Pete Biro - R.I.P.

[Matthew Field]

Just read on Facebook of the death of Pete Biro, after a stroke a while ago. A talented race car photographer and magician. I considered him a friend although we were miles apart politically. There are some hilarious stories around him out there.

[Bill Mullins]

How sad. He used to be an active participant here on the Forum, but I haven't seen him post in some time. I always enjoyed what he had to say.

[erdnasephile]

Very sad. I used to enjoy reading his column, "The Reel Work", and he had some great props with Joe Porper and RP Wilson. My favorite story was how he nailed Johnny Thompson with his version of Card in Balloon.

[Leonard Hevia]

R.I.P. Pete. He was something, always had a story to share, and was a constant fixture in magic forums.

[Pete McCabe]

What a loss. A great guy, a great friend, a great magician. Creative and generous. We'll miss you, Pete.

[Terry]

One of the best things about the decades old Stevens Magic Gemini BBS was the verbal back and forth between Pete and Mike Rogers. I guess the "discussions" can continue again.

R.I.P.

[Tom Gilbert]

I thought it had been a while since I had read a post by Pete.. RIP

[Ryan Matney]

I never met Pete but we spoke many times online over the years. He was a wealth of knowledge and a generous guy.
One of my favorite stories about him is how he would handle dropping a gimmick during a performance. Once, while performing, Pete dropped a salt pour (I think it was) gimmick and it bounced to the floor. Pete instantly picks it up and says "What the hell is this!?!" before tossing it into his topit.

Its gone. Nothing to discuss. Moving on.

I love that.

[Jon Pendragon]

I loved Pete, he was a good friend. An honest critic (that's impossible to find) and a man who knew who invented what most of the time which made him essential to a conversation. He was a good guy who carried with all his heart about the art of magic. He will be missed.

[F.Amílcar]

Hi:

I have not met personally, but is the same a big loss for the magic community.

Our most sincere condolences to his family and friends.

R.I.P. from Barcelona-Spain.


Sincerely yours,

F. Amílcar Riega i Bello.

[Joe Mckay]

This is very sad.

Pete was a fount of knowledge. He always had a useful tip or fun story to add to any magic discussion.

He was the ultimate amateur. But he was privy to a lot of inner circle stuff. So he was always fun to listen to.

2018 has been a very bad year for deaths in magic. I just wanted to add my thoughts to those above since Pete was such an interesting voice in the world of magic forums over the past couple of decades. His column in GENII was a lot of fun as well.

You can read more about Pete Biro in the August 2007 issue of GENII magazine. He was on the cover of that issue.

Farewell, Peter.

[Q. Kumber]

While still at school, I subscribed to a whole bunch of magazines, Abra, Magigram, GENII, New Tops, Magic Info, Crandall's Comments, and Lloyd Jones' S.O.B. jr.

The latter was of particular interest because of the inserts. There were always some kind of advertising novelties enclosed and a special sheet called Pete's Leaflet, penned by Mr. Biro.

Pete used come over to some of the British Ring conventions, but we only met once, briefly, as I was walking along Wardour Street, coming from Ken Brooke's, as he was heading towards it.

He wrote with the mind of a working professional. A few years back I bought a bunch of his booklets, all of interest. In our emails, it turned out he had a few Troublewits, which are difficult to find these days. He sold them to me, including a most beautiful one made by Tan Hock Chuan.

I do wish we had known each other more. May he rest in peace.