Annual Calendar
November Meeting
December Meeting – Holiday Party
Michigan Magic Day 2027
Other Events
Ring 22 Monthly Meeting
Coming Up
November Meeting
- AAMC
Monthly Board MeetingRepeating Event
- AAMC
December Meeting – Holiday Party
- AAMC
The Magic Messenger
The Magic Messenger is published monthly by the Ann Arbor Magic Club (AAMC). The AAMC the Hank Moorehouse Assembly 88 of the Society of American Magicians and Duke Stern Ring 210 of the International Brotherhood of Magicians.
The AAMC (est. 1971) is a Michigan Domestic Non-Profit whose focus is to advance the magical arts by making available equipment, education, mentors and opportunities for magical enthusiasts of all ages to expand their craft.
Ann Arbor Magic Club
Board of Directors
- President: Sean Howell
- Vice-President: Wendy Stone
- Treasurer: Rob Krozal
- Secretary: Karl Rabe
- Sgt at Arms: April Barrett
The Ann Arbor Magic Club meets the 2nd Wed of each month at 7p at the Plymouth Community Arts Council.
Plymouth Community Arts Council
774 N. Sheldon Road at Junction Street
Plymouth, MI 48170
Published by Karl Rabe using Generate Press Theme and Generate Blocks Plugin on WordPress.
©Copyright 2026. All rights reserved, Ann Arbor Magic Club.
In This Issue
- The President's Corner
- The Ring Report
- Hocus Focus
- Around the Town - Coming UP
- Around the Town - Recap
- Ex Libris
- The Vanishing Archives
- Funny Business
Website:
Email:
US Mail:
https://aamagic.org
annarbormagicclub@gmail.com
P.O. Box 532244 Livonia, MI. 48152
Cap'n Sean's Corner
By Sean Howell
Ahoy, Magicians!
Well, here we are in November already! It seems like just yesterday we were planning our summer activities, and now we're looking toward the holidays and another year of magic. Somewhere along the way, somebody must have figured out how to make the calendar disappear!
October was a busy month for Ring 210, and I want to extend my appreciation to everyone who helped bring our Fall Parlor Show together. These events don't happen by themselves. They require performers willing to put themselves in front of an audience, volunteers willing to work behind the scenes, and members willing to support their fellow magicians. Every one of those contributions matters.
One of the things I've always appreciated about our club is the opportunity it provides to actually perform magic. We can spend countless hours discussing methods, collecting props, watching lectures, and debating the finer points of a particular sleight, but sooner or later, the magic has to leave the practice room.
There's simply no substitute for standing in front of an audience. That's where we discover what works, what doesn't, and occasionally what seemed like a brilliant idea right up until we tried it!
Our Literary Challenge continues this month, and if you haven't participated yet, there's still time to get involved. Dust off one of those books sitting on your shelf, find an effect that catches your imagination, and give it a try. Remember, the object isn't necessarily to perform the most difficult trick in the book. It's to explore the tremendous wealth of knowledge that generations of magicians have left for us.
And speaking of the Literary Challenge, this month we'll finally reveal the mystery prize! The drawing will take place at our January meeting, so keep earning those tickets.
Meanwhile, preparations for Michigan Magic Day 2027, April 9–10 at the Sheraton Detroit Novi, continue to gather momentum. We're working to put together a weekend worthy of our club's reputation, with opportunities to learn, perform, renew old friendships, and make new ones.
As we approach the holiday season, I also want to take a moment to recognize something that can sometimes get lost among all the meetings, performances, and preparations.
The greatest asset this club has isn't its treasury, its equipment, or even its impressive history. It's its members.
I've had the privilege of knowing some extraordinary people through magic, and many of those friendships began with something as simple as attending a club meeting. We share a rather peculiar fascination with making things disappear, producing objects from thin air, and convincing perfectly intelligent people that the impossible just happened. It's a wonderful thing to have in common.
So as we head toward Thanksgiving, I hope you'll take a moment to appreciate the friendships and fellowship that magic has brought into your life. I certainly do.
And if you've been sitting on the sidelines lately, consider this your personal invitation to get involved. Bring a trick, share an idea, volunteer for an event, or simply come to a meeting and enjoy the company.
There's always room for another hand on deck.
Until next month, keep practicing, keep performing, and above all, keep sharing the magic!
Fraternally,
Cap'n Sean
President, Ann Arbor Magic Club
IBM Ring 210
Ring Report
By Karl Rabe
Ring 210 — Ann Arbor, Michigan
October 2026 Ring Report
October brought a little competition, a little Halloween magic, and plenty of good-natured ribbing to the Ann Arbor Magic Club as members gathered for our annual Parlor Magic Competition.
