The Genii Forum

It's pretty telling that your candidate Gallaway is primarily based on your belief that he had gambling books in his collection. Your reading comprehension is lacking. It is one of the less important pieces of evidence I have offered over the last weeks. And once again your tact is lacking and so i...

Also, what other books on gambling or magic did Gallaway have in his library? We don't know. You've mentioned repeatedly that he had other gambling books in his collection, how many and what are they? Were they all printed after Erdnase's book? We don't know. But if we find these books which had hi...

Zenner wrote:and probably started bottling "Knock- Out Spots" in a spare room just to make some extra cash. Clever bloke our Emory

Peter Zenner

I'm sorry to be ignorant but what the heck are "Knock- Out Spots"?

When somebody has several books on the same subject it is a straight forward assumption that he must have had an interest in that subject. You must not be serious about that. Did you ever meet Jay Marshall? Jay, like many others, bought many books on subjects that didn't directly interest him. Jay ...

Since it's your first post, you're obviously either Ron Bauer or one of his friends. I don't have to defend my comments to you. Mr. Kaufman, I'm not sure what your post means, please explain. For the record I'm not Ron Bauer (can you not see my name is Ed Finck how can that be mistaken for Ron Baue...

It is no worse a match than Gallaway's. And how do you know? A signature is not enough to compare handwriting according to handwriting analysts. You seem to be the expert on everything, handwriting, linguistics, print estimating, use of German back then, yet all you offer is your own opinion. I am ...

Why was the book sold under the title The Expert at the Card Table , rather than Artiface Ruse and Subterfuge at the Card Table ? Because it sounded less technical and more likely to appeal to those people who thought they might benefit financially by purchasing the book? Actually that is incorrect...

Busby/Whaley speculated that the table might have been a "train table", held on the knees of opposing players on a train. Tabman made some of these based on his interpretation of the Gardner/Smith notes. I couldn't find an illustration of one in the 1909/1910 H. C. Evans Catalog, but on p...

If there were 1000 1st edition copies, how many of them were owned by McKinney employees? Most employees of a printing firm who might want a copy from a job would probably get an overrun copy and not part of the 1000 ordered by the customer. This sort of thing happens all the time. Does anyone know...

Well, at the very least, that seems to confirm (in my mind, at least), that Jay believed that Edward Galloway was involved in the book in some important way. However, in view of the fact that Jay at some time believed that Gallaway bound the book, that by itself does not go further than that (again...

I wonder if that folder still exists. Might tell us what he asked Gallaway's daughter-in-law. A lot of Jay's things got lost over time. He showed me files at about this same time (on another subject) that were never found again by anyone! I stupidly did not take pictures of the other file and now i...

Here is the previously promised scan of that old photo from 20 odd years ago. Show's Jay Marshall's doodling in regard to Gallaway. This made at the time when Jay was considering Gallaway's involvement (author?, editor?, binder?) in the book. I tried to upload it directly but it gave me an error sta...

The 1906 article you quote seems to be plagiarized from Joseph Dennie's The Lay Preacher , written about a century before. Or at least, an unattributed quotation. Given that these words are Dennie's and not Gallaway's, I don't see how they add to the case that Gallaway wrote like Erdnase. Please no...

This part of Smith's wording is to be doubted: "Smith recalled that Erdnase was a small man of slight build, with blonde hair, 5'10" at the tallest." 5 foot 10 inches tall would not have been considered a "small man of slight build" at that height in 1902. It is not conside...

Case closed? Nope, not even close. W.S. Sanders and E.S. Andrews remain far more compelling candidates for author of EATCT than either Thompson or Gallaway. Thompson and Gallaway have had leaps of faith made that (for me) are just too large to actually consider either of them seriously at this poin...

Case closed? Peter Zenner Wow! it's great that we finally all agree and can move on to other great mysteries in magic. It's quite astonishing how quickly the majority of serious researchers dropped their candidates and came around to the obvious fact that Harry S. Thompson was Erdnase. Well done Mr...

Case closed? Peter Zenner Wow! it's great that we finally all agree and can move on to other great mysteries in magic. It's quite astonishing how quickly the majority of serious researchers dropped their candidates and came around to the obvious fact that Harry S. Thompson was Erdnase. Well done Mr...

I also think that it shouldn't be overlooked that Gallaway does not match the description of Erdnase that Garnder got from Smith nor does he match internal evidence from The Book . Apologies if I've duplicated other recently made points. Gallaway was born in Ohio, Smith thought Erdnase was from the ...

Gallaway has been referred to here as the typesetter, Jay believed he was the binder and working separately from McKinney. Is there any evidence he was a/the typesetter? His obituary makes no reference to typesetting. In the 1910 and 1920 censuses (censii?) he reported his occupation as "print...

From the bankruptcy files it is pretty clear that James McKinney did not have an in-house bindery and outsourced such work. This was the norm back then for print shops. Typesetting and printing go together well, but binding is a different beast and was usually handled by separate companies who spec...

Brad, I was wondering almost the exact same things, cuz I couldn't remember ever hearing that Jay thought Gallaway was in the running. If Jay had some powerful evidence that changed his mind, that would be highly significant. --Tom Some of the info came from Jay directly via conversation and some c...

Regarding Edward Gallaway as a candidate. Jay Marshall considered him in the 50s and after contacting his then extant family etc. decided he wasn't a strong contender and rejected the notion. Jay then moved all of his attention to Milton Franklin who, I believe, he continued to believe was Erdnase u...

Vernon's recollection on this video clearly illustrates, in spite of the missing quotations in that Vernon Touch column, that Vernon was referring to Sprong who asked Drake and NOT himself: [/b] Thank you for clarifying. So we should now understand that when Vernon is speaking in the first person a...

Vernon's story is suspect on it's face because he says he continued "badgering" old man Drake for months but "old man" Drake was dead and had died at 47 years of age and years before Vernon even came to the U.S. The sons were all around Vernon's age or younger. This strongly imp...

Didn't Vernon cut silhouettes in Chicago at the 1933 World's Fair? I always assumed that was when he followed up on Sprong's lead and "pestered" the Drake folks then for more information, which they either didn't have or weren't willing to share. Drake was still publishing the book then. ...

Drake died in 1912. His son Frederick died much later, 1937, but I don't believe he was involved in the publishing company. His sons Stafford and Logan were. Point taken, I didn't realize that FJD jr. probably wasn't involved with the publishing firm. My larger point was that I don't believe that V...

My 2 cents and they might not be worth that much. Discounting primary source material like M. D. Smith's recollections because they don't fit a profile is very dangerous. We have only a few unequivocal eye witnesses to Erdnase and I don't think we should discount their recollections without strong r...

I've had my word with Jon years ago and we're best of friends. He was being manipulated by the vicious and jealous Ron Bauer (a scoundrel), who was only happy to steer him to Jeff Busby. Mr. Kaufman, why cast such aspersions publicly without explanation? Ron Bauer has done many many great things fo...