November 21, 2022 • 38 mins
Robert-Houdin was the magician that Houdini named himself after, his story is hard to pin down, because even his own memoir is written to be entertaining, not accurate. Part one covers his early life, marriages, and beginnings in magic.
Research:
- Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin". Encyclopedia Britannica, 9 Jun. 2022, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jean-Eugene-Robert-Houdin
- “How to Do the Classic Cups & Balls Trick.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVXNCMdKs-Y&t=124s
- “ROBERT-HOUDIN TRIPLE MYSTERY CLOCK.” JACQUES NÈVE HORLOGER D'ART. https://www.horloger.net/purchase-sales/mystery-clocks/74-robert-houdin-triple-mystery-clock/
- Robert-Houdin, Jean-Eugène. “Memoirs of Robert-Houdin : ambassador, author, and conjurer.” Geo. G. Evans. Philadelphia. 1859. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/42916/42916-h/42916-h.htm
- Evans, Henry Ridgely (2010) "Robert-Houdin. Conjuror, Author, and Ambassador.," The Open Court: Vol. 1903 : Iss. 12 , Article 3. https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/ocj/vol1903/iss12/3
- “Houdin and the Arabs.” Scientific American, vol. 80, no. 13, 1899, pp. 202–202. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/26121253
- “Witchcraft as Stagecraft.” New York Times. 1999. https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/magazine/millennium/m1/teller.html
- Houdini, Harry. “The Unmasking of Robert-Houdin.” NEW YORK
THE PUBLISHERS PRINTING CO. 1908. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/42723/42723-h/42723-h.htm - ONES, GRAHAM M. “Modern Magic and the War on Miracles in French Colonial Culture.” Comparative Studies in Society and History, vol. 52, no. 1, 2010, pp. 66–99. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40603072
- Fechner, Christian. “The Magic of Robert-Houdin: An Artist's Life.” Editions N.C.F.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Holly Fry and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. So Tracy.
The name Robert Rudin came up on the show recently.
It was on our classic episode that we ran about
(00:23):
Harry Houdini. Yep, because he's sometimes just called Udin. That's wrong,
and we'll talk about it in a minute. But because
he was the magician that Houdini named himself after and
then debunked, that's kind of part of why he showed
up in that episode, but also that's part of the
lore of kind of magic culture. Um. As a note
(00:43):
though here Robert Uda is his last name, both words together.
His first name was not Robert. Robert had been his
last name at birth, but then he hyphenated when he
got married. And we're going to talk about all of
that and a lot more so much more that this
became a two part uh, and that's even paring down
an awful lot of his story, because there's a lot
(01:06):
written about him. This is interesting because Robert UDA's story
is actually kind of tricky to pin down. He wrote
an autobiography his Memoirs, which is probably ghost written confidence
dom plaz De digit in the late eighteen sixties after
he retired from his stage career. But that was definitely
a book that was written to be more of an
(01:28):
entertainment than an accurate history, and some parts of it
are probably entirely fabricated. We'll talk about some of those.
Almost forty years after that, Houdini wrote a book called
The Unmasking of Robert U Dam, in which he goes
point by points through his Once Heroes book to show
what was not factual. He also is basically saying, hey,
(01:50):
this guy didn't invent all the stuff he claimed he invented,
and we'll talk about some of those in in specifics. However,
Houdini's work in The Unmasking doesn't really dissect the early
part of Robert U Dan's life. Houdini wrote of it
quote because of his supreme egotism, his obvious desire to
make his autobiography picturesque and interesting rather than historically correct,
(02:15):
and his utter indifference to dates, exact names of places, theaters, books, etcetera,
it is extremely hard to present logical and consistent statements
regarding his life. Other biographers, though particularly Christian Fashnaire, who
amassed the largest private collection of Robert U dance artifacts
and research materials during his lifetime. Uh he and others
(02:38):
have worked to verify, clarify, and correct the original account, though,
and so that is where we're going to begin, at
the beginning. He was born Jean Ujeanne Robert in blew Off, France,
which is a Loire River valley town about a hundred
and eighty kilometers south southwest of Paris, and it was,
as Roberto Dan noted in his writing, where King Louis
(03:01):
the twelfth was born. Robert Dan's mother was Marie Catherine
guille who died when Jean Nujanne was still a small child.
His father, rosbero Bert, was watchmaker. Both Roberto Dan and
Houdini report the date of his birth as December six,
(03:22):
eighteen o five, but that actually seems to be incorrect
based on documentation. He was born the day after that,
December seven. Fetchner's biography of Robert Udan makes the case
in footnotes that he would have known his birthday. It's
clearly marked in all the documents, but it seems like
the family always celebrated it on December six, due to
(03:44):
a quote misinterpretation of the Revolutionary calendar. So for a
little bit of clarity there. In seventeen the French Republican
calendar had been introduced to replace the Gregorian calendar, and
it's stripped out religious days. That seems fine, but then
it also completely reorganized the year with different month names.
(04:06):
It switched over to a ten day week. There was
this whole base ten approach to defining the year. You
can see where that would be confusing, and I actually
want to do an episode on it because the logic
of that decision was pretty entertaining and how it played
out was pretty entertaining. Yeah. I knew, I knew there
had been a different calendar during that time, but I
(04:27):
did not realize how different it was. Right, It wasn't
just renaming existing months. Those months didn't exist anymore. So
eighteen o five, the year Jean Ugen was born, was
the last full year that that had been used. His
father's profession was something he was interested in from an
early age. He talks about playing with his father's tools
(04:50):
from the time he was tiny, because, as he wrote, quote,
those implements were my toys and delight I learned how
to use them as other children learned to walk and talk.
We mentioned that jehan Ugen's mother died when he was
still young, but that death was brought about by another
family tragedy, which was the death of jeann Eugene's brother, who,
(05:13):
like their father, was named Prosper, and that after the
death of two year old Prosper, Mary Catherine's health declined sharply.
She died in eighteen o nine, when Jean Jujanne was
four years old. Initially after Marie Catherine's death, the remaining children,
Jean Jujeanne and a sister named Marie Selene, were cared
(05:34):
for by a relative so that their father, Prosper, could
continue to manage his business. In eighteen ten, Prosper remarried
to Marguerite Rosalie Mettive, but just as the Robert home
was stabilizing again, Jean Ugeenne became quite ill. We don't
know the specific nature of this illness he had when
he was a child, but it kept him confined at
(05:55):
home for several years, starting when he was just five
years old, and it was during this confinement that a
neighbor who often visited started teaching him sleight of hand.
Prospera envisioned and educated life for his son, and so,
according to Roberto Dan's account, sent him away to school
in or Lean at the age of eleven. This is
(06:18):
another inaccuracy. He was actually thirteen at the time. The
time that he spent confined at home didn't seem to
have a negative effect on his ability to integrate into
a boarding school. He was a good student. He won
a number of awards and history Latin and Greek. He
also made traps for mice, and once he had caught them,
(06:39):
he built little machines that they would run through mouse power,
including a small water pump. Although he did well in school,
Roberto Dan wrote that the happiest day of his life
was the day that he left. Once again, that date's unclear,
and we can't really be sure whether he received a
diploma or not. Yeah, there's no survive documentation if he did.
(07:02):
After his schooling was complete, Jean Jujean returned home to
Blois and also spent time at his grandfather's cottage in
the countryside nearby. He described this time in which he
had no obligations as a quote earthly paradise, and it
was while idly walking around town one day in October
of eighty three that he happened upon a public performance.
(07:25):
This was a cup and ball show done by a
traveling performer, and Robert Udan described this performer as quote
a tall fellow with a quick eye, a sunburnt face,
long and crispy hair, and he stemmed his fist in
his side while he held his head impudently high. His costume,
though rather loud, was still cleanly and announced a man
(07:46):
who probably had some hay in his boots. Jean Jeanne
was so enthralled that when it finished and the performer
offered to sell him a pamphlet describing his secrets, he
gladly bought it. But this really only contained the dialogue
that the performer had used in the show and some
very purposefully vague notes about the trick that he was doing.
