Life Of Harry Houdini, Ehrich Weiss Biography
Life Of Harry Houdini
Ehrich Weiss was born in Budapest, Hungary on March 24, 1874. His family migrated to the United States of America when he was only four years old. At an early age he was hooked by the magic shows that he attended. When he was seventeen he read the memoirs of Robert-Houdin, a French magician of the 1800s. Houdin became his idol, and later his life-long inspiration to become “First in my profession, in my speciality in my profession.” When a friend told him that if he were to add the letter ‘i’ to Houdin’s name that it would mean ‘like Houdin” in the French language, he adopted Houdini “with enthusiasm” as his stage name. His friends had already Americanized his first name to Harry.
“One day I was hired to give an exhibition at a children’s party in Brooklyn. At the close a little girl, about sixteen, said to me very bashfully, ‘I think you are awfully clever,’ and then, with a blush, ‘I like you.’ ‘How much do you like me?’ I said, ‘enough to marry me?’ We had never seen each other before. She nodded. And so, after talking the matter over, we were married.” Although Houdini’s marriage may not have been quite so sudden as this account in a magazine interview, this was how he felt emotionally at the time. At the age of 19 he married Wilhelmina Beatrice Rahner (usually called Bess). The date was July 22, 1894.
Houdini’s career as an entertainer began slowly. He and his wife wandered from side show to dime museum, taking any engagement that they could get paid for. It was rare for them to get paid $60 a week between the two of them. During these times their magic shows did not draw crowds and they were left doing comedy shows or freak sideshow acts.
During these early years Harry’s talents as an escape artist were rarely appreciated. One day in a small town in Rhode Island while he was touring with the Welsh Brothers’ Circus, the entire troupe was arrested and locked in jail for breaking the Sunday law. That night after the sheriff had gone home, Houdini picked all of the locks and freed the entire Circus.
Still, audiences seemed uninterested in watching Ehrich free himself from handcuffs. In 1895, while traveling with the American Gaiety Girls, he thought of a way to make his act more interesting....