Cerebral Shangrila

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Rainbow Quiz - Identify the personality - Week 32

Here is the next weekly "Rainbow" quiz , where I would be giving 7 clues (Hence the name Rainbow) about a personality. Try to discover the person in the least number of clues . You can either leave the answer as a comment / email me . Feedback/ suggestions welcome. Googling is not preferred but then its just for fun and so go ahead if you need to.

We all love magic. X was perhaps the most famous practitioner of that art.

clue # 1 : "X" was born in Budapest, Hungary and was of Jewish decent. His father was a rabbi.

clue # 2 : He immigrated with his family to the United States in 1878 at the age of 4 . As a child he took several jobs, one of which was as a locksmith's apprentice, and then being a champion cross country runner.

clue # 3 : He made his public debut as a 10-year-old trapeze artist, calling himself, "the prince of the air."

clue # 4 : In 1894, he became a professional magician, and began calling himself "X "( his assumed name by which he is famous) .

clue # 5 : He was a sensation being billed as the "King of Cards", "The Handcuff King" for his dare-devil shows and performed with great success around US & Europe.
He would free himself from jails, handcuffs, chains, ropes, and straitjackets, often while hanging from a rope in plain sight of street audiences.

clue # 6 : "X" died from a ruptured appendix caused due to blows delivered to him by a student.

clue # 7 : A new biography of him suggests that he worked for both Scotland Yard and the US Secret Service. It suggests that he used his escape act tours to cover intelligence gathering.

Who is "X" ?

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