Cap'n Sean's Corner

By Sean Howell

There is a big difference between knowing a magic trick and performing magic.

We can practice a move a thousand times. We can stand in front of a mirror, work through the script, adjust the timing, and convince ourselves that something is ready. But eventually there comes a point when you have to put it in front of an audience.

That can be uncomfortable.

Good.

Getting outside our comfort zone is one of the ways we grow as performers.

This month, our club gives you a perfect opportunity to do exactly that with our Parlor Competition. You don't need to walk in believing you're going to win. You don't even need to walk in believing your performance is perfect. Enter because getting up and performing makes the next performance easier—and usually better.

There is also an opportunity to accomplish two things at once.

If your Parlor Competition performance includes something that qualifies for our Literary Challenge, you'll also earn a ticket for our Magic Prop Raffle.

And this month, you'll finally get to see what you've been earning those tickets for. The raffle prop will be revealed at the October meeting.

The Literary Challenge was never intended to be homework. Its purpose is to get us opening the books on our shelves, discovering—or rediscovering—magic that deserves to be performed, and then doing something with it.

Reading about magic is valuable. Practicing magic is necessary.

But magic ultimately needs an audience.

And speaking of audiences, don't forget our Parlor Show on October 24.

For those participating in the show, we have Zoom rehearsals the next three Thursdays from 7:00 PM until 8:08-ish.

Rehearsal is another opportunity to get outside your comfort zone. Bring what you're working on. Let other performers see it. Take some constructive criticism. Make changes. Try it again. A club like ours gives us something extremely valuable: a room full of people who understand what it takes to make magic work in front of an audience.

Take advantage of that.

So this month, find something that makes you a little uncomfortable. Try a routine you haven't performed before. Dust off something you've neglected. Open one of those books you've been meaning to read. Enter the Parlor Competition. Participate in rehearsal. Get yourself in front of an audience.

You might win.

You might earn yourself another raffle ticket.

You might completely screw it up.

And if you do, you'll probably learn more from those few minutes in front of your fellow magicians than you would from another month of practicing it alone.

Get up. Perform. Get uncomfortable. Get better.

— Cap’n Sean
President, Ann Arbor Magic Club
IBM Ring 22

Hocus Focus

By Various Contributors

Around the Town: Coming Up

By Karl Rabe

Next Meeting

November Meeting

The Ann Arbor Magic Club meets the second Wednesday of each month. Anyone with an interest in magic is welcome to show up to a meeting and see what it is all about.

11 Nov

7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

Plymouth Community Arts Council

​774 N. Sheldon Road,Plymouth, MI 48170

• AAMC

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Volunteer's Needed

These are upcoming events where member volunteers are needed. Typical needs are ushers, performers, ticket takers, cleanup, etc. Go to Signup Genius to signup or email the board.

Other Events

October 2026

Ring 22 Monthly MeetingRepeating Event

Our friends at The Detroit Magic Club (Ring 22) generally meet the 3rd Tuesday of every month. Please check their Calendar to confirm

20 Oct

7:15 pm - 9:30 pm

Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church

749 W. 14 Mile Rd., Clawson, MI 48017

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Monthly Board MeetingRepeating Event

All members in good standing are welcome to join the AAMC Monthly Board Meetings which are generally held on the 3rd Wednesday of the Month from 10am to 11am via zoom.

21 Oct

10:00 am - 11:00 am

Zoom Meeting

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Parlor Show – Afternoon

The AA Magic Club Parlor Show takes place at the beautiful Plymouth Community Arts Council conveniently located on Sheldon road just south of M-14. Seating is general admission. The doors will open 30 minutes before show-time. Soft drinks and snacks will be available for purchase. Ticket prices and online handling fees are as follows... Cash ... Read more

24 Oct

2:00 pm - 3:30 pm

Plymouth Community Arts Council

​774 N. Sheldon Road,Plymouth, MI 48170

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Parlor Show – Evening

The AA Magic Club Parlor Show takes place at the beautiful Plymouth Community Arts Council conveniently located on Sheldon road just south of M-14. Seating is general admission. The doors will open 30 minutes before show-time. Soft drinks and snacks will be available for purchase. Ticket prices and online handling fees are as follows... Cash ... Read more

24 Oct

5:00 pm - 6:30 pm

Plymouth Community Arts Council

​774 N. Sheldon Road,Plymouth, MI 48170

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December 2026

AAMC Board Elections

09 Dec

7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

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No event found!

Michigan Magic Day Update

As you all know, the Ann Arbor Magic Club will be hosting Michigan Magic Day 2027 on April 10, 2027 at the Sheraton Hotel in Novi Michigan. If you haven't already, go to the website and sign up for updates: https://mmd27.com.

The Michigan Magic Day 2027 Steering Committee has been meeting regularly and is responsible for planning, coordinating, and delivering a successful regional magic convention.

