Indeed, he was an affront to authorities everywhere. It was a time of intense anti-Semitism in Russia, and Houdini, who was Jewish, wanted to flummox the tsarist politsiya. In Europe, he had pulled off such stunts as escaping (in 1903) from the “Siberian Transport Cell,” a metal safe on wheels that was used to haul political renegades off to prison. As a beginner, he had performed with trained monkeys and fat ladies a few years later, he did his tricks in a tuxedo with a boutonnière. He had toured all over the United States, playing circus sideshows, vaudeville houses, and packed theatres of the Orpheum Circuit.
He was thirty-four and had worked in show business for fifteen years. In 1908, Harry Houdini-“The World’s Handcuff King and Prison Breaker”-needed a new act.
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