(08:10):
There was no real explanation of how the trick was done.
So just in case you don't know what the cup
and ball trick is, it's an act where performer moves
three cups and three balls around the varying stacks, basically
making it up here as though the balls are passing
through the cups. So not quite if you were thinking
of the one where there's one ball and cups and
(08:31):
like there's just the one ball and you're trying to
keep a it's a little more complex than that. Yeah,
it's not the one that's like the precursor to three
card Monty, right, Like it's like a thing where matter
appears to have been warped away. Yes, so this is
a trick that people still do today. You can easily
find how to videos nowadays on how to do it online. Yeah,
(08:55):
you can learn magic online, which I love. Um. According
to Roberto Damn, the ver Jean he saw that day
used nutmegs and goblets, and it went like this quote.
During a long series of tricks, the nutmegs, at first invisible,
appeared at the finger ends of the conjurer. Then they
passed through the cups under the table into a spectator's pockets,
(09:17):
and finally emerged to the general delight from the nose
of a young looker on. But of course Robert did
not have the benefit of the Internet to figure this
one out, so he was really disappointed at having spent
money on this booklet to learn nothing. He tried to
hunt down the conjurer, who he calls Dr garlos Bach
in his memoir, but though he tracked him to a
(09:40):
nearby inn, the innkeeper told him the performer had vanished,
incidentally not paying his bill. Clearly, Jean Eugene was fascinated
with sleight of hand and other tricks early on, but
his career path did not lead him there initially. And
we're going to talk about all of that after a
sponsor break. From an early age, Jean Jean had wanted
(10:09):
to be a watchmaker like his father, and to also
make other clockwork mechanisms, but his father, prosper was not
actually supportive of this idea. He had envisioned that his
children would have greater socio economic status than he did,
so he wanted his surviving son to be a lawyer.
According to Robert Rod, his father told him, quote, consider
(10:31):
it would be unreasonable to bury the ten years schooling
for which I made such heavy sacrifices in my shop.
Remember too, that after thirty five years hard work, I
have been hardly able to save sufficient provision for my
old age. Then pray, change your resolution and give up
your mania for making a parcel of filings. So for
(10:54):
a while, Roberto Don worked in an unpaid apprenticeship as
a clerk for an otary, he copied legal papers. There
By all accounts, he had just extraordinarily beautiful handwriting. So
while this work was shortly tedious, he was very very
good at it and also hated it. Yeah, there are
(11:16):
examples you can find of some of these documents that
he copied in various biographies of him. And he does
have handwriting so beautiful. It looks like art like it's legible,
but also very caligraphic, and it's very very pretty. But
if you don't like it doesn't matter. One day, his
father had received a snuff box which had been brought
(11:38):
into his shop for repair. This box sounds incredible, according
to Roberto, it had a clockwork scene that was embedded
in the lid. And this was a hunting scene that
featured a rabbit running pursued by a hunter and his dog.
And when we say that it's not still, it's literally
a clockwork that's moving. The tiny clockwork hunter could show
(12:00):
there his rifle and fire it. The object reportedly made
a popping sound at this point in the scene, and
then the rabbit would run away, followed by the dog.
This all sounds really mind blowing and complex, and John
jen said that he surreptitiously drew a detailed diagram of
all of this snuff box lids workings. He did not
(12:22):
dare work on that actual box himself, but he had
the idea that he could make a copy of it.
So he got up early every morning and worked secretly
in his father's shop before he went to work. It
took a year, but he completed his replica and when
he assembled all the pieces, it worked. And when he
showed this to his father, thinking ha ha, I will
(12:43):
win him over, he will say, yes, of course you
can be a watchmaker. This is your passion, and Prosper
was impressed, but then he told him quote, you had
better take no pride in your skill, for it may
injure your prospects. He moved next to a sal read
position in a lawyer's office, basically as an office boy
(13:04):
who ran errands and kept the offices tidy. This job
was an over a a bit north of blah and
for the first time Jean Yugen had money and free time.
He also had access to the firm's library. He used
that library to expand his knowledge, particularly in the area
of the natural sciences. He was trying to reconcile himself
(13:27):
to a future as a notary, but he also could
not stifle his impulses to work on creating these little machines.
Before long, he had redesigned the canary cage that his
boss kept in the waiting room to entertain waiting clients,
so that the birds activated mechanisms that let them access
(13:48):
food and baths and better purchase with treats. Led to
a serious discussion with his boss that did not end
the way you might expect. The notary offered to speak
to Prospero, there on behalf of Gean Eugena, to make
the case that really, the younger Robert was not going
to be happy and fulfilled in any job unless it
(14:09):
took advantage of his inventive love of the mechanical world.
This actually worked. Prospery, who had been so opposed, was
becoming a watchmaker, Finally acquiesced. At this point, prosper had
sold his business to one of Jean Eugene's older cousins,
Jean Martin Robert, who became his mentor and watchmaking. The
(14:31):
two men would be in business together for the next
four and a half decades, although not in watchmaking, no,
some of it was in watchmaking, but not all of it.
Because cousin Robert encouraged Jean Yugin to study watchmaking seriously.
The younger Robert ordered a copy of treat do Laxerie
the watch Trade from the local bookseller, and according to
(14:54):
Robert D's memoirs, this was a significant development for him
in his career. Has When he received that parcel and
took it home and opened it up, it was not
what he ordered. Instead of the manual of the watchmaker's
industry that he was expecting, he got a two volume
set of Amusement de sience that's scientific amusements. And when
(15:16):
he opened this incorrect book he was completely absorbed and
began reading it without even meaning to. He attributed his
finding of his life's calling to this accidental switch by
the bookseller. A good point to remind listeners that his
memoirs were intended to be entertaining above all else. There
are a few different points where he says, and that
(15:36):
was the most important moment of my life. But this
was he basically got a book that was teaching him
how to make small mechanical things even more intricate than
he had already been working on. But again we can't
be entirely sure if any of Roberto Dance stories of
this nature are entirely true. Regardless, starting in the late
eighteen twenties, he became fascinated with magic. Unlike his encounter
(16:01):
with Dr girls Buck, which left him with no information,
these books opened up a whole world of information to him,
and he just devoured it. But though he had read
the whole thing in a matter of days, he was
still left without anybody to show him how tricks really
needed to work in the real world. To make up
(16:22):
for the lack of a mentor, he did things like
take juggling lessons. He practiced tricks based on the drawings
in the book. Robertodan used the lack of a mentor
to just bolster the idea that he came up with
much of his stage act on his own out of
thin air. But among his effects found after his death
(16:43):
were four notebooks written by a man notated only as
Monsieur David, who was himself an amateur magician. These notebooks
were filled with notes and comments on the acts of
many magicians that Msieur David had seen performed. Yes, so
while he's like no, I had to like basically try
to act it out based on pictures and books, and
(17:05):
I taught myself everything. He in fact, had lots of
information about how magic was performed. But throughout all of
this discovery of magic, for jean Usen, he was still
an apprentice to his cousin in the watch shop. He
later wrote of learning simple tricks during his early career
in watchworks quote, although my time was fully occupied here,
(17:26):
I managed to continue my pocket practice, and I daily
noticed with joy the progress I was making. Thanks to
my constant exercises. I had learned how to make any
object I held in my hand disappear with the greatest ease.
And as for the principles of card tricks, they were
only child's play to me, and I could produce some
delightful illusions. I confessed to feeling a degree of pride
(17:50):
in my humble power of amusing my friends, and I
neglected no occasion of displaying it. In the spring of
eight he was declared graduate did from his apprenticeship. At
that point he started a tour of France to work
in the best watchmakers shops all around the country to
further refine his skills. That wasn't an unusual practice at
(18:12):
the time, and during his travels, he claimed that he
once had food poisoning so bad that it caused him delirium.