Each of the stream leads above is coordinating their areas, and other members have volunteered to work with them in their areas. If you have volunteered, thank you! If you are willing and able to help with the planning, reach out directly to the Team Lead above that matches your area of interest. As a team we have decided our budget and ticket prices based on that. We expect to be opening online registration very soon.

AAMC Board Elections - Call for Candidates

This is an election year.

• October - Call for Candidate Nominations
• November - Ballots Issued
• December - Elections

Any member in good standing 18 years or older is eligible to run for election for any position. Candidates can nominate themselves or be nominated by another member. Nominations by another member will not be accepted if the named candidate does not want to run.

• President
• Vice-President
• Treasurer
• Secretary
• Sgt at Arms

To nominate yourself or another candidate, mail the board or raise it at our October meeting.

Around the Town: Recap

By Karl Rabe

Around the Town: Recap shares photos and short reports from meetings, shows, lectures, and other events that have already happened. If you have photos or stories to share, email them to the AAMC.

The Ann Arbor Magic Club held their 2026 Flea Market at St. Pricilla's Church in Livonia. Vice-President Wendy Stone suggested this location and it resulted in a fantastic event. There was loads of room for merchant tables, socializing, stage and stage seating and the auction. Parking was plentiful too.

This was the largest flea market in recent memory. 32 tables and 45 entry tickets were sold.

The extra space enabled relaxing, eating and socializing and attendees took advantage of it! The full kitchen allowed us to expand the concession menu.

Many volunteers contributed to making this event awesome. Planning, setting up, tearing down, handling the expanded concessions, tickets, 50:50, the auction all were run by volunteers. The new auction format with a simple 10% buyers fee was well received. Additionally many vendors and some attendees donated items to the club for the auction.

Wendy proposed and facilitated a new idea to offer concession sales. A seller who couldn't attend the auction could give items for sale to the club and we would sell them for them and take a commission. Only one items was put up for consignment sale this year, but the concept holds possibilities for the future.

Dr. Don Oesterwind was his usual gregarious self as he performed auctioneer duties. The new space allowed for chairs around the stage and a good crowd gathered to enjoy an expert demonstration of bid calling. Nathan Kranzo had dropped off a box of goodies as a donation for the club to auction. That went for a healthy $60. Thank you Nathan. Other sellers also generously helped out the club with donations for the auction. There was still plenty of other auction items and many sellers successfully thinned their collections and fattened their pocket books. Some of the more unusual items were a complete chair suspension, a unique vent dummy and about 15 different vintage(ish) magic kits.

Roving Photo Reporter Ming Louie reports that Kevin Peshick held a well-attended "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde; The History and Horrors of Early Stage Adaptations" themed performance at the Huntington Woods Library! Congratulations Kevin! Photo by Ming.

Ex Libris

By Dr. Joaquin M. Ayala, PhD

Hello folks and welcome to the Ex Libris article for October 2026! Spooky season is here and so too is the cooler weather, longer nights, and the beautiful color changes on the trees, one of my favorite times of the year.

Speaking of changes, we will be looking at Sub Rosa by Ariel Frailich, which is a 180-page, 6 x 9 hardcover book, originally published in 2019 by I Saw That! and illustrated with high quality photographs.

This book is really something else, but it is really about one thing and one thing only, however, that one thing is useful for many things. Sounds strange? Allow me to clarify: This book focuses on a singular technique which is used to accomplish many different effects, ranging from close-up to stage magic, mentalism to bizarre, and even more beyond that.

There are more than a few classic effects in magic that can be accomplished in a different way using this utility move (which is probably the best way to describe this technique, which is hard to describe) – Cups & Balls, Color-Changing Knives, Linking Rings/Pins, etc. and in fact, those are described in this tome. There are other effects which could benefit from its use to either clean up the ending or make the actual effect cleaner than before.

To be fair and clear, this technique is easily categorized as a switching technique; it is not a demanding thing to learn or execute, it is direct and yet, very subtle and it is decidedly an open move, but at the same time, not at all. It is in fact done exactly as the title of the book would suggest: sub rosa, meaning ‘concealed’ or ‘in secret.’

That being said, you will find some absolute gems in this as far as effects are concerned, many of them coming to you fully scripted and ready to go. You will find things like Bill/Card in Cigarette, Linking Finger Rings, Coin in Bottle, transpositions, transmutations, a great mentalism effect using borrowed coins where you apparently never touch the coins and yet, you can divine their dates and even throw in a design duplication for good measure.

One of my favorite effects in here uses a gold ring (held by your assistant) and a silver coin. The assumption applied by magicians would tell you that the objects will change places, but instead, the metals change places, the ring turning silver and the coin turning to gold.

