The Houdini Factor

Harry Houdini (the famous magician) spent years trying to communicate with his mother, Cecilia Weiss, who passed over in 1913. He spent so much time in fact that he eventually became a psychic debunker exposing the fraudulent spiritualists who preyed upon grieving families. He NEVER successfully acheived his goal of communicating with the "other side."

Prior to his untimely death in 1926, Houdini made a secret pact with Bess, his wife of thirty-two years. They made a ten word code which only each of them knew. Each would try their best to communicate with the other once they passed over. The correct code would act as proof that it was really them coming through from the other side. For ten (10) years Mrs. Houdini offered a $10,000 reward for anyone, psychic or layman, who could communicate with Harry. She visited psychics from around the world in an attempt to communicate with him. Not a single psychic could produce the secret code, although almost all of them claimed to have communicated with Houdini himself on the other side. In her last seance in 1936, she tried one final time to reach Harry. After this final failure, Bess made this little speech, "I do not think that Harry will come back to me, or anyone. I think the dead don't speak. I now regretfully turn out the light. This is the end, Harry, good night!" She then blew out the candle that she had lit after his death and that had been buring for him for ten years. In 1937, Mrs. Houdini, sent out a final letter to the media, the general public and to those psychics who participated saying, "Since the failure of the ten year test, it is my opinion that all concerned have struck a mighty worldwide blow at superstition."

By the way, Houdini's ten word secret code was: "Rosabelle - Answer - Tell - Pray, Answer - Look - Tell - Answer, Answer - Tell." It was based upon an old Vaudeville mindreading routine. "Rosabelle" was the name of the song Bess was singing when the two first met. The other words correspond to a secret spelling code used to pass information between a magician and his assistant during a mind reading act. Each word or word pairs equals a letter. The word "Answer" stood for the letter "B", for example. "Answer, Answer" stood for the letter "V". With this unique code within a code, Houdini's secret spelled out the word, "BELIEVE."

For more information regarding Readers, Mediums, cold reading techniques and other paranormal debunking, consult the James Randi Educational Foundation.