No. 301 - Houdini

I was listening to a show on XM Radio today about Harry Houdini, the famous magician. It mentioned that he died on Halloween in 1926. I think I recall hearing that at some point.

I learned that in the summer of 1926, a few months before he died, Houdini heard about a magician who had sealed himself inside a box and had been lowered into water, where he allegedly stayed for over an hour, submerged, before coming up out of the water and the box, triumphant. Houdini purchased a bronze coffin and had himself locked into it and submerged in a hotel swimming pool for an hour and a half before the coffin was pulled out of the water and opened to reveal a smiling, healthy Houdini. Houdini took the coffin on tour with him in the fall, displaying it in the lobbies of the theaters he played. The famous Buried Alive! poster was designed to promote this very illusion. He jokingly instructed his wife to use the coffin should anything happen to him while on tour. Sadly, it was in that very coffin that Houdini's body was returned to New York for burial.