Houdini’s most famous acts included escaping from a straitjacket while suspended from a crane, an underwater escape called the “Chinese water torture cell,” and surviving being buried alive. His stunts grew more and more dangerous as he fought to stay ahead of his competitors. While making a name for himself, he challenged several police departments to handcuff and jail him, but no one could contain him.
In tribute to French illusionist Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin - known as the “ father of magic” - the aspiring magician changed his name from Ehrich Weiss to Harry Houdini - a name now synonymous with disappearance and escape.Īn athletic and deeply competitive man, Houdini excelled as an entertainer and moved to New York City. As a child, he imitated the high-wire and trapeze artist, Jean Weitzman, going so far as to lose a few teeth while attempting his own high-wire act. Growing up in Wisconsin, Houdini became enamored with the traveling magicians, circus performers, and vaudeville acts that came through the town. Wikimedia Commons photo by John Thurston. Harry Houdini jumped from the Harvard Bridge in Massachusetts in 1908.
First arriving in Castle Island, New York, the day before Independence Day, 1878, they relocated to Appleton, Wisconsin, where Houdini’s father immigrated two years earlier and became the town’s rabbi. When he was just four years old, Houdini (born Ehrich Weiss) and his four siblings emigrated from Hungary to the US with their mother. During his time as a magician, Houdini’s performances garnered enough fame and wealth to allow him to tour the world, but when war broke out in Europe, the renowned escape artist stepped out of the spotlight to teach survival and escape techniques to American soldiers and spies. Harry Houdini - the magician best known for his death-defying escapes underwater, underground, and in the air - played a significant yet little-known role in the American war effort during World War I.
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