President Sean Howell opened the meeting with our Sgt. at Arms April Barrett welcoming guests. Among the visitors was Phil Lockwood, a longtime clown and one of the founders of the Grand and Glorious Mid-Michigan Galaxy of Clowns. Phil confessed that after some 60 years in entertainment, he had never joined a magic club. We hope his first visit won't be his last! We also welcomed back some familiar faces, including former junior member Josh, who recalled his club involvement dating back to 1999, Member and I.B.M. International President Elect Keith Fields and club friend and Ring 22 member Fred Lenter.
Before the magic began, Treasurer Rob Krozal shared the results of our September Magic Flea Market. The event was a resounding success, generating almost $800 in net proceeds. Table sales were particularly strong, and the new venue helped reduce expenses. Rob thanked the many volunteers who made the event possible, with special appreciation for Wendy and Kevin Stone for their contribution of food and beverage for the concession.
Then it was time for the main attraction: our Annual Parlor Competition. Six performers took the stage, each bringing a distinctly different approach to entertaining the audience.
Alex Heath opened with an imaginative musical magic presentation set to the song "I Take a Lot of Pride in What I Am." Performing a cups-and-balls routine from the floor, Alex incorporated the perspective of a wandering hobo into the staging. It was an unusual and thoughtful interpretation that prompted an appreciative discussion afterward about the theatrical choices involved.
Phil Mann the Magic Mann followed with a Halloween-themed story featuring five ghosts, including Cory, a friendly ghost who preferred handing out candy to frightening children. The whimsical presentation was well suited to the season.
Mike Reuter brought his customary confidence and humor to a mentalism routine involving a freely imagined word, an Oxford dictionary, and several willing audience participants. Mike even had his own recorded introduction, announcing himself as a master magician ready to blow everyone's mind!
Ryan Hoffman offered a colorful seasonal routine involving wreaths and a magic bag.
Then First Mate Austin transported the audience aboard a pirate ship. With the assistance of young Lincoln, Austin explored the various duties of a ship's crew, from gunner to cook to navigator, with plenty of laughs along the way.
The final competitor was The Ancient One, whose character claimed responsibility for introducing magic to civilizations throughout history. From ancient Egypt to China, he regaled the audience with stories of his magical influence, illustrating his adventures with a variety of classic apparatus effects. His tales included helping build the pyramids, introducing the cups and balls, and receiving magical gifts from the Chinese emperor. Apparently, there is very little in the history of magic for which The Ancient One cannot claim credit!
Audience members selected their three favorite performers, with an additional vote marking their top choice. When the ballots were counted, Ryan Hoffman took third place with 14 votes, Mike Reuter earned second with 15, and The Ancient One captured first place with 20 votes. Remarkably, this was reported to be his first stage performance in a very long time. Congratulations to our newest Champion!
While ballots were being counted, members were treated to additional magic. Robert Langefeld contributed to the club's ongoing Literary Challenge by performing card magic learned from a book, including an effect from 101 Amazing Magic Tricks with a Svengali Deck.
Dr. Don Osterwind followed with his own customized version of the classic packet trick B'Wave.
Next was Hugh Erwin, "The Kilted Magician," who entertained the group with a dice trick.
Finally Dan Jones rounded out the performances with a charming Houdini-themed story featuring two imaginary dogs, Bluey and Pinky.
The Literary Challenge continues to encourage members to explore their magic libraries, learn something new, and perform it for the club. Members who identify their sources earn entries into a drawing for a special prize.
Members were also encouraged to help promote the club's upcoming public parlor show by distributing posters throughout the community. Nominations for club officers remain open, with the current board willing to continue serving.
Members were reminded that the Ann Arbor Magic Club will be hosting Michigan Magic Day 2027 on Saturday, April 10, 2027, in Novi, Michigan. Plans are well underway for a full day of magic, fellowship, and entertainment. Visit mmd27.com for event details, the latest announcements, and registration information as it becomes available.
It was a wonderful evening of creativity, friendly competition, and shared enthusiasm for magic. Congratulations to all six competitors for stepping forward and entertaining their fellow magicians. We look forward to seeing what everyone dreams up next October!
Hocus Focus
By Various Contributors
Around the Town: Coming Up
By Karl Rabe
Next Meeting
November Meeting
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.
Michigan Magic Day 2027
Other Events
November 2026
Ring 22 Monthly MeetingRepeating Event
Monthly Board MeetingRepeating Event
April 2027
Michigan Magic Day 2027
AAMC Board Elections
This is an election year. At the beginning of October we issued a call for candidates and repeated that at our October Meeting.
No additional names were put forward and since there is only one candidate running for each position, every candidate is uncontested and ballots will not be issued. The board will be elected by acclimation.
