This program is part of Village Preservation’s Semiquincentennial series of programs celebrating our Revolutionary Village. The Revolutionary Village not only celebrates the founding of our country, but the exceptional role our neighborhoods played in its development and the realization of its ideals over the last 250 years and beyond.

Co-Sponsored by Boroughs of the Dead and the Merchant’s House Museum

On this panel we’ll talk about Houdini’s rise to fame in New York, including the East Village, while learning wild facts about his life, his place in the history of stage magic alongside other luminaries and – in honor of the 100th anniversary of his death – Houdini’s meandering detour into the strange worlds of ghosts and Spiritualism, some of which is directly connected to historic sites right here in Greenwich Village. 

On this panel Houdini’s rise to fame in New York, including the East Village, will be discussed, while learning wild facts about his life, his place in the history of stage magic alongside other luminaries and – in honor of the 100th anniversary of his death – Houdini’s meandering detour into the strange worlds of ghosts and Spiritualism, some of which is directly connected to historic sites right here in Greenwich Village. 

Come with a love for the world’s best-known magician, leave with a deeper knowledge of his backstory and his afterlife among the spirits!

Panelists 

Panelists include Ilise S. Carter, award-winning sideshow performer, and author of When We Spoke to the Dead; Allison C. Meier, writer, researcher, and magic history aficionado; Marc Hartzman, author of numerous books on subjects ranging from UFOs, ghosts, sideshow performers, and more; and Leanna Renee Hieber, author, tour guide, and designer of Harry Houdini-themed walking tours of New York City. Panel moderated by Andrea Janes, author and founder of Boroughs of the Dead: Macabre NYC History Tours.    

Boroughs of the Dead was founded in 2013. Their historic ghost tours are in-depth, meticulously researched creations written and led by published authors and working artists. They explore medical and women’s history, the spectral, the occult, and other urban hauntings.

The Merchant’s House Museum preserves and interprets New York City’s only 19th century family home to survive intact — inside and out. Built in 1832 by a fervent abolitionist, Joseph Brewster, who designed the house with a hidden passageway, it is Manhattan’s only documented site of the Underground Railroad open to the public. In 1835, it became home to a prosperous merchant family, the Tredwells, and their Irish servants for nearly a century. Through public education programs and exhibitions, restoration of its landmark building, and conservation of its irreplaceable collections, the Museum tells two compelling stories of 19th-century New York City: the early years of the abolition movement and the Underground Railroad, and the domestic life of a wealthy merchant family in a city rising as the commercial emporium of America.