Flashback
I clearly remember when the name unexpectedly came to my attention. It was while sitting in the Blenheim Bar, a pub in London where magicians would congregate. This was close to where The Magic Circle would meet at the time—around 1980. The idea of magicians congregating, of course, suggests our tendency to skulk in darkened corners of bars. I was listening intently to a conversation between Fred Robinson and Gordon Bruce, hanging on every word. You see, I was relatively new to this world and lucky to be in such esteemed company.
Anyone familiar with the strange, underground world of card magic would be familiar with aspects at the heart of this story, if not my personal specifics. At the time, it seemed a world full of mysterious and shadowy figures, the names I had only encountered in books. I was hungry—greedily eating all I could from the seemingly endless plates in front of me.
I had known Gordon for about a year, having been introduced to him by Fred Robinson. “You need to see Gordon work,” Fred told me. “He has a wonderful mind when it comes to card handling. He’s also a great performer.” Indeed, he was.
Fred himself was no slouch in this twilight world of magicians, being a driving force behind the U.K. close-up journal of the 70’s and 80’s, Pabular. He was a man who could sprinkle names like Vernon, Miller, Kaps, Jay, Ramsay, etc., with effortless authority. What I found beguiling about Fred was he was modest and self-effacing, which gave him a quiet authority.