Numero!

Here is one of those rare effects that hasan anticlimax but becomes greater because of it. The basis of the trick, the addition part, is not new but Mr. Baker has woven around it a bit of chicanery which dresses up the problem in a not easily forgotten guise.

Effect

A spectator is chosen for the problem, and is handed a folded paper upon which the performer has scribbled something. Showing a large size slate, the performer hands him chalk with the request that he write down a line of figures as they come to mind. Immediately under this row the performer jots a row and the spectator follows with a third. Then the performer finishes quickly by writing a fourth and fifth line. Drawing a line underneath, the spectator is handed slate for adding. The total is read aloud and shown.

Opening the folded paper, the spectator finds prophecied the correct total! So far nothing original has happened, but wait! The performer shows the back of the slate on which has been inscribed the letters of the alphabet, each letter followed by a numeral from 1 to 0, see illustration. The spectator is asked his first or last name. Substituting letters for the figures of the problem's total, this spectator's name is found to be revealed by that row of figures!

It will be realized immediately by many that this also makes a valuable effect as a publicity trick with a pad of paper. Although it will puzzle a mathematician, and it will confound magicians who know only the addition effect, the mechanics are so simple that it practically becomes an impromptu stunt.