The first recorded magician in history was Dedi about 3,800-4,500 years ago in Egypt. He did such feats as restoring a goose after he had wringed its head off and even cut off an Ox’s head and brought it back to life. Also he could have wild animals like lions follow him at will. Not one pick a card trick though! Probably because cards weren’t invented until centuries later.

Houdini didn’t die in the water torture cell or any other escapes as most people think. Actually, Houdini claimed to be able to with stand a blow to the chest due to well-developed muscles and was unexpectedly challenged one night before a show. His appendix was ruptured and peritonitis set in by the time he got to the hospital several hours after the show. He died shortly after arriving at the hospital.

David Copperfield’s real name is David Kotkin. The “Copperfield” he picked up from a Dicken’s novel by the same name. Also, David began his magic career performing as “Davino” boy magician at kid’s birthday parties.

Criss Angel, a modern day Houdini. Started out in magic like most people do. He said, in a newspaper article from USA Today on August, 2nd 2005, “ My Aunt Stella did a card trick. . .It boggled my mind.” He goes on about how he learned to do the trick and what fun he had puzzling adults with it.

David Blaine was a waiter in a organic food restaurant doing things like making people’s check appear on his back and changing cards in people’s hands before he became a mysterious stranger on TV.

Doug Henning the forerunner of David Copperfield on network TV dropped out of magic when he became deeply involved in the Transcendental Meditation movement and began to work on creating a spiritual theme park called “Veda Land.” Yes, it’s actually true!

The “Sawing a lady in Half” illusion was invented by P.T. Selbit in 1921.
Indian Conjuror Sorcar did a version of “Sawing a Lady In Half” with a buzz saw for a British TV special. Apparently time was running short. The lady was never put back together. The station was flooded with calls form concerned viewers who had to be calmed by operator’s reassurances that she was all right.

One magician a Mr. Sutton in January of 1838 did a trick in which a lady vanished and was found in an enormous pie. No reference made as to what type of pie it was.

“The Rabbit From The Hat” trick is believed to be traced back to a magician taking advantage of a topical story in 1726 about an English housewife, Mary Tofts who gave birth to a litter of Rabbits, said to be sexually accosted by a large rabbit in the woods. This even drew the interest of King George I. When the press clamored for a repeat she obliged, but under more stringent conditions and was found out to be a fraud. Who would have thought?

The trick known as the “bullet catch” has actually killed more than a few magicians either by forgetting some key step to the trick or by some jokester putting foreign objects like a button or shot pellets into the gun without the performer’s knowledge. Most conjurors for obvious reasons avoid doing this trick. However, Penn and Teller the famous comedy duo do a double bullet catch as part of their show.

Washington Irving Bishop, born in1856 a noted mind reader/psychic was prone to cataleptic fits. He was known to pass out and appear in a death-like state for hours, even days before reviving. Because of this he always carried a letter, his "life guard” preventing autopsy or application of electrodes or ice. After one such fit, he was seen my doctor’s who applied electrodes. After twelve hours and no signs of life he was pronounced dead. His wife and his mother both emphatically claimed he was autopsied while still alive. No proof was ever brought to substantiate the claim.

Erik Van Hanussen, a German mind reader/psychic rose to fame during the Nazi’s reign and was a close confidant to Hitler. In one session among the elite of Berlin Society he foresaw the burning of the Reichstag, an important German government building. Of course it prove to be correct the next day when it burned because he overheard secret plans of the Nazi’s to burn it the night before. This breech of secrecy by Hanussen cost him his life. It wasn’t until years later he was found in the woods outside Berlin having been shot twelve times.

Matthew Buchinger, nicknamed, “The Little man From Nuremberg” was married four times, fathered eleven children, excelled as a marksman, nine pins (forerunner of bowling), playing half a dozen musical instruments and was an accomplished calligrapher in addition to being an accomplished conjuror all while growing no more than 29 inches tall. He was severely handicapped by having no arm or legs only two fin like protrusions where arms and hands would normally be. He used ingenious methods and courage to overcome his shortcomings.

Robert-Houdin, Houdini’s namesake (adopted after a friend mentioned adding an “i” would mean like so and so.) quelled an uprising of Marabouts, religious holy men in the French occupied Algeria in the 1850’s performing magic feats such as making a young native disappear, causing a strong man to be unable to lift a tiny chest that earlier he had lifted with ease and the greatest of all, to accept a challenge to be fired at by a marabout in a village square. The conjuror being allowed to chose the pellets and load the guns. Robert applied his magical arts and avoided death.

George Melies, a French magician born in 1861 pioneered the use of “trick” photography to make films where people appeared, dissolved, and transformed before the viewers eye using basic cuts and edits as well as specially painted backdrops he painted himself. Many of these filmed illusions were inspired by Maskelyne&Cooke’s illusion shows of the same time period.