He said that he ordered a coach to take him
back to Blois, but then jumped out in a moment
of frenzy from this fever that he had and he
fell to the ground unconscious. When he woke up, there
(18:33):
was a stranger taking care of him and that was
the moment that changed his life. It was another one
of those, according to Roberto that was how he met
his magic mentor, a man who went by the stage
named Turini, who was really Edmund Degreezy, the son of
Count Degreezy. Turini or Edmond is a very romantic figure
(18:54):
in Roberto Dan's writing, with a dramatic and sad backstory,
and this traveling magician nursed Jean Ujan back to health
and taught him conjuring tricks, and before the two men
parted ways, Jean Jugen even stepped in for Tarini when
he was injured in an accident and could not perform,
as a way of paying him back for the kindness
(19:15):
that he had shown in caring for him. Dramatic, it's
all very romantic. Um Incidentally, there isn't really any hard
evidence found to indicate the degrees E or his stage
persona Turini were real. He very well might have been,
But Robert daz writing is also influential enough that Tarini
(19:36):
often appears in lists of historical magicians, and much of
what we know in air quotes about him comes from
these accounts. After his time abroad studying watchmaking and magic,
Jean Eugene Robert returned to Blois, where his aging grandfather
was near death. When the old man died, he left
his grandson a considerable amount of money, enough that he
(19:59):
could really kick around doing whatever he wanted for a while.
But Roberto Dan's late in life account of this time
suggests that he was still getting a lot of pressure
from his father to settle down, find a wife, and
become a watchmaker. He related that he was often called
to defend his bachelorhood, and one evening, when he was
(20:20):
doing so at a social event, something surprising happened. It
was the moment that changed his life again yet another
um he wrote, quote, Now, it happened that among the
persons listening to this description of the blessings of celibacy
was a young lady of seventeen, who inclined a serious
(20:41):
ear to my arguments against marriage. It was the first
time I had met her, so I could not describe
any other reason for her fixed attention than her desire
to detect the word. A man is always delighted to
find an attentive listener, more especially when it is a
pretty young girl. Ns I thought it my bound and
(21:01):
duty to make some polite remarks to her. During the
course of the evening, A conversation ensued and became so
interesting that we had a great deal still to say
to each other when the hour came for separation. And
I believe the regret at parting was not felt by
myself alone. The simple event was, however, the cause of
my marriage with Mademoiselle Uda, and this marriage took me
(21:24):
to Paris. That marriage, incidentally, I like how he rushes
through the whole thing, and it's just like And then
we were married, like it happened at the end of
the night. Um. That marriage actually took place in July
of eighteen thirty uh, and things were not quite as
speedy as that account makes it seem. Robert moved to
Paris before they were married, and he negotiated the marriage
(21:44):
contract with his bride's father. Cecile actually didn't know the
wedding was being arranged until that deal was struck incomplete.
This all sounds very magical, uh maybe romantic, definitely accidental,
but there are too many ties to Jean Ujanne's life
and blah for it to have really been a surprise
(22:05):
for one. The young woman who became his wife, Josepha
Cecilia Glantina, was also from Blois. She was the cousin
of Jean Jeanne's stepmother, Marguerite Rosalie met Vi. Historians think
this meeting probably took place in the home of the
architect Pino me Devi, who was Marguerite Rosalie's brother. Just
(22:27):
so happened that Joseph Cecil's father was a watchmaker. Let's
believed this is why Roberto Dan chose to hyphenate his name.
He worked in his father in law's shop and joined
the family business, so he made their name his name. Yeah,
it does seem a little too perfect the way all
of this clicks together, that his family wasn't like, Hey,
(22:49):
Cecile should be at this party because she might be
a really good match for showing you ship it seems
pretty obvious that some sort of maneuvering of that nature
must have had And we will talk about how roberto
dance life changed once he had moved to Paris and
settled into married life. But before we do that, we'll
have a word from the sponsors that keep stuff you
(23:10):
missed in history class. Going marriage was not the only
thing for Jegan in Paris. There were also conjurors performing
all the time. He was able to go to a
(23:30):
new show every night when he wished. He also made
the acquaintance of professional magicians in Paris, and he also
had exposure to many clockwork automeda. Have you been listening
to the show for a long time, you may remember
episode on Historical Robots that featured a lot of automoda.
We've also run that as a classic, and that particular
(23:53):
entertainment of automoda was very much in vogue in Paris
at this time. There are two particular men who Roberto
Den came to know while traveling through the side streets
of the Paris magic scene. One of those was a
man known as Perugal. His full name was Alexandra Francois Rougel,
(24:14):
and while he was listed in the city directory as
a tin smith, he actually sold magicians props out of
his shop at five Richlieu. Roberto Den had found a
magic shop, but Rugel's works were not like small entertainments.
He did offer some small scale props for sleight of
(24:34):
hand tricks, but he also built and sold much larger
automata for bigger spectacles. Rujol is said to have had
a catalog of a hundred and thirty two different tricks
for sale. The shop was also a social nexus for magicians,
and it was there that Roberto Dan met a lot
of other conjurors. He also wrote a book ROCDI recreation
(24:58):
de Physique and mus The Recreations of Physical Amusements that
document that how a lot of these large scale automata worked.
It's an important work in the history of conjuring, and
it gave later practitioners vital information about the mechanical aspects
of this art. The other important figure who came into
Roberto Dan's life in Paris was Christine Emmanuel Comte, a
(25:23):
Swiss born magician who was also the son of a watchmaker.
It seems like everybody's dad made watches for a living.
Monsieur Compte had performed for Louis the eighteenth and the
eighteen teens, and was granted the title of the King's
Conjurer for so amusing the monarch. King Louis Philippe granted
him the honors Chevalier de Lejon. Done during his reign.
(25:44):
Compt is often credited with establishing ventriloquism as part of
conjuring acts, although this was more about throwing his voice
around a theater than what you might think of e
ventriloquis being using puppets or dolls. He also is sometimes
credit at it with being the first performer to pull
a rabbit out of a hat, though other magicians sometimes
(26:05):
get that credit. Comped was someone whose work in creating
fantastical stage acts was something that robertod And admired, of course,
but he seemed almost more entranced by the Compt as
a businessman. He wrote of him quote Compt was also
an object of interesting study to me, both as manager
(26:26):
and as artist. As manager, Compt could have challenged the
most skillful to a comparison, and he was a famous
hand at bringing grist to his mill. The little schemes
of manager employees to attract the public and increase. His
receipts are tolerably well known, but comped for a long
time did not require to have recourse to them, as
(26:48):
his room was always crowded. He also wrote about the
various ways that Comped bolstered income. When theater attendants waned,
he offered various kinds of discounted tickets and group rates,
and then offered additional things for sale to make up
the gap. And he added a small cafe at the
side of the theater. Patrons paid for a cup of
(27:10):
coffee or a cordial, and then the waiter would admit
them to the theater through a door that enabled them
to pass by the line, skip to the front, be
the first at the box office. It's pretty ingenious. Um,
I would do that. Dine in our cafe, get a cocktail,
and then you first. That sounds great to me. Um.
(27:33):
There were things that Robert Udas saw in Coombs shows
that he actually thought could be plussed up, or ways
that they might be staged differently for added spectacle. He
certainly was not thinking seriously at this point of taking
to the stage himself, and with pretty good reason. For one,
he just didn't have the experience to try to compete
in the Paris Magic scene, and for another no one
(27:55):
competed with the King's conjuror not at his own style
of act. They were other amusements vying for the money
of entertainment seekers, like the Phantasmagoria. But even though there
were some other conjurers playing here and there, compt ruled
supreme at this point. But the combination of inspiration from
watching Compta's act and business, seeing the automatons and other
(28:18):
props and rusual shop, and his own ingenuity led Roberto
down to start making mechanical show pieces of his own.