On his Instagram channel, Ariel described an effect using the Sub Rosa technique that does not appear in the book because it came about well after publication. I had to work out the details of the flow, but it is absolutely fantastic. You bring out a small cloth bag and dump out, say, ten silver dimes. You introduce a lump of gold or a magic stone, pick up one of the coins and touch it with the stone and the dime turns to gold. The rest of the coins are picked up and put back into the cloth bag and given to a spectator to hold. They pick up the stone, tap the bag and dump out its contents; all the dimes have turned to gold. Because of the way the effect is accomplished, you finish clean, and everything can be inspected.

This technique can also be used to switch out a gaffed/gimmicked item(s) in and out for a normal duplicate, such as a color changing knife, gaffed coins, etc. Once you learn the technique, you will find lots of uses for it and you will not have to spend years on it. As alluded to previously, this technique is also useful to anyone, regardless of what kind of magic you perform, be it coins, cards, mentalism, bizarre magic, mathemagic, etc.

Well, that is all for this article. Please enjoy the spooky season and the colorful Autumnal changes coming your way (it has already started up here in the Charlevoix/Petoskey area), and have a fun, safe Halloween!

J. M. A.

The Vanishing Archives

By Mike Bogdas

Keeping traditions alive is what makes a magic club more than just a monthly gathering—it’s the invisible thread that ties one generation of wonder-workers to the next. When we dig out the old tubs of tricks, swap the classics, elect new officers, and still make room for a good flea-market free-for-all, we’re not just repeating the past. We’re expanding it—adding fresh faces, new bits, and a few extra laughs along the way. And the best part? Those traditions are better than ever. That spirit is exactly what you’ll find in this slice of Assembly 88 history from March 2012.

Assembly 88 March 2012
(AAMC March Meeting / Swap Night / New Officers)
ANN ARBOR/YPSILANTI, MI

March – time to do some spring cleaning! Our club members went through all of their magic and props and brought in stuff to swap or sell. It was a great time to pick up something new to use for the next performance. Member Jim Folki brought four or five tubs of magic, as did Jeff Walters and Marvin Mathena. Dan Jones, Jim Ruth, and a few others had miscellaneous odds and ends. So there was plenty to choose from, if it was what you were looking for! We also had our last nominations and elections for the officers. Dan Jones was elected as our new president, Jim Placido for our vice president, and Bob Waite is now our sergeant at arms. No one ran against Marvin Mathena, our treasurer, or me, Randy A. Smith, secretary. Now it’s time to prepare for our annual banquet on March 25th.

—Randy A. Smith

We had our flea market and it was a great turnout—proof that this long-standing tradition is better than ever!

Why did the silk scarf refuse to be sold at the flea market?
It said, “I’m already tied up in too many routines!”

Vox Pop

By Mike Thornton

The Magicians Who Made Me a Magician

By Mike Thornton

People sometimes ask me how I became interested in magic. After performing for most of my life, it's difficult to point to one exact moment. But when I look back, there are three men who clearly stand out in the beginning of my story: Officer Tom McCormick, Larry Thompson - better known to thousands of Detroit kids as Mr. Whoodini - and David Linsell.

I'm not sure whether Officer McCormick or Mr. Whoodini was the first magician I ever saw. I do know that both made an impression on me long before I could have imagined that magic would become such a large part of my life.

Officer Tom McCormick

My earliest memories of seeing a magician perform live are probably of Detroit Police Officer Tom McCormick. I attended Thomas A. Edison School on Grand River in northwest Detroit, and I remember Officer McCormick coming to our school when I was probably around third grade. He used magic to teach children lessons about safety. To a little kid who was already fascinated by magic, he was unforgettable.

I can still remember him performing the Magician's Coloring Book, that classic children's trick where the pages mysteriously change from blank, to drawings, to full color. I also remember seeing him perform outdoors during the summer at the park next to Edison School.

Years later I learned that McCormick wasn't simply a police officer who happened to know a few tricks. He was genuinely involved in magic and even created magical effects of his own. One of them was Color Changing Shoelaces. There is a wonderful bit of symmetry in that for me because I eventually added Color Changing Shoelaces to my own act and performed it for many years.

I never personally knew Tom McCormick. He probably never knew the influence he had on the little kid sitting in his audience. But there's a very good chance that he was the first magician I ever saw perform live. Sometimes you influence somebody without ever knowing it.

Mr. Whoodini - Larry Thompson

At about the same time, there was another magician entering our home through television. His name was Larry Thompson, although every kid watching television in Detroit knew him as Mr. Whoodini.

Larry had a television program on Channel 9 called The Magic Shoppe, and I watched it faithfully. If Mr. Whoodini was doing magic on television, I wanted to see it. Later, Larry became part of Detroit's Bozo show, and naturally I followed him there too.

