Roy presented this talk in the History of Mystery session at the British Ring of the International Brotherhood of Magicians convention in Buxton, 9 September 2016. Click on this PDF to join the conventioneers of 1931, and to understand what happened and why it was so enjoyed by the participants.
This was a show from the British Ring No. 25 of The International Brotherhood of Magicians. Although Lewis Davenport is shown topping the bill, he did not appear as he had a week’s engagement in Northampton. George Davenport appeared in the show. He is billed as Gilly Gilly in magic of 1932.
The bill includes Lewis Davenport the Mysterious presenting a series of bewildering novelties assisted by Winifred Wynne and Co.
The collection contains cine film taken by the family, much of it from the 1930s. The film has been transferred to tape, and more recently converted to an electronic form, in order to preserve the images. During this process some of the more interesting frames have been printed out as photographs. The magician on the top sheet of photographs shown here is Gus Davenport performing in Berlin in 1937. The face of Ottokar Fischer can be seen in one of the photographs lower down in the pile.