Welcome to my magic and hypnotism scrapbook!
When I was young and just starting to learn magic I wanted to do great card work like Jack Pyle and great sleight of hand magic like Don Alan. I watched them both perform magic when I was a kid. And later I performed shows for both of them after I became a professional magician!
Glenn Bishop at the Marshall Brodien Magic Shop at Old Chicago Amusement Park 1975. This was where I really got my start in magic.
Glenn Bishop At The First Bishop's Magic Shop.
Buddy Farnan and Glenn Bishop at Buddy's 70th birthday party. Buddy Farnan is a top class coin and card manipulator. And the star and technical adviser of one of the first video's that exposed card cheating. I met Buddy Farnan for the first time when he became the general manager of Old Chicago Amusement park. On lunch breaks he would come down and we would show me card and magic effects.
Buddy Farnan And Glenn Bishop
Later Buddy booked me into malls to do close up magic with a Houdini display that would be set up in one of the empty stores.
Jack Pyle was born in Indiana and moved to Wisconsin and later to Chicago. One of his fist jobs was driving a milk wagon and delivering milk. He wanted to be a magician so he got a job at a privet club that booked acts. He ran the spotlight for the stage shows. There he met John Shirley, Billy Bishop and Tommy Martin.
Jack Pyle... Known To Magicians As The Chicago Punch Deck Pro And Performed In The Close Up Gallery Of The World Famous Magic Castle In 1975!
Later Jack Pyle joined the Houdini Club of Wisconsin Jack Pyle worked out a comedy stage act with the production of a live rabbit from a bunch of silks at the end of the act. Along with the stage act he booked and perfected his close up magic with cards. And was a performer that was much in demand for his gambling and card shark expo on card cheating. I watched Jack Pyle on the WGN Bozo Circus television show several times. He did a stand up talking act that included many magic classics like the cards up the sleeve and he produced a large white rabbit from a group of silk scarf's that were held by spectators from the audience and knots traveled from one group of scarf's to the other.
That rabbit production was a great surprise and an unexpected happening of magic. I first saw Jack Pyle work doing close up in the basement of an old church a block away from Magic Inc. He did a session of card magic and card sharp poker deals. I liked that he used only one deck of cards and the act worked on the "skill" of the performer rather than magic props.
The Legend Dai Vernon. The man who fooled Houdini was considered to be one of the greatest magicians of his day. A master with the deck of cards Dai Vernon's ability was to be able to take ideas that were being used by card cheats and then twist them and use them for magic.
His cups and balls routine is still being used in whole or in part by many of the performing magicians today. I met Dai Vernon and saw him lecture and it was one of the most outstanding nights of magic that I have been privileged to see in my lifetime.
Glenn Bishop At A Show For Philip Morris As Mr. Swindle. Entertaining Audiences With The Shell Game, Three Card Monte And Poker And Bridge Deals Exposing How Modern Day Card Sharks Cheat At The Card Table!
As long as I am talking about card sharps and cheating with cards I might as well talk about the shell game. I started to do the shell game when I was about eight or nine years old. Each Christmas season my grandfather on my Mom's side used to send us several bags of walnuts. He had walnut and apple trees. So we would get between five and ten large bags of walnuts each season. These walnuts went into the Christmas cookies and homemade candy my Mom used to make each year to give out as gifts and for the show business parties they went to after each season.
I got the interest in the shell game and I made a set of shells from the real walnut shells we got one season. But my hands were very small so I worked out a way to do it with my small hands and a soft sponge pea. Later I worked out a routine and over years it turned into the shell routine that I do today. This routine I wrote up as a comb bound book and later I converted it to an e-book.
I performed this routine at the World Famous Magic Castle as well as several times on television. I have fooled and entertained a lot of people with this routine with my unique shell steal and my unique ending of having the pea appear in the shot glass at the end of the routine. Ed Marlo saw the routine and said it was one of the "best" endings that he has seen a magician do with the shells.
"DEAR GLENN BISHOP,
I WOULD LIKE TO TAKE THIS OPPORTUNITY TO THANK YOU ONCE AGAIN FOR ALL YOUR TIME AND EFFORT IN HELPING ME PRODUCE THE VIDEO TAPES FOR MY LECTURE ON CON GAMES. AS YOU KNOW THE MATERIAL YOU PERFORMED WILL BE USED TO HELP EDUCATE OTHER POLICE OFFICERS THROUGHOUT THE UNITED STATES ON HOW CON GAMES WORK!
YOUR PRESENTATION OF THREE CARD MONTE AND THE SHELL GAME WERE EXCELLENT! THE SEGMENT YOU TAPED ON CROOKED GAMBLING WAS FANTASTIC ALSO"
Sincerely,
Investigator Bruce Walsted, Franklin Park Police Department, Author Of The Book Sting Shift!
(October 12. 1987)
Glenn Bishop With David Yee - Both Performed In The Close Up Gallery At The "World Famous Magic Castle" In Hollywood CA. - If You Have A Magic Act Today! - You Would Dream About Working The Castle!
