opinion that she died of polio within a year or so of her return. Val wasn't sure of her nationality. She spoke impeccable English and also French. She seemed to have no settled home in England, always living in a luxury hotel."


Thus ends the testimony of the few surviving sorcerers who had contact with the mysterious lady legerdemanist.



page 97

M's brochure. The item is not in the Harry Price collection or the Magic Circle Library. It was not circulated amount magicians, except for the four men who coached her, each of whom received a complimentary copy.

Precious as the item might be to collectors of magicana, it is not the sort of thing and Indian potentate would keep around his palace. Many of these copies, I am afraid, have been destroyed, I know of two copies of the booklet in the hands of magicians in England and one copy in the United States.

Woman, some sage said, is the eternal mystery, Gloria Minoprio was all that.

Page 98

Supplement

The Eagle Magician Vol. 6, No. 12, July - September 1935.

(Reprinted with permission from The Magic Cauldron. Copyright 1966. Send an e-mail to Bill Kuethe with any comments or questions.)