He still wasn't performing any tricks on stage, though, but
he did sell his mechanisms to other performers. He also
repaired other people's automata out of the watch shop, and
brushed up against one that we talked about in that
(28:41):
earlier Five Historical Robots episode. In eighteen forty four, he
he repaired von Kinstone's famous pooping robot duck. We can't
get away from that duck. Uh. The early eighteen forties
were actually pretty rough for Roberto dem In October of
eighteen forty three, his wife Cecile died. She had been
(29:02):
through a lengthy illness. We don't know specifically what it was.
She had given birth to seven children over the course
of their thirteen year marriage, but four of those children
had died. Their surviving children, Emil, Marie, Rosalie, and Prosperoujean
had to be cared for. While Emil, the eldest, stayed
with Jean Eugene, the younger two children went to Blois
(29:24):
to stay with their grandfather. But then, just five months
after Cecile died in February of eighteen forty four, Marie
Rosalie and Jean Eugene's father, prosper Robert, both died on
the same day. At this point, Robert ro Dan had
his two sons to care for, and he didn't really
know how, so he remarried. The young woman was Marguerite
(29:47):
Francoise or Lamp Braconnier, who went by O Lamp. She
was twenty eight, and, according to Roberto Dan's correspondence with
a friend, she had not initially wanted to get married.
She had resolved that she would say single and live
with her mother. She was also reluctant to take on
jan Jan's two children, but eventually she acquiesced that two
(30:09):
of them got married on August eighteen forty four in Paris.
It was not long after his second wedding that Roberto
Dem met another figure. It has come up on the
show many times, Phineas Taylor Barnum. Barnum was in Paris
for the eighteen forty four Exposition, an event at which
Roberto Dam was an exhibitor. The watchmaker showed off many
(30:31):
of the automata he had made, but one in particular
was the Star. This was a piece called the Writing
and Drawing Automaton. You'll also see it as the Writing
and Drawing Man. Sometimes it's describe. It gets called different
things in different historical accounts. And it was, as the
name indicates, a human shaped figure that could write and
draw when prompted. But more than that, it answered questions
(30:55):
posed to it, and it would answer those questions by
drawing or writing out the answer. And that automaton really
enchanted the most illustrious visitor to the expo, not Barnum,
but we'll be coming back to him. The visitor in
question here was King Louis Philippe. For the King, the
automaton answered the question of how many people lived in Paris?
(31:17):
It wrote nine thousand nine hundred sixty four, although the
king was hoping it would have predictively known the number
that had just been tabulated by a new census that
was not published yet. The automaton also finished poems, and
it did so for Louis Philippe. It also wrote poetry,
and it drew a crown. Robertodan won a silver medal,
(31:40):
and the King himself presented it to him with the
words you enriched me I honor you etched on there.
When the expo finished, Roberto Don sold the Writing and
Drawing Man two p. T. Barnum. This actually is a
situation that later led Houdini to believe that Roberto Dn
was some sort of fraud. Houdini notes in his book
(32:02):
The Unmasking of Roberto Dan that Roberto Din only ever
showed the writing Automaton at the Expo, and nothing quite
like it ever appeared in any of the shows he
would later perform. Hudini wrote, quote, this question naturally arises.
If Roberto Den built the original Writing and Drawing figure,
why could he not make a duplicate and include it
(32:24):
in his program. Surely it was one of the most
remarkable of the automata, which he claims as the creations
of his brain and hands. Biographer Christian Fashnair theorized that Barnum,
who purchased the device for use in his shows, most
likely called for the inclusion of an exclusivity clause in
the purchase agreement, i e. If Roberto Din had made
(32:47):
copies of that same figure, Barnum's would not have been
as effective as an audience draw. There's also a really
interesting account written by Barnum about the expo and Roberto
Den's mechanical wonder. He wrote, quote, I paid a round
price for this most ingenious little figure, which was an
automaton writer and artist. It sat on a small table,
(33:09):
pencil in hand, and if asked, for instance, for an
emblem of fidelity, it would instantly draw the picture of
a handsome dog. If love was wanted, a cupid was
exquisitely penciled. The automaton would also answer many questions in writing.
During my visit, Huda was giving evening legend of main performances,
(33:30):
and by his pressing invitation I frequently was present. He
took great pains to to introduce me to other inventors
and exhibitors of moving figures, which I liberally purchased, making
them prominent features in the attractions of the American Museum.
This account is really really interesting, specifically because it offers
(33:51):
a glimpse at Robertud's personality that is rather counter to
the way he was portrayed by Houdini later on. Houdini's
books that we've mentioned, The Unmasking of Roberto Da includes
this description of his one time hero quote stripped of
his self woven veil of romance, Roberto Dan stood forth
in the uncompromising light of cold historical facts, a mere pretender,
(34:14):
a man who waxed great on the brainwork of others,
a mechanician who had boldly filtered the inventions of the
master craftsman among his predecessors. Hudini really makes the case
that Roberto Dan took credit for the works of others
and was really entirely self serving. But then when you
look at Barnum's account, it sounds like he had certainly
enough generosity of spirit to make sure other people who
(34:38):
worked in his field, so people that were theoretically his
competitors at market also had the chance to be seen
by Barnum and to sell their inventions to him. This
really jumped out of me, because it just illustrates how
differently two people can perceive the same person, and how
their own biases may color that perception, and then how
that gets relaid through the ages to us who are
(34:59):
trying to learn about these people. And that's where we
will leave this one, because after that eighty four exposition,
a lot changed for Robert Dan and just a very
short period of time. Dun dun da. And since we're
talking about art and fun things, I'm going to read
an art themed listener mail that sounds great. This is
(35:23):
from our listener Tara, who writes, Hi, Holly and Tracy,
I love your podcast and I listen all the time.
My name is Tara bar and I'm an artist based
in the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria, Virginia. The
Torpedo Factory was built in nineteen nineteen and served as
a munitions plant through the end of World War Two.
After it was decommissioned, it sat vacant as an issore
(35:44):
until the mid seventies, when a group of artists petitioned
the city to convert it into art studios. Today, it
is a three story building taking up half a city
block on the Potomac River Waterfront in Old Town, Alexandria.
Over two hundred artists work and exhibit here. In addition
to art studios, there are also art classrooms, printmaking workshops,
(36:04):
galleries and archaeology museum, and an art supply store. The
Torpedo Factory is open to the public seven days a week,
and all our studios are open to the public, so
visitors can come see us making our art any time.
I'm including some pictures to entice you to visit the
next time you're in the Washington, d C. Area. Your
podcast keeps me company during many long hours of painting.
(36:27):
Many of my pieces relate to or are directly inspired
by your episodes. I wanted to send you some art gifts,
but I know you don't have a physical mailing address
right now, so I'm linking to some images below so
you can at least look at some art. Expect some
art goodies in the mail if you ever share your
new mailing address in the future. Unfortunately, I don't have
any cute Kinty pictures to share because my husband is
(36:47):
allergic to cats and we cannot have one attaching a
painting of a cat instead. Thank you for all you
do and keep up the good work. Uh. Tara. Here's
the thing, Terra is amazing uh and I normally wouldn't.
We don't usually give people's first and last names out
of respect for their privacy, but since she uses her
name public facing as an artist, I did. I will
(37:09):
also tell you that in looking at her art, I
bought a painting this morning. So Tara, thank you for
alerting me to your work, because I think that's gonna
be a Christmas present for my husband. UM. Also, go
check this out. I just did a quick Google search
for Torpedo Factory Art Center and there are a lot
(37:30):
of amazing artists. They are doing really amazing work. I
did not know this place existed, and now it's top
of my list should I be in d C in
the future because it looks really cool and it's it's
like a magical wonderland if you're into art. It's like
a lot of great artists doing really cool art and
you could learn there if you wanted, and you can
watch them make our and you can buy art supplies.