Your 2027/2028 Board Members will be:
- President - Sean Howell
- Vice-President - Wendy Stone
- Treasurer - Rob Krozal
- Secretary - Karl Rabe
- Sgt at Arms - April Barrett
Around the Town: Recap
By Karl Rabe
The Fall Parlor Show had a great lineup and even a first-time performer. Can you spot her in the lineup?
The show would not be possible without volunteers. Every performer helped out in some way, Jim Molnar handled all the back-stage duties, Wendy and Phil Mann handled concessions, Rob was at the front table taking tickets with Jackie Clark and keeping track of the finances, and Mike Palko took plenty of photos. Bob Goodwin and Dan Jones distributed posters in downtown Plymouth and Bob also donated magic kits to raffle off and kept track of how attendees heard about the event.
All Photos by Mike Palko.
Ex Libris
By Dr. Joaquin M. Ayala, PhD
Hello folks and welcome to the Ex Libris article for November of 2026! I hope all my readers here in the U.S. had a fun, safe and Happy Halloween, and that you all had a chance to celebrate National Magic Day on October 31st!
Some of you may or may not know that I have a long running list of books for review. From those books, which of course I not only own but also, I have read multiple times, and from those tomes I have taken material and worked it into my own repertoire and style over the years. In fact, for each and every one of the books that I have reviewed thus far for this column to date, that holds true. Some of you may also know that I strictly avoided card magic for many years throughout my development, except for card manipulation. I have long come to regret that phase, but the reason was thus: even in my young brain, I thought, “How cliché – every magician and his brother does card magic!”
Only later would I discover my error in this thinking because there were some BANG UP card MASTERS, long before anyone of us was born! The book we are focusing on this month comes from a contemporary master (though he would likely dispute this label as gratuitous). He is very well spoken, he is a practicing barrister in England, very proper and one helluva magician. The book I am referring to is Drawing Room Deceptions by Guy Hollingworth, which is a 311-page hardcover book originally published in 1999 by Mike Caveney’s Magic Words, illustrated by drawings done by the author entirely.
Now, a slight deviation, if I may…Countless magician on the planet, especially those here in the United States, would have their first encounter with Guy Hollingworth via the NBC program, The World’s Greatest Magic III, hosted by the late, great John Ritter, and originally aired on November 27th, 1996, in the United States. On this program, Guy performed two of his original effects which catapulted him into fame: Waving the Aces and The Reformation. Guy was 22 years old at the time, and he took the magic world by storm! He was, however, already making waves prior to this at various conventions in Europe, and via publications in earlier notes and magic books.
Eventually this became the very first magic book that I bought with my own money, even against the advice of Sr. Martínez, the owner of the shop in Barcelona where I purchased it. I knew why he rejected almost immediately, because this book intimidated my skill set at the time, but I was determined. I studied it and practiced the material within for at least three years, and eventually, it really opened my eyes to…non-cliché card magic!
To my own surprise, the two card effects featured on the NBC show were both described in the book. I studied those diligently, but along the way, there were many other treasures to be found…
Among those treasures is what is probably my favourite effect in the whole book, The Cassandra Quandary. This day and age, it is a convoluted method for a very worthy effect, and Darwin Ortiz thought the same when he took the method, tweaked it, and created one of his greatest effects of all time – more on that next month! The effect is that a known prediction is removed from a new deck, shown, and sealed inside an envelope, which itself is signed and held by the participant. A random card is removed face-down from the deck, never revealed. The envelope is later opened and found to be empty, and the random face-down selection is found to be the card from within the envelope - impossible! It is an EXTRAORDINARILY strong effect!
In this book you will find a wide variety of original ideas, methods for accomplishing certain things/moves, and some novel utilities that can be used in not just card work, but other types of magic as well. There are quite a few ways of using your clothing, pockets, hems, jackets and even paper clips to accomplish the work, and not necessarily in the traditional way of using those items.
The principle behind the working of Waving the Aces (which, for those of you who do not know, is his VERY visual treatment of the classic, Twisting the Aces), which is called the Optical Alignment, is applied to some other effects, to their enhancement. These include a 6-card Oil & Water, Cherchez la Femme (classic Monte-themed packet effect), and Hofsinzer Problem(and yes, Hofzinser was misspelled in the title).
There are some standard sleights given the Hollingworth treatment in this book, which are what Guy refers to as rather “eccentric moves,” including the Hugard Top Palm, Loewy Palm, Gambler’s Cop, various switches, card controls, shifts and passes with a smidgen of false deals and false shuffles. This is the stuff that will require some work if you are not already familiar with them, but they are well worth at least studying them.
