Hello,
I am looking for information on the working of the Blackstone Sr. "Tire Illusion". Any information on presentation and method would be welcome. Thank you in advance for your replies.
Best Wishes,
James

Hi James .. you might be able to find some video of this illusion as his son, Harry Jr. also performed this illusion from time to time. There is even a DVD available that might have it on there. This may still be the property of Mrs. Blackstone as far as performing or recreating this illusion. I think if you send an email to her you'll get all the information you'll need. Look it up online possibly under Blackstone Magik .. yes with a "k" in magic. Good luck ..

Steve

Blackstone Jr performed the "Tire Illusion" on the Best of Magic in the UK about 15 years ago. There may be some people around with a VHS/DVD of the performance.

Blackstone Jr. performed a version of the Tires but not exactly as Sr. did. George Johnstone tipped the whole thing to me once. It was typical Blackstone Sr. simple and gutsy but it worked 100%. The original apparatus was owned by Mark Wilson and is now in the Copperfield museum where I saw it last year.

Jr.'s version is on tape. It might be on the dvd or the PBS special. Bill Smith made the apparatus and had a devil of time working with the heavy truck tires.

A great illusion but it takes the proper staging and personality to properly sell it.

Richard

Hi James,

You'll find a performance of it on the Magical Moments DVD from Stevens. It's in the Christmas Toyland sequence.

John

I've also seen a version on one of Bill Smith's promo materials showing some of the Illusions that he has built. You may want to contact him as well.

=Frank=

Thank you to everyone who replied...I will let you know what I find out.
Happy Holidays,
James

Few people know that this illusion was originally conceptualized by Walter Gibson, who passed the idea along to Blackstone, Sr.

Gibson had thought of it as a part of his SHADOW series of novels and radio plays. In one of the plays, a gang of thugs are chasing The Shadow, ready to shoot him with machine guns. The hero dives into a rack of rubber tires to escape. The thugs pull out the tires, one by one, but The Shadow has vanished.

The tires used by Blackstone SR. were multi-colored and very thin as compared to today's car or truck tires.

This illusion certainly doesn't pack small, and requires several assistants and a theatre fly system to pull it off properly, but in the right cirucmstances, is very novel and mystifying.

- entity

Cool post Entity!!

Blair Marshall
"ShaZzam!"

The best thing for Blackstone was the advertising he could generate for local dealers by using "their tires".

I had forgot it was Walter Gibson's idea.

Richard

I would like to thank everyone for there information...lots of good stuff.
Thanks again,
James

Wasn't there a version of this in a book by Tom Palmer?

Is this in print anywhere? are the rights available? I am interested in this effect. Any help would be appreciated.

Norrabmagic, contact Gay Blackstone. magik@blackstonemagic.com or 12800 Puesta Del Sol , Redlands, CA 92373-7408
909.792.1227 ph
909.794.2737 fax
or you can sometimes reach her through the magic castle, since she is president of the board.

Here's a video of Harry Blackstone Jr. performing it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fqq9YCM-ok

Thanks Chris... had never seen it.

That's a different version than I'm familiar with. I've seen a stack of tires on one side of the stage inside of which the girl is, the rack center stage. The tires are unstacked and rolled across the stage to the other side where they are restacked and the girl emerges. Method used BA and only one girl.

Two completely different methods. Which, if either, are proprietary?

I don't believe the method Starrpower described is proprietary. If it's the version using the triangular BA tables, I know for a fact it is in several books. I believe it might be in one put out by Abbott's, New Tops illusions, or something like that? I would have to look.

Harry Jr's version is a bit different from his dad's which was pretty gutsy. But then Harry Jr never tried to copy his dad and generally took illusions his dad did and improved on the performance. Harry, Jr's was still gutsy in its own right, but not exactly the same way Uncle Harry did it.

Photius, is correct. Jr's version was much different than his dad's.

I would talk to Bill Smith about it. Bill will tell you if he would make it for you or if it is proprietary.

Realize, this is a heavy illusion in many and requires quite a few assistants to properly stage it. You just don't grab a girl and guy and do it.

Reread my earlier posts carefully. I do have a reasonable background on this straight from the horse's mouth.
Richard