(37:50):
This is a theme park of art basic why so, UM,
definitely go check that out if you're interested. It's very
very cool. Um. Tara, thank you so much for sending
me this and I love your work and I really
like that kittie painting. That might have been what I
was looking for when I went today and ended up
buying something completely different. Um. If you would like to
(38:11):
write to us and share the art you're making or
whatever it is that's on your mind, you can do
so at History Podcast at i heeart radio dot com.
You can also find us on social media as Missed
in History, and if you have not subscribed yet, you
can do that on the iHeart Radio app or wherever
you listen to your favorite podcasts. Stuff you Missed in
(38:34):
History Class is a production of I Heart Radio. For
more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Holly Fry and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. So Tracy.
The name Robert Rudin came up on the show recently.
It was on our classic episode that we ran about
(00:23):
Harry Houdini. Yep, because he's sometimes just called Udin. That's wrong,
and we'll talk about it in a minute. But because
he was the magician that Houdini named himself after and
then debunked, that's kind of part of why he showed
up in that episode, but also that's part of the
lore of kind of magic culture. Um. As a note
(00:43):
though here Robert Uda is his last name, both words together.
His first name was not Robert. Robert had been his
last name at birth, but then he hyphenated when he
got married. And we're going to talk about all of
that and a lot more so much more that this
became a two part uh, and that's even paring down
an awful lot of his story, because there's a lot
(01:06):
written about him. This is interesting because Robert UDA's story
is actually kind of tricky to pin down. He wrote
an autobiography his Memoirs, which is probably ghost written confidence
dom plaz De digit in the late eighteen sixties after
he retired from his stage career. But that was definitely
a book that was written to be more of an
(01:28):
entertainment than an accurate history, and some parts of it
are probably entirely fabricated. We'll talk about some of those.
Almost forty years after that, Houdini wrote a book called
The Unmasking of Robert U Dam, in which he goes
point by points through his Once Heroes book to show
what was not factual. He also is basically saying, hey,
(01:50):
this guy didn't invent all the stuff he claimed he invented,
and we'll talk about some of those in in specifics. However,
Houdini's work in The Unmasking doesn't really dissect the early
part of Robert U Dan's life. Houdini wrote of it
quote because of his supreme egotism, his obvious desire to
make his autobiography picturesque and interesting rather than historically correct,
(02:15):
and his utter indifference to dates, exact names of places, theaters, books, etcetera,
it is extremely hard to present logical and consistent statements
regarding his life. Other biographers, though particularly Christian Fashnaire, who
amassed the largest private collection of Robert U dance artifacts
and research materials during his lifetime. Uh he and others
(02:38):
have worked to verify, clarify, and correct the original account, though,
and so that is where we're going to begin, at
the beginning. He was born Jean Ujeanne Robert in blew Off, France,
which is a Loire River valley town about a hundred
and eighty kilometers south southwest of Paris, and it was,
as Roberto Dan noted in his writing, where King Louis
(03:01):
the twelfth was born. Robert Dan's mother was Marie Catherine
guille who died when Jean Nujanne was still a small child.
His father, rosbero Bert, was watchmaker. Both Roberto Dan and
Houdini report the date of his birth as December six,
(03:22):
eighteen o five, but that actually seems to be incorrect
based on documentation. He was born the day after that,
December seven. Fetchner's biography of Robert Udan makes the case
in footnotes that he would have known his birthday. It's
clearly marked in all the documents, but it seems like
the family always celebrated it on December six, due to
(03:44):
a quote misinterpretation of the Revolutionary calendar. So for a
little bit of clarity there. In seventeen the French Republican
calendar had been introduced to replace the Gregorian calendar, and
it's stripped out religious days. That seems fine, but then
it also completely reorganized the year with different month names.
(04:06):
It switched over to a ten day week. There was
this whole base ten approach to defining the year. You
can see where that would be confusing, and I actually
want to do an episode on it because the logic
of that decision was pretty entertaining and how it played
out was pretty entertaining. Yeah. I knew, I knew there
had been a different calendar during that time, but I
(04:27):
did not realize how different it was. Right, It wasn't
just renaming existing months. Those months didn't exist anymore. So
eighteen o five, the year Jean Ugen was born, was
the last full year that that had been used. His
father's profession was something he was interested in from an
early age. He talks about playing with his father's tools
(04:50):
from the time he was tiny, because, as he wrote, quote,
those implements were my toys and delight I learned how
to use them as other children learned to walk and talk.
We mentioned that jehan Ugen's mother died when he was
still young, but that death was brought about by another
family tragedy, which was the death of jeann Eugene's brother, who,
(05:13):
like their father, was named Prosper, and that after the
death of two year old Prosper, Mary Catherine's health declined sharply.
She died in eighteen o nine, when Jean Jujanne was
four years old. Initially after Marie Catherine's death, the remaining children,
Jean Jujeanne and a sister named Marie Selene, were cared
(05:34):
for by a relative so that their father, Prosper, could
continue to manage his business. In eighteen ten, Prosper remarried
to Marguerite Rosalie Mettive, but just as the Robert home
was stabilizing again, Jean Ugeenne became quite ill. We don't
know the specific nature of this illness he had when
he was a child, but it kept him confined at
(05:55):
home for several years, starting when he was just five
years old, and it was during this confinement that a
neighbor who often visited started teaching him sleight of hand.
Prospera envisioned and educated life for his son, and so,
according to Roberto Dan's account, sent him away to school
in or Lean at the age of eleven. This is
(06:18):
another inaccuracy. He was actually thirteen at the time. The
time that he spent confined at home didn't seem to
have a negative effect on his ability to integrate into
a boarding school. He was a good student. He won
a number of awards and history Latin and Greek. He
also made traps for mice, and once he had caught them,
(06:39):
he built little machines that they would run through mouse power,
including a small water pump. Although he did well in school,
Roberto Dan wrote that the happiest day of his life
was the day that he left. Once again, that date's unclear,
and we can't really be sure whether he received a
diploma or not. Yeah, there's no survive documentation if he did.
(07:02):
After his schooling was complete, Jean Jujean returned home to
Blois and also spent time at his grandfather's cottage in
the countryside nearby. He described this time in which he
had no obligations as a quote earthly paradise, and it
was while idly walking around town one day in October
of eighty three that he happened upon a public performance.
(07:25):
This was a cup and ball show done by a
traveling performer, and Robert Udan described this performer as quote
a tall fellow with a quick eye, a sunburnt face,
long and crispy hair, and he stemmed his fist in
his side while he held his head impudently high. His costume,
though rather loud, was still cleanly and announced a man
(07:46):
who probably had some hay in his boots. Jean Jeanne
was so enthralled that when it finished and the performer
offered to sell him a pamphlet describing his secrets, he
gladly bought it. But this really only contained the dialogue
that the performer had used in the show and some
very purposefully vague notes about the trick that he was doing.
(08:10):
There was no real explanation of how the trick was done.
So just in case you don't know what the cup
and ball trick is, it's an act where performer moves
three cups and three balls around the varying stacks, basically
making it up here as though the balls are passing
through the cups. So not quite if you were thinking
of the one where there's one ball and cups and
(08:31):
like there's just the one ball and you're trying to
keep a it's a little more complex than that. Yeah,
it's not the one that's like the precursor to three
card Monty, right, Like it's like a thing where matter
appears to have been warped away. Yes, so this is
a trick that people still do today. You can easily
find how to videos nowadays on how to do it online. Yeah,
(08:55):
you can learn magic online, which I love. Um. According
to Roberto Damn, the ver Jean he saw that day
used nutmegs and goblets, and it went like this quote.
