Three doctors - Frank Abbott of Jamaica, George Gregory and J A Winter - have challenged Houdini to what he says will be the hardest task he has ever undertaken. He appeared at Hammerstein’s at the afternoon and night performances. It was not until he was back on the boat deck that the box floated to the surface.
Harry Houdini came up in less than two and one-half minutes, two hundred and fifty feet away from where he had been thrown in, and was hauled aboard. He kept the box on the boat, however, and yesterday morning, shortly after the appointed hour, was shackled, chained, trussed and nailed in the box, which was thrown overboard off Governor’s Island. NEW YORK - Such a big crowd collected to see Harry Houdini, the “handcuff king,” nailed in a box and thrown into the East River that the police interfered and drove the vaudeville performer away in a boat. Harry Houdini, Vaudeville man, does underwater box escape “stunt” in East River (1912) See photos from a few of his adventures below, and then get the behind-the-scenes details on how the escape really worked. Hundreds of people would gather to watch the master illusionist achieve what seemed to be impossible - like getting out of handcuffs and shackles, then working his way out of a wooden box that had been dropped into a river.Īnd every time, he nailed it - so to speak. The door to belief is ready to open and is locked only in the minds of those who choose to believe it is.Houdini’s underwater box escape made headlines every time he performed the stunt - and it was one of his most popular. It is not the result of years of education, pilgrimages, or flashy supernatural experiences. The only place the door was locked was in his mind.įaith is not a complex process.
Houdini worked himself to near exhaustion trying to achieve what could be accomplished by simply pushing the door open.
The problem? The cell had never been locked. Two hours later he gave up in frustration. For two hours he applied skill and experience to the lock but failed time and time again. No matter how hard Houdini worked, he couldn't unlock the lock.
Once alone, he pulled a thin but strong piece of metal from his belt and began working the lock. He entered the cell, wearing his street clothes, and the jail cell door shut. He accepted another invitation to demonstrate his skill. Time and again, he would be locked in a cell only to reappear minutes later. He boasted that no jail cell could hold him. In his book 40 Days, Alton Gansky relates this story: "Harry Houdini made a name for himself by escaping from every imaginable confinement - from straightjackets to multiple pairs of handcuffs clamped to his arms.
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