Magic at War

In 1945, Major Douglas Kelley was sent to examine Hermann Göring and the other leading Nazis awaiting trial at Nuremberg. Kelley was an American Army psychiatrist experienced in treating combat casualties. He was also an accomplished magician and prominent figure in American amateur magic, a prize-winning performer who became a national officer of the Society of American Magicians. Doctor and magician Douglas McGlashan Kelley was born at Truckee, California, on 11 August 1912 and grew up in San Francisco. He studied at the University of California, Berkeley, qualified in medicine at the University of California School of Medicine in 1937, and later undertook postgraduate work at Columbia University, receiving a Doctor of Medical Science degree in 1941. Magic had been part of his life long before then. As a student Kelley performed escapes, card magic and public stunts. Contemporary newspaper reports record Houdini-style feats, including freeing himself while restrained inside a mail s...

MAGICIAN INVENTS DAY-GLO COLOURS. In 1934, in the middle of the Great Depression, a nineteen-year-old American university student was working a summer job at a tomato quality control laboratory, when he fell and was knocked unconscious.  Months later, Robert 'Bob' Switzer awoke from a coma with blurred vision.  To continue his recuperation, Bob's doctor recommended avoiding bright light. Acting on this advice, Switzer's father, a pharmacist, turned his shop’s basement into a darkroom. One day, Bob was playing with an ultraviolet light with his younger brother Joseph. The pair noticed that the some of the organic compounds in his father storeroom glowed brightly under the ultraviolet light. Intrigued, the pair started experimenting with the chemicals, especially with Murine eye wash. They found that by mixing it with an alcohol solution of white shellac paint, they could make a fluorescent yellow paint. The compound appeared white to the naked eye, but under a U.V. light...