David Yee is an outstanding magician and contest winner Pacific Coast Association of Magicians 1984, 1993 Close Up - SAM 1984, 1993 Close Up. David has performed at the Magic Castle for 25 consecutive years. David did an amazing show including some of the most creative magic that I have seen in a long time.
The close up room at the magic castle is one of the few places in the world that presents close up magic as a performance art form. Pictured on the wall are large paintings of Dai Vernon, Jay Ose and Charlie Miller. The room had a nice backstage for the performer and the seats are theater seating with spotlights that highlight the action.
Billy McComb And Glenn Bishop At The Magic Castle!
Over the week, Pete Biro, Billy McComb, Max Maven, Tony Picasso, Robert Cooney, Bobby Reynolds, Rich Cowley, Todd Brown, Kirk Grodske, Richard Rumble, Aye Jaye, Rich Freeman, Neil Lester and many more came in to see my show and some of them my magic lecture.
Michael Ammar and Glenn Bishop just after we performed in the close up show at the Houdini Convention 2003!
I started doing magic when I was eight years old. I saw my Dad do magic at a party and later he would bring me along with him to watch him do shows. I liked the idea of magic and how it entertained people. So I snuck into his library of magic books at home and started to read magic books.
Glenn Bishop With Actor - Magician - Night Club Legend - Carl Ballentine At The Magic Castle!
Most of the books he had were way over my head so the next place I went was out home town library. I started to read and then built my first show out of coffee cans and cardboard tubes. I used to do this show for the local birthday parties that were next door and down the block from where we lived.
Later I was hired at the Marshall Brodien magic shop at Old Chicago Amusement Park. And that was how the Bishop Family got into the magic shop business. I found at this time close up magic was my thing and I got a big interest in card magic. Three of the books I started with when I was eight years old I still read and reread today. That is Close Up Card Magic by, Harry Lorayne, The Stars Of Magic, And Expert At The Card Table by, Erdnase (E. S. Andrews).
Doc Eason and Glenn just after performing in the close up show at the Houdini Convention!
I have been lucky to have sessioned and talked magic and theory with some of the best magic brains and professional people in show business for many years. And this started at an early age. One of the effects that opened a lot of doors in magic was my shell game routine. I came up with a lot of new ideas and new steals for this old time swindle.
Glenn And Aldo Colombini at the Magic Castle!
One of the reason's that I did that was that I wanted to do the trick but I had small hands as an eight year old. So as an eight year old I worked out a new and different way to do it. Later I published a book on the shell game and then it became an e-book. But it has been my trademark effect for many years and it has been my good fortune to have presented this on many local television shows and national television.
Glenn with Ron Kaye who is a top card expert and used to talk cards with Ed Marlo, Carmen D'Amico, and "Senator" Clark Crandall at Crandall's bar. This picture was taken at the Houdini Convention 2003.
Over the years it has been my good fortune to know and session with guys like, Bill Malone, Jay Marshall, Don Alan, Jack Pyle, Jack Gwynne, David Hoy, Terry Vecky, Jimmy "Cards" Molinari, Bill Weimer, Dan Fleshman, Bob Rath, Buddy Farnan, Eddie Fields, Glenn Haywood, Jim Ryan, Marshall Brodien, Tom Ogden, Jim Gleason, Jeff Korst, Steve Taylor and many more. I added magic over the years and as I got older I started to perform my magic in night clubs.
Later I went west to Salt Lake City UT. And there It was that I started to learn hypnotism.
Glenn Bishop Performing Hypnotism In A High School Many Years Ago!
I was entertaining in a club called Harvey's in the Dune's International Hotel and one of the people that went there was a former stage hypnotist. He wanted to learn magic as a retirement hobby. So we worked it out where I would teach him magic and he would teach me self hypnosis. At the time I had a sleeping disorder and this was long before hypnotherapy. Self hypnosis did help with my problem and I did self hypnosis for over five years. Later I worked out a comedy stage show and then I started to book a stage hypnosis show into the night clubs.
I make my living doing three different shows. A comedy stage hypnosis show, Close up magic and a gambling card cheating expo, and a full sized full evening illusion show.
Magic is great and the thing I like about it is that you can't learn it all. And as each day is a new day I look forward to life and each new magic day adventure.
One of the adventures that I got into over the last four years has been producing some of my own routines on DVD's. The first was called Tested Card Work For Card Sharp Magicians DVD-1 and it had on it many of my card effects that I used right out of my close up work.
The second was called Tested Tricks For Tableside Tricksters DVD-2. It had on it a lot of my close up work like the shell game and my cups and balls routine. Also my coins to glass and my DieNamic Diamonds and other effects I used to make a living were on this DVD.
Then I did a short DVD on more card work and called it A Different Look At Tested Card Work. This DVD was quite popular.
Then I did my Glenn Bishop Punch Deck Pro DVD-4. This had on it the innovation of using the punch with a cull and opened up new ideas in card magic and card effects. And I published for the first time my never before seen punch idea's and routines.
More later!
Thank you for looking in on this little site.
Glenn Bishop
Bish the Magish!
And The Man Called Mr. Hypnotist!
© 2001 Glenn Bishop Productions