During a long series of tricks, the nutmegs, at first invisible,
appeared at the finger ends of the conjurer. Then they
passed through the cups under the table into a spectator's pockets,
(09:17):
and finally emerged to the general delight from the nose
of a young looker on. But of course Robert did
not have the benefit of the Internet to figure this
one out, so he was really disappointed at having spent
money on this booklet to learn nothing. He tried to
hunt down the conjurer, who he calls Dr garlos Bach
in his memoir, but though he tracked him to a
(09:40):
nearby inn, the innkeeper told him the performer had vanished,
incidentally not paying his bill. Clearly, Jean Eugene was fascinated
with sleight of hand and other tricks early on, but
his career path did not lead him there initially. And
we're going to talk about all of that after a
sponsor break. From an early age, Jean Jean had wanted
(10:09):
to be a watchmaker like his father, and to also
make other clockwork mechanisms, but his father, prosper was not
actually supportive of this idea. He had envisioned that his
children would have greater socio economic status than he did,
so he wanted his surviving son to be a lawyer.
According to Robert Rod, his father told him, quote, consider
(10:31):
it would be unreasonable to bury the ten years schooling
for which I made such heavy sacrifices in my shop.
Remember too, that after thirty five years hard work, I
have been hardly able to save sufficient provision for my
old age. Then pray, change your resolution and give up
your mania for making a parcel of filings. So for
(10:54):
a while, Roberto Don worked in an unpaid apprenticeship as
a clerk for an otary, he copied legal papers. There
By all accounts, he had just extraordinarily beautiful handwriting. So
while this work was shortly tedious, he was very very
good at it and also hated it. Yeah, there are
(11:16):
examples you can find of some of these documents that
he copied in various biographies of him. And he does
have handwriting so beautiful. It looks like art like it's legible,
but also very caligraphic, and it's very very pretty. But
if you don't like it doesn't matter. One day, his
father had received a snuff box which had been brought
(11:38):
into his shop for repair. This box sounds incredible, according
to Roberto, it had a clockwork scene that was embedded
in the lid. And this was a hunting scene that
featured a rabbit running pursued by a hunter and his dog.
And when we say that it's not still, it's literally
a clockwork that's moving. The tiny clockwork hunter could show
(12:00):
there his rifle and fire it. The object reportedly made
a popping sound at this point in the scene, and
then the rabbit would run away, followed by the dog.
This all sounds really mind blowing and complex, and John
jen said that he surreptitiously drew a detailed diagram of
all of this snuff box lids workings. He did not
(12:22):
dare work on that actual box himself, but he had
the idea that he could make a copy of it.
So he got up early every morning and worked secretly
in his father's shop before he went to work. It
took a year, but he completed his replica and when
he assembled all the pieces, it worked. And when he
showed this to his father, thinking ha ha, I will
(12:43):
win him over, he will say, yes, of course you
can be a watchmaker. This is your passion, and Prosper
was impressed, but then he told him quote, you had
better take no pride in your skill, for it may
injure your prospects. He moved next to a sal read
position in a lawyer's office, basically as an office boy
(13:04):
who ran errands and kept the offices tidy. This job
was an over a a bit north of blah and
for the first time Jean Yugen had money and free time.
He also had access to the firm's library. He used
that library to expand his knowledge, particularly in the area
of the natural sciences. He was trying to reconcile himself
(13:27):
to a future as a notary, but he also could
not stifle his impulses to work on creating these little machines.
Before long, he had redesigned the canary cage that his
boss kept in the waiting room to entertain waiting clients,
so that the birds activated mechanisms that let them access
(13:48):
food and baths and better purchase with treats. Led to
a serious discussion with his boss that did not end
the way you might expect. The notary offered to speak
to Prospero, there on behalf of Gean Eugena, to make
the case that really, the younger Robert was not going
to be happy and fulfilled in any job unless it
(14:09):
took advantage of his inventive love of the mechanical world.
This actually worked. Prospery, who had been so opposed, was
becoming a watchmaker, Finally acquiesced. At this point, prosper had
sold his business to one of Jean Eugene's older cousins,
Jean Martin Robert, who became his mentor and watchmaking. The
(14:31):
two men would be in business together for the next
four and a half decades, although not in watchmaking, no,
some of it was in watchmaking, but not all of it.
Because cousin Robert encouraged Jean Yugin to study watchmaking seriously.
The younger Robert ordered a copy of treat do Laxerie
the watch Trade from the local bookseller, and according to
(14:54):
Robert D's memoirs, this was a significant development for him
in his career. Has When he received that parcel and
took it home and opened it up, it was not
what he ordered. Instead of the manual of the watchmaker's
industry that he was expecting, he got a two volume
set of Amusement de sience that's scientific amusements. And when
(15:16):
he opened this incorrect book he was completely absorbed and
began reading it without even meaning to. He attributed his
finding of his life's calling to this accidental switch by
the bookseller. A good point to remind listeners that his
memoirs were intended to be entertaining above all else. There
are a few different points where he says, and that
(15:36):
was the most important moment of my life. But this
was he basically got a book that was teaching him
how to make small mechanical things even more intricate than
he had already been working on. But again we can't
be entirely sure if any of Roberto Dance stories of
this nature are entirely true. Regardless, starting in the late
eighteen twenties, he became fascinated with magic. Unlike his encounter
(16:01):
with Dr girls Buck, which left him with no information,
these books opened up a whole world of information to him,
and he just devoured it. But though he had read
the whole thing in a matter of days, he was
still left without anybody to show him how tricks really
needed to work in the real world. To make up
(16:22):
for the lack of a mentor, he did things like
take juggling lessons. He practiced tricks based on the drawings
in the book. Robertodan used the lack of a mentor
to just bolster the idea that he came up with
much of his stage act on his own out of
thin air. But among his effects found after his death
(16:43):
were four notebooks written by a man notated only as
Monsieur David, who was himself an amateur magician. These notebooks
were filled with notes and comments on the acts of
many magicians that Msieur David had seen performed. Yes, so
while he's like no, I had to like basically try
to act it out based on pictures and books, and
(17:05):
I taught myself everything. He in fact, had lots of
information about how magic was performed. But throughout all of
this discovery of magic, for jean Usen, he was still
an apprentice to his cousin in the watch shop. He
later wrote of learning simple tricks during his early career
in watchworks quote, although my time was fully occupied here,
(17:26):
I managed to continue my pocket practice, and I daily
noticed with joy the progress I was making. Thanks to
my constant exercises. I had learned how to make any
object I held in my hand disappear with the greatest ease.
And as for the principles of card tricks, they were
only child's play to me, and I could produce some
delightful illusions. I confessed to feeling a degree of pride
(17:50):
in my humble power of amusing my friends, and I
neglected no occasion of displaying it. In the spring of
eight he was declared graduate did from his apprenticeship. At
that point he started a tour of France to work
in the best watchmakers shops all around the country to
further refine his skills. That wasn't an unusual practice at
(18:12):
the time, and during his travels, he claimed that he
once had food poisoning so bad that it caused him delirium.
He said that he ordered a coach to take him
back to Blois, but then jumped out in a moment
of frenzy from this fever that he had and he
fell to the ground unconscious. When he woke up, there
(18:33):
was a stranger taking care of him and that was
the moment that changed his life. It was another one
of those, according to Roberto that was how he met
his magic mentor, a man who went by the stage
named Turini, who was really Edmund Degreezy, the son of
Count Degreezy. Turini or Edmond is a very romantic figure
(18:54):
in Roberto Dan's writing, with a dramatic and sad backstory,
and this traveling magician nursed Jean Ujan back to health
and taught him conjuring tricks, and before the two men
parted ways, Jean Jugen even stepped in for Tarini when
he was injured in an accident and could not perform,
as a way of paying him back for the kindness
(19:15):
that he had shown in caring for him. Dramatic, it's
all very romantic. Um Incidentally, there isn't really any hard
evidence found to indicate the degrees E or his stage
persona Turini were real. He very well might have been,
But Robert daz writing is also influential enough that Tarini
(19:36):
often appears in lists of historical magicians, and much of
what we know in air quotes about him comes from
these accounts. After his time abroad studying watchmaking and magic,
Jean Eugene Robert returned to Blois, where his aging grandfather
was near death. When the old man died, he left
his grandson a considerable amount of money, enough that he
(19:59):
could really kick around doing whatever he wanted for a while.