Eventually I did more than watch from home. I would go to WJBK-TV Channel 2 and watch the programs being taped. On a Saturday they would typically tape five shows in one day. For a kid who loved magic and television, getting to sit there and watch all of that happen was pretty special.

At the time, Larry Thompson was a television magician I admired. I could never have imagined that someday Larry would become one of my mentors and, eventually, a good friend. As I became older and more involved in magic professionally, our relationship changed. Larry wasn't Mr. Whoodini to me anymore. He was Larry.

And his influence on me went well beyond magic. Larry was the person who turned me on to the Macintosh computer. That may seem unrelated to magic, but it had an enormous effect on the way I eventually operated my business. I learned to use the Mac for the business side of entertainment, and computers became tools I would rely on for years. That's something about mentors we sometimes overlook. The most important thing they teach you isn't always a trick.

Larry's annual Christmas parties were another great memory. I attended them for years, and - as you might expect from a party hosted by Larry - they were always entertaining. There was another connection through my longtime magician friend Bob Schinker, whom I met in Colon, Michigan. Bob worked for Larry for a number of years performing Larry's educational robot show featuring Topo the Robot.

Larry remained my friend for the rest of his life. When Larry died in 2019, Bob Schinker and I both had the honor of speaking at his funeral. Standing there talking about my friend, it wasn't lost on me that decades earlier I had been a little boy sitting in front of a television set watching Mr. Whoodini perform magic. Life has a funny way of completing circles.

David Linsell

The third major influence came directly through Edison School. I was in fifth grade, and my teacher was Gloria Williams. Mrs. Williams was wonderfully supportive of my interest in magic and allowed me to perform in class.

One day she told me that another teacher at Edison, Mrs. Linsell, had a son who was going to perform a magic show in the auditorium for the younger students. She asked if I would like to get out of class and go watch him. Obviously, she didn't have to ask twice. The magician was David Linsell.

That simple decision by Mrs. Williams - to let a fifth-grade boy leave class to watch a magic show - changed my life. David became my first real mentor in magic. He came to our house many times. Sometimes he would show my family magic. Other times I would perform tricks for him and he would critique what I was doing.

One piece of advice has stayed with me all these years: Don't hide behind the table. David wanted me out front, interacting with the audience rather than using the magician's table as a barrier between us. It sounds like a small piece of advice, but more than fifty years later I'm still a performer who wants to be with the audience, not separated from them.

David introduced me to more of the world of magic. He brought me my first Abbott's Magic catalog. He taught me the Gene Anderson Torn and Restored Newspaper, a classic routine that became an important part of magic for generations of performers. When David was traveling with Denny Loomis's Magic Capades, he would even send me memorabilia from the road.

Remember, this was long before texts, email or social media. If somebody was traveling and thought about you, they put something in an envelope, wrote your address on it and mailed it to your house. As a young magician, receiving those envelopes was exciting.

David eventually became well known in the magic community as a photographer of magicians. More importantly to me, just like Larry Thompson, David remained my friend for the rest of his life.

Editor's Note: You can read more about David and see some of his absolutely iconic photos of magicians here.

Looking Back

When you're a kid, you don't know which moments are going to matter fifty years later.

Officer McCormick probably didn't know that a boy watching his safety show at Edison School would remember his magic for the rest of his life - and would someday perform McCormick's own Color Changing Shoelaces professionally. Larry Thompson couldn't have known that one of the kids faithfully watching The Magic Shoppe would eventually become his friend, learn from him, attend his Christmas parties and someday stand up at his funeral and speak about what he meant to him. And Gloria Williams couldn't possibly have known what would happen when she let a fifth grader leave her classroom to watch David Linsell perform.

But I know.

I've been fortunate to spend most of my life performing magic. I've won awards, performed thousands of shows, met wonderful magicians and made friendships through magic that have lasted a lifetime. But before any of that happened, I was just a kid in Detroit who loved magic.

There was a police officer doing magic at my elementary school. There was a magician named Mr. Whoodini on my television. And there was a young magician named David Linsell who took the time to encourage me, critique my magic and give a young magician some very good advice.

Those three men helped make me the magician I became. And after all these years, I still think one of the greatest things a magician can do isn't to fool somebody. It's to inspire somebody.

Editor's Note: Our club is exceedingly fortunate to benefit from Mike Thornton's inspiration regularly during the "Learning Sessions" he conducts for the club.

At the left Mike Thornton shares his knowledge by teaching members some basic rope moves.

Vox Pop (The Voice of the People) is an occasional feature of The Magic Messenger when members have something to share. We welcome member contributions. If you have something to share, write it up and mail it to annarbormagicclub@gmail.com.

Funny Business

By Karl Rabe and various contributors

This month we feature a new classic, The ZYX Song, sung to the tune of The ABC Song. You will be glad to know the copyright has expired on the ABC Song so feel free to sing this at all your gigs.