Who invented this control?

A place where beginners can participate, ask questions, and post their views. However, beginners typically ask a lot of questions about sources, tricks, books, and so on. In fact, all magicians are interested (or should be) in the provenance of tricks, ideas, and related matters. This department will service these needs.
Philippe Billot
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Who invented this control?

Postby Philippe Billot » August 16th, 2019, 4:04 am

You have a key, say in 26th position. For instance the AS.

A spectator cut a small packet.

You cut a bunch past the 26th card.

You spread your cards face up until you see the AS.

You count the cards from then on.

Suppose you count TEN cards.

Substract TEN from TWENTY-SIX (key position) and you have the number of cards cut by the spectator.

Who was the first who find this?

Stadelman wrote that R.W. Hull invented it but I can't find it in his books.

Who can help me?

EdwinCorrie
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby EdwinCorrie » August 20th, 2019, 5:39 pm

Not sure if this is exactly what you're referring to, but I found the following.

"One is to take the position of the key card from the top of the deck and deduct it from 52 (the number of cards in play). (...) Now continue counting, starting on your key card (20), and again counting backwards: 20, 19, 18, 17 etc. When you run out of cards you know the next number represents the number of cards the spectator holds. (...) When Paul Stadelman republished the trick, So Simple, in The Sphinx (Vol 48, No 5, July 1949), he mentioned an idea of Ralph Hull’s."

NOTE: This comes from a strange website which I won't link to here as it looks a bit suspicious (my browser says it's "Not secure"), but if anyone wants to look just search for the article title, which is "Helping You To Comprehend The Industry Of Baseball With One Of These Simple Tips". It looks like some kind of gaming or betting site, and I have no idea how the instructions for a card trick got in there. I've just copied out the relevant parts. Very strange - but I'm not very familiar with this sort of thing. Perhaps someone can explain it to me... Anyway, the reference to The Sphinx and Ralph Hull might be interesting.

Moderator: Feel free to delete all or part of this post as you see fit.

Philippe Billot
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Philippe Billot » August 21st, 2019, 12:56 am

Thanks Edwin,

Yes, it is that Paul Stadelman wrote in 1934 in his book Sandu Writes Again. He reprint his trick "So Simple" in The Sphinx in 1949 (as you write it) but I read all the books of Ralph W. Hull and I can't find this control.

For me, it's a variation of old mathematical tircks (like Card at Any Number or Clock Card Trick) bu t I can't find who the first used the Key card like this (to deduce a number of cards).

Philippe Billot
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Philippe Billot » August 21st, 2019, 1:28 am

I just discover that this kind of key is named a Remote Key (dixit Hugard in Royal Road to Card Magic - 1948) and Horowitz used it in 1934 (See The Linking Ring, Vol. 65, no. 7, July 1985, page 69).

Pete McCabe
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Pete McCabe » August 21st, 2019, 10:49 am

I've also seen this kind of thing called a "Floating Key", so that might be worth looking for also.

Joe Mckay
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Joe Mckay » August 21st, 2019, 10:58 am

Harry Riser has a really cool trick using this principle. It also uses a faro shuffle and the combination will definitely end up fooling you. It is just impossible to work out why it works.

The trick is called The Forgotten Sunken Prediction and it is in the March 2006 issue of MUM.

It is described by Michael Close.

Philippe Billot
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Philippe Billot » August 21st, 2019, 12:43 pm

Pete McCabe wrote:I've also seen this kind of thing called a "Floating Key", so that might be worth looking for also.


I think you read this in a book (or magazine) by Karl Fulves but I don't remember which one.

Pete McCabe
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Pete McCabe » August 21st, 2019, 3:31 pm

Philippe Billot wrote:I think you read this in a book (or magazine) by Karl Fulves but I don't remember which one.


I have seen "Floating Key" used in several places. Bannon has a trick with a floating key in one of his books. I think I've read something by Racherbaumer with the same name. Dave Solomon's name sticks in my head, but maybe he was mentioned in the Bannon book. I know Mike Powers has a trick using a similar principle, but I don't remember what he called it.

I've also seen similar things referred to as a "Sunken" key, and I may be mixing these up.

Both terms will probably help you find what you are looking for.

Denis Behr
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Denis Behr » August 22nd, 2019, 2:55 am

("Floating Key Card", "Sunken Key Card", "Distant Key Card" - If there is any agreed-upon distinction, I am not aware of it.)

Jack Shalom
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Jack Shalom » August 22nd, 2019, 7:23 am

Simon Aronson uses the Floating Key as well in some of the effects in Simply Simon, e.g. "Past, Present, Future."

Philippe Billot
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Philippe Billot » August 22nd, 2019, 7:49 am

Thanks everybody !

All these informations are interesting but give no "key" for the creator.

It seems Scalbert was the originator of "Sunken Key" in the 50s

I continue the research

jason156
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby jason156 » August 22nd, 2019, 10:13 am

Pete McCabe wrote:
Philippe Billot wrote:I think you read this in a book (or magazine) by Karl Fulves but I don't remember which one.


I have seen "Floating Key" used in several places.... I know Mike Powers has a trick using a similar principle, but I don't remember what he called it.


If memory serves, the effect by Mike Powers was called The PM Principle.

Joe Mckay
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Joe Mckay » August 22nd, 2019, 10:55 am

Here is a cool version of The Open Principle. It makes sneaky use of the PM Principle and works great as a magician fooler.

http://www.mallofmagic.com/free%20stuff/BTROMF.pdf

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Paco Nagata
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Paco Nagata » September 17th, 2019, 6:25 am

"Prio Commitment" by Simon Aronson is also based on the concept of a "distant key card".
The concept seems to be anonymus.

Maybe, the specific effect you're talking about is
Dave Solomon and Steve Draun's "S-D Location" in Kabbala Vol. 1 (1972) reprinted by Jon Racherbaumer in 1980, as we can see thanks to the great Denis Behr "Conjuring Credits" https://www.conjuringarchive.com/list/b ... ight=28243
I learned this trick thanks to the popular and very famous Spanish book called "Cartomagia Fundamental" (Fundamental card magic), writing specially for spanish speakers by Vicente Canuto. Vicente credited the trick to Solomon and Draun, so I got the first source.

Nevertheless, the idea of a distance key card appeared first in "Modern Magic" (page 44), in 1876. In "Expert Card Technique" by Hugard and Braue (1940) there is a trick called "The Twenty-Sixth Location" (page 398), which uses
the idea in a generalised way, and five pages later, in 403, we find "A Certain Card Trick,” a true gem of Percy Abbott based on the principle of location by estimation of the cut of the spectator, trick that we can find as well in the "Encyclopedia of Card Trick” of Hugard and Braue with the title "The Card Miracle-Certain” (Abbott’s version; the second one, page 37).
"The Passion of an Amateur Card Magician"
https://bit.ly/2lXdO2O
"La pasion de un cartómago aficionado"
https://bit.ly/2kkjpjn

webbmaster
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby webbmaster » February 20th, 2020, 3:05 pm

I've heard it called "wandering key", but I think Max Maven knows about this. I seem to remember him writing something about this.

Bob Farmer
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby Bob Farmer » February 20th, 2020, 5:09 pm

And see Roberto Giobbi's column, "The Distant Key Card," Genii, March, 2004, pp. 70-71.

webbmaster
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Re: Who invented this control?

Postby webbmaster » March 23rd, 2020, 1:08 pm

Doug Edwards had some work on this in one of his books.


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