But Roberto Dan's late in life account of this time
suggests that he was still getting a lot of pressure
from his father to settle down, find a wife, and
become a watchmaker. He related that he was often called
to defend his bachelorhood, and one evening, when he was
(20:20):
doing so at a social event, something surprising happened. It
was the moment that changed his life again yet another
um he wrote, quote, Now, it happened that among the
persons listening to this description of the blessings of celibacy
was a young lady of seventeen, who inclined a serious
(20:41):
ear to my arguments against marriage. It was the first
time I had met her, so I could not describe
any other reason for her fixed attention than her desire
to detect the word. A man is always delighted to
find an attentive listener, more especially when it is a
pretty young girl. Ns I thought it my bound and
(21:01):
duty to make some polite remarks to her. During the
course of the evening, A conversation ensued and became so
interesting that we had a great deal still to say
to each other when the hour came for separation. And
I believe the regret at parting was not felt by
myself alone. The simple event was, however, the cause of
my marriage with Mademoiselle Uda, and this marriage took me
(21:24):
to Paris. That marriage, incidentally, I like how he rushes
through the whole thing, and it's just like And then
we were married, like it happened at the end of
the night. Um. That marriage actually took place in July
of eighteen thirty uh, and things were not quite as
speedy as that account makes it seem. Robert moved to
Paris before they were married, and he negotiated the marriage
(21:44):
contract with his bride's father. Cecile actually didn't know the
wedding was being arranged until that deal was struck incomplete.
This all sounds very magical, uh maybe romantic, definitely accidental,
but there are too many ties to Jean Ujanne's life
and blah for it to have really been a surprise
(22:05):
for one. The young woman who became his wife, Josepha
Cecilia Glantina, was also from Blois. She was the cousin
of Jean Jeanne's stepmother, Marguerite Rosalie met Vi. Historians think
this meeting probably took place in the home of the
architect Pino me Devi, who was Marguerite Rosalie's brother. Just
(22:27):
so happened that Joseph Cecil's father was a watchmaker. Let's
believed this is why Roberto Dan chose to hyphenate his name.
He worked in his father in law's shop and joined
the family business, so he made their name his name. Yeah,
it does seem a little too perfect the way all
of this clicks together, that his family wasn't like, Hey,
(22:49):
Cecile should be at this party because she might be
a really good match for showing you ship it seems
pretty obvious that some sort of maneuvering of that nature
must have had And we will talk about how roberto
dance life changed once he had moved to Paris and
settled into married life. But before we do that, we'll
have a word from the sponsors that keep stuff you
(23:10):
missed in history class. Going marriage was not the only
thing for Jegan in Paris. There were also conjurors performing
all the time. He was able to go to a
(23:30):
new show every night when he wished. He also made
the acquaintance of professional magicians in Paris, and he also
had exposure to many clockwork automeda. Have you been listening
to the show for a long time, you may remember
episode on Historical Robots that featured a lot of automoda.
We've also run that as a classic, and that particular
(23:53):
entertainment of automoda was very much in vogue in Paris
at this time. There are two particular men who Roberto
Den came to know while traveling through the side streets
of the Paris magic scene. One of those was a
man known as Perugal. His full name was Alexandra Francois Rougel,
(24:14):
and while he was listed in the city directory as
a tin smith, he actually sold magicians props out of
his shop at five Richlieu. Roberto Den had found a
magic shop, but Rugel's works were not like small entertainments.
He did offer some small scale props for sleight of
(24:34):
hand tricks, but he also built and sold much larger
automata for bigger spectacles. Rujol is said to have had
a catalog of a hundred and thirty two different tricks
for sale. The shop was also a social nexus for magicians,
and it was there that Roberto Dan met a lot
of other conjurors. He also wrote a book ROCDI recreation
(24:58):
de Physique and mus The Recreations of Physical Amusements that
document that how a lot of these large scale automata worked.
It's an important work in the history of conjuring, and
it gave later practitioners vital information about the mechanical aspects
of this art. The other important figure who came into
Roberto Dan's life in Paris was Christine Emmanuel Comte, a
(25:23):
Swiss born magician who was also the son of a watchmaker.
It seems like everybody's dad made watches for a living.
Monsieur Compte had performed for Louis the eighteenth and the
eighteen teens, and was granted the title of the King's
Conjurer for so amusing the monarch. King Louis Philippe granted
him the honors Chevalier de Lejon. Done during his reign.
(25:44):
Compt is often credited with establishing ventriloquism as part of
conjuring acts, although this was more about throwing his voice
around a theater than what you might think of e
ventriloquis being using puppets or dolls. He also is sometimes
credit at it with being the first performer to pull
a rabbit out of a hat, though other magicians sometimes
(26:05):
get that credit. Comped was someone whose work in creating
fantastical stage acts was something that robertod And admired, of course,
but he seemed almost more entranced by the Compt as
a businessman. He wrote of him quote Compt was also
an object of interesting study to me, both as manager
(26:26):
and as artist. As manager, Compt could have challenged the
most skillful to a comparison, and he was a famous
hand at bringing grist to his mill. The little schemes
of manager employees to attract the public and increase. His
receipts are tolerably well known, but comped for a long
time did not require to have recourse to them, as
(26:48):
his room was always crowded. He also wrote about the
various ways that Comped bolstered income. When theater attendants waned,
he offered various kinds of discounted tickets and group rates,
and then offered additional things for sale to make up
the gap. And he added a small cafe at the
side of the theater. Patrons paid for a cup of
(27:10):
coffee or a cordial, and then the waiter would admit
them to the theater through a door that enabled them
to pass by the line, skip to the front, be
the first at the box office. It's pretty ingenious. Um,
I would do that. Dine in our cafe, get a cocktail,
and then you first. That sounds great to me. Um.
(27:33):
There were things that Robert Udas saw in Coombs shows
that he actually thought could be plussed up, or ways
that they might be staged differently for added spectacle. He
certainly was not thinking seriously at this point of taking
to the stage himself, and with pretty good reason. For one,
he just didn't have the experience to try to compete
in the Paris Magic scene, and for another no one
(27:55):
competed with the King's conjuror not at his own style
of act. They were other amusements vying for the money
of entertainment seekers, like the Phantasmagoria. But even though there
were some other conjurers playing here and there, compt ruled
supreme at this point. But the combination of inspiration from
watching Compta's act and business, seeing the automatons and other
(28:18):
props and rusual shop, and his own ingenuity led Roberto
down to start making mechanical show pieces of his own.
He still wasn't performing any tricks on stage, though, but
he did sell his mechanisms to other performers. He also
repaired other people's automata out of the watch shop, and
brushed up against one that we talked about in that
(28:41):
earlier Five Historical Robots episode. In eighteen forty four, he
he repaired von Kinstone's famous pooping robot duck. We can't
get away from that duck. Uh. The early eighteen forties
were actually pretty rough for Roberto dem In October of
eighteen forty three, his wife Cecile died. She had been
(29:02):
through a lengthy illness. We don't know specifically what it was.
