Magic Of Australia

Melbourne’s Magic Age Featured in New Exhibit

The young, Australian museum curator Simon Gregg believes “the history of Melbourne as two parallel stories: one about the development of a modern-day metropolis and the other about the emergence of floating ladies, vanishing handkerchiefs, straitjacket escapes and a bottomless barrel of logic-defying tricks and illusions.”

Mr. Gregg is featured in a big way in Melbourne’s The Age for his new museum exhibit Hocus Pocus: Melbourne Magic, Mystery and Illusion. The show starts next week, December 6, at the beautiful City Museum. The focus is “the city’s so-called golden era of magic, from 1850 to 1950.”

Gold was discovered in Melbourne’s environs during the 19th Century. And where there is gold, there are people. And where there are people, there are audiences. And where there is an audience, there is bound to be at least one magician.

Mr. Gregg believes Melbourne’s “emergence as a magic town came to be after the discovery of gold and the subsequent population explosion of the 1850s.”

Ellis and Webster Top Beanie Weenies

Assume you grew up in the wild and never knew of civilization; as if you were a modern day Kaspar Hauser.

This strange man/boy wandered into a German town and lived a short, mysterious life. He lacked the social, hygienic and language skills that come from being raised by humans.

And yet he was very bright and inquisitive. He was plagued with a terrible hunchback apparently caused by his prior imprisonment in a small space.

He was either murdered or killed himself in the center of the town one evening and the cause of his death has never been determined.

Now, you as little Kaspar, stumble into civilization and are adopted by a very rich person and treated to only the best in life.

You have the best food, even though your palate lacked the sophistication necessary to discern Filet Mignon with a fine 1989 Mondavi Cabernet Reserve from Beanie Weenies and Grape Kool-Aid.

You would rightfully guess that all food in this brave new world tastes so wonderful and that all homes were stately mansions populated by caring and giving people.

You’re probably thinking, “what the heck is he talking about? So much for modern psychotropic medication!” Or maybe your thinking, “I haven’t even read this far. I gave up in the first paragraph.” Actually, no, I don’t know how you could think that if you stopped reading in the first paragraph.

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