His treatment of The Cannibal Cards and The Homing Card are things of beauty, as is his Ace Assembly. These three are accomplished with that staple of the stationery drawer, a paper clip, and in very clever ways. I also particularly enjoyed his Call to the Colours, a classic wherein spectators randomly name the color they wish to see (reds/blacks), and they are produced in that order from a mixed deck. This one, however, ends in new deck order! You will even find a Travellers-esque effect where four aces are lost in the deck, the deck is placed in a pocket and one at a time, the aces are extracted through the lining, except the last one where the whole deck, minus the fourth ace, penetrates the jacket.
This book is jam packed with excellent magic, but one of the things I enjoyed most were his essays and articles at the beginning of each section, which really drives home his views on magic, on practicing, his perspective and perception of various ideas and philosophies and it gives you an inside look at the man behind the magic, Guy Hollingworth himself. The book ends with The Epilogue, in which he describes the history, method and variations on the effect for which he is most known, The Reformation, a piece-by-piece restoration of a signed, torn playing card.
Well, that is the article for this month and if you read all the way through the winding road of my sideline discussion on the background of this book, I thank you! For now, for all my U.S. readers, please have a fun, safe and Happy Thanksgiving holiday later this month and I will “see” you again in December!
Yours In the Secret Art (YItSA),
J. M. A.
The Vanishing Archives
By Mike Bogdas
SAM June 1988
This month we dig back nearly four decades to a March meeting of Hank Moorehouse Assembly #88 that felt less like a club night and more like a working magicians’ trade school held at a Denny’s. Restaurant and bar workers in tuxedos, smoke from a thumb, a card permanently stuck to the ceiling, and Jeff Hobson dropping in with commentary—pure 1988 Michigan magic.
YPSILANTI, MICHIGAN
Hank Moorehouse Assembly #88
President: Jim Fitzsimmons, 3231 Randolph Ct., Ann Arbor, MI 48108
Secretary: Jack Savage, 37620 Knoll Dr., Wayne, MI 48184Wanna know what you’ve been missing by not coming to the Assembly #88 meetings? Answer: some great stuff!
The March meeting, for instance, was held at Denny’s restaurant. We were entertained by a promo video of Franz Harary.
The meeting and program got underway with volunteer performances by Tony Chaudhuri, Lindsey Jansen, Chris Carter, and Warren Stephens.
It was then into the main event of the evening: a symposium on restaurant and bar magic. Our two experts on this subject were guests Al the Only and Andrew Mark. These gentlemen are polished professionals and work bars and restaurants on a regular basis. Al the Only works the Carlos Murphy restaurant chain and other local eateries. Andrew, as he prefers to be called, is a regular nightly performer at the Novi Hilton. Both appeared in their working attire, which, in general, is a semi-formal tuxedo. Each presented a portion of his typical act.
Al the Only opened with a smooth version of “Ring Flite,” followed by cigarette-thru-quarter, a cigarette vanish, and then a surprising card-on-ceiling. (Denny’s has a lasting souvenir of our visit.) These items were punctuated with tips on working tables, handling props, talking to customers, etc. as related to restaurant magic.
Andrew came on next and started by producing smoke from nowhere (smoking his thumb actually), then quickly changing a cigarette lighter to a box of matches. These effects were mingled with various sight bits, like a green light glowing from his mouth, and humorous one-liners, along with mysterious sound effects that occurred at just the right moments. Then…wham! A silk vanished in a flash of light; and, when you thought he was all through, there came a lit cigarette from nowhere!
Both performers took the floor and fielded questions concerning all phases of their art. Many subjects were covered, such as setting up, tips, handling hecklers or those who do not seem interested in magic, and how to approach a table. These pros handled the questions very thoroughly, and sometimes both gave ready answers. This was all most interesting and went on until President Jim Fitzsimmons called a cease fire.
Our thanks to Al and Andrew for giving so generously of their time and expertise to make our Mini Bar and Restaurant Magic Seminar educational, as well as entertaining. We were also honored by a surprise from Jeff Hobson, local pro, who added appropriate comments during the evening.
Submitted by: Jack Savage
So there you have it—Assembly #88 turned a Denny’s into a temporary magic school, left a card permanently glued to the ceiling as a housewarming gift, watched a guy pull a lit cigarette out of thin air after vanishing a silk in a flash of light, and still managed to squeeze in tips on dealing with people who clearly don’t want magic at their table. Jim Fitzsimmons eventually had to call “cease fire” on the Q&A, which tells you everything you need to know about how long the real-world advice went on.
And for the record: the Novi Hilton where Andrew was working nights in 1988 is the same hotel that later became the Sheraton Detroit Novi — the very place Michigan Magic Day 2027 will be held. Same building, different name, same general neighborhood of magical confusion. Classic 1988: tuxedos, thumb smoke, and a souvenir for the restaurant that no amount of cleaning would ever erase.
Funny Business
By Karl Rabe and various contributors
Contributed via Frank Machniak...