She had given birth to seven children over the course
of their thirteen year marriage, but four of those children
had died. Their surviving children, Emil, Marie, Rosalie, and Prosperoujean
had to be cared for. While Emil, the eldest, stayed
with Jean Eugene, the younger two children went to Blois
(29:24):
to stay with their grandfather. But then, just five months
after Cecile died in February of eighteen forty four, Marie
Rosalie and Jean Eugene's father, prosper Robert, both died on
the same day. At this point, Robert ro Dan had
his two sons to care for, and he didn't really
know how, so he remarried. The young woman was Marguerite
(29:47):
Francoise or Lamp Braconnier, who went by O Lamp. She
was twenty eight, and, according to Roberto Dan's correspondence with
a friend, she had not initially wanted to get married.
She had resolved that she would say single and live
with her mother. She was also reluctant to take on
jan Jan's two children, but eventually she acquiesced that two
(30:09):
of them got married on August eighteen forty four in Paris.
It was not long after his second wedding that Roberto
Dem met another figure. It has come up on the
show many times, Phineas Taylor Barnum. Barnum was in Paris
for the eighteen forty four Exposition, an event at which
Roberto Dam was an exhibitor. The watchmaker showed off many
(30:31):
of the automata he had made, but one in particular
was the Star. This was a piece called the Writing
and Drawing Automaton. You'll also see it as the Writing
and Drawing Man. Sometimes it's describe. It gets called different
things in different historical accounts. And it was, as the
name indicates, a human shaped figure that could write and
draw when prompted. But more than that, it answered questions
(30:55):
posed to it, and it would answer those questions by
drawing or writing out the answer. And that automaton really
enchanted the most illustrious visitor to the expo, not Barnum,
but we'll be coming back to him. The visitor in
question here was King Louis Philippe. For the King, the
automaton answered the question of how many people lived in Paris?
(31:17):
It wrote nine thousand nine hundred sixty four, although the
king was hoping it would have predictively known the number
that had just been tabulated by a new census that
was not published yet. The automaton also finished poems, and
it did so for Louis Philippe. It also wrote poetry,
and it drew a crown. Robertodan won a silver medal,
(31:40):
and the King himself presented it to him with the
words you enriched me I honor you etched on there.
When the expo finished, Roberto Don sold the Writing and
Drawing Man two p. T. Barnum. This actually is a
situation that later led Houdini to believe that Roberto Dn
was some sort of fraud. Houdini notes in his book
(32:02):
The Unmasking of Roberto Dan that Roberto Din only ever
showed the writing Automaton at the Expo, and nothing quite
like it ever appeared in any of the shows he
would later perform. Hudini wrote, quote, this question naturally arises.
If Roberto Den built the original Writing and Drawing figure,
why could he not make a duplicate and include it
(32:24):
in his program. Surely it was one of the most
remarkable of the automata, which he claims as the creations
of his brain and hands. Biographer Christian Fashnair theorized that Barnum,
who purchased the device for use in his shows, most
likely called for the inclusion of an exclusivity clause in
the purchase agreement, i e. If Roberto Din had made
(32:47):
copies of that same figure, Barnum's would not have been
as effective as an audience draw. There's also a really
interesting account written by Barnum about the expo and Roberto
Den's mechanical wonder. He wrote, quote, I paid a round
price for this most ingenious little figure, which was an
automaton writer and artist. It sat on a small table,
(33:09):
pencil in hand, and if asked, for instance, for an
emblem of fidelity, it would instantly draw the picture of
a handsome dog. If love was wanted, a cupid was
exquisitely penciled. The automaton would also answer many questions in writing.
During my visit, Huda was giving evening legend of main performances,
(33:30):
and by his pressing invitation I frequently was present. He
took great pains to to introduce me to other inventors
and exhibitors of moving figures, which I liberally purchased, making
them prominent features in the attractions of the American Museum.
This account is really really interesting, specifically because it offers
(33:51):
a glimpse at Robertud's personality that is rather counter to
the way he was portrayed by Houdini later on. Houdini's
books that we've mentioned, The Unmasking of Roberto Da includes
this description of his one time hero quote stripped of
his self woven veil of romance, Roberto Dan stood forth
in the uncompromising light of cold historical facts, a mere pretender,
(34:14):
a man who waxed great on the brainwork of others,
a mechanician who had boldly filtered the inventions of the
master craftsman among his predecessors. Hudini really makes the case
that Roberto Dan took credit for the works of others
and was really entirely self serving. But then when you
look at Barnum's account, it sounds like he had certainly
enough generosity of spirit to make sure other people who
(34:38):
worked in his field, so people that were theoretically his
competitors at market also had the chance to be seen
by Barnum and to sell their inventions to him. This
really jumped out of me, because it just illustrates how
differently two people can perceive the same person, and how
their own biases may color that perception, and then how
that gets relaid through the ages to us who are
(34:59):
trying to learn about these people. And that's where we
will leave this one, because after that eighty four exposition,
a lot changed for Robert Dan and just a very
short period of time. Dun dun da. And since we're
talking about art and fun things, I'm going to read
an art themed listener mail that sounds great. This is
(35:23):
from our listener Tara, who writes, Hi, Holly and Tracy,
I love your podcast and I listen all the time.
My name is Tara bar and I'm an artist based
in the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria, Virginia. The
Torpedo Factory was built in nineteen nineteen and served as
a munitions plant through the end of World War Two.
After it was decommissioned, it sat vacant as an issore
(35:44):
until the mid seventies, when a group of artists petitioned
the city to convert it into art studios. Today, it
is a three story building taking up half a city
block on the Potomac River Waterfront in Old Town, Alexandria.
Over two hundred artists work and exhibit here. In addition
to art studios, there are also art classrooms, printmaking workshops,
(36:04):
galleries and archaeology museum, and an art supply store. The
Torpedo Factory is open to the public seven days a week,
and all our studios are open to the public, so
visitors can come see us making our art any time.
I'm including some pictures to entice you to visit the
next time you're in the Washington, d C. Area. Your
podcast keeps me company during many long hours of painting.
(36:27):
Many of my pieces relate to or are directly inspired
by your episodes. I wanted to send you some art gifts,
but I know you don't have a physical mailing address
right now, so I'm linking to some images below so
you can at least look at some art. Expect some
art goodies in the mail if you ever share your
new mailing address in the future. Unfortunately, I don't have
any cute Kinty pictures to share because my husband is
(36:47):
allergic to cats and we cannot have one attaching a
painting of a cat instead. Thank you for all you
do and keep up the good work. Uh. Tara. Here's
the thing, Terra is amazing uh and I normally wouldn't.
We don't usually give people's first and last names out
of respect for their privacy, but since she uses her
name public facing as an artist, I did. I will
(37:09):
also tell you that in looking at her art, I
bought a painting this morning. So Tara, thank you for
alerting me to your work, because I think that's gonna
be a Christmas present for my husband. UM. Also, go
check this out. I just did a quick Google search
for Torpedo Factory Art Center and there are a lot
(37:30):
of amazing artists. They are doing really amazing work. I
did not know this place existed, and now it's top
of my list should I be in d C in
the future because it looks really cool and it's it's
like a magical wonderland if you're into art. It's like
a lot of great artists doing really cool art and
you could learn there if you wanted, and you can
watch them make our and you can buy art supplies.
(37:50):
This is a theme park of art basic why so, UM,
definitely go check that out if you're interested. It's very
very cool. Um. Tara, thank you so much for sending
me this and I love your work and I really
like that kittie painting. That might have been what I
was looking for when I went today and ended up
buying something completely different. Um. If you would like to
(38:11):
write to us and share the art you're making or
whatever it is that's on your mind, you can do
so at History Podcast at i heeart radio dot com.
You can also find us on social media as Missed
in History, and if you have not subscribed yet, you
can do that on the iHeart Radio app or wherever
you listen to your favorite podcasts. Stuff you Missed in
(38:34):
History Class is a production of I Heart Radio. For
more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
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Stuff You Missed in History Class News
Hosts And Creators
Holly Frey
Tracy Wilson
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