Raja Raboid (in hat), Jean Foley,
and an unidentified lady-friend of Raboid. Photo courtesy of David Charvet.

On February 25, 1937, an illusion debuted at Keith's Theater in Portland, Maine that, in the ensuing 60 years, has become legendary. It was also the must remarkable use of twins in the history of magic.
Mentalist-turned-illusionist Raja Raboid presented the illusion... Raboid invited four volunteers from the audience to assist him in a demonstration of hypnotism. After the routine, two of the helpers were dismissed, while two were asked to remain on stage to participate in the next illusion. One volunteer was... "re-hypnotized" and [Raboid] announced to the audience that he was going to perform the often-seen effect of "Sawing A Woman In Half;" only this time, he would use the man from the audience as his victim.
... Two of Raboid's assistants lifted the now-hypnotized assistant into the box. As [Raboid] began to saw, the volunteer seated on the stage started to complain, "It's a trick box!" ... Indignantly, Raboid summoned his assistants to dismantle the box... and the thin plank on which the man reclined was carried forward and placed across two saw horses.
Raboid again began to saw, this time in full view. After the saw had passed through the body, the subject awakened. Then incredibly, the upper half of the man raised himself on his hands - entirely separated from the lower half of his body.... The man on the plank kept muttering, "I want my legs! Where are my legs?" ... Raboid's assistants brought out a small set of steps.... Walking on his hands, the man descended the seteps to the stage.... At that moment, the disembodied legs on the plank ... swung over the edge of the board and stepped onto the stage....
Then the half-man... began running on his hands, chasing after [the legs]. ....
Just as the man was about to catch his legs near the stage wings, Raboid's two assistants grabbed the man under the arms and placed his torso atop his legs; at the same time giving him a quick spin. As he stopped, the man kept telling Raboid, "I want my... I want my.... I want my coat!" .... He then ran up the aisle and out of the theater as the still-laughing audience broke into an ovation.
The effect was an immediate hit.... The Raboid show continued touring Keith theaters in the northeastern United States through the late spring of 1937. Everywhere the show played, the routine was included, always recieving the same hilarious response.
The secret of the illusion assured that it would not be stolen. Half-man, Johhy Eck and his full-sized twin brother, Robert, were the players that made the illusion a reality. Born August 27, 1911 in Baltimore, Maryland, John and Robert Eckhardt led a normal childhood, despite Johnny's deformity. In December 1923, the pair attended a magic show at their local church. The ... magician could not believe his eyes when he first met Johnny. Eck recalled years later in his autobiography: "All he ... could do was look at me for a full five minutes (and) gasp. Then he started to sweet-talk... He would put me on the stage! That stage would turn out later to be a six-inch pile of hay, covered over by an old worn piece of green carpet, in a pit-show in a rag-bag carnival." Exhibited in side shows and carnivals during his teenage years, Johnny Eck created an act consisting of magic, juggling and music. In 1931, he was signed by MGM studios to appear in Tod Browning's masterpiece of the macabre, Freaks. ... Later signed by the enigmatic Robert L Ripley, Johnny Eck appeared at Ripley's "Odditoriums" throughout America. He met Raboid in 1936.
(Raboid's stage manager Jean Foley recalled), "When the sawing box was rolled on stage, Johnny and the midget (who played the part of the legs...) were concealed in the back of the box. As Robert was lowered into the box, he dropped right through the bottom into the table base. The assistants then folded the double-back down inside, releasing Johnny and the midget."
When the box was dismanteld at the urging of the stooge, the pieces were set aisde, and later stacked on the table base (that contained Robert) , after the plank on which Johnny and the midget were laying was placed across the two saw horses. Very casually, the stacked pieces were rolled off-stage into the left wing, where Robert was released from the base.
The "restoration" occurred after the chase of Johnny and the midget. As they reached the stage-left wing, two of Raboid's assistants grabbed Johnny and as they placed him atop the pants containing the midget, they gave them a quick spin, which for an instant hid them from view behind the stage left leg drop. At that moment, a switch was made and Robert continued spinning his way back out on stage. The mystery was complete.
... Foley recalled, "I went out front ... for one show to see how it all looked, and I couldn't believe it. It was the greatest illusion I ever saw. But we played it strictly for laughs. It was a laugh riot." But that's not how George Boston "remembered" it in a column he wrote years later in Ginii. Boston claimed that the illusion had only been preformed one time, and that the effect was so grisly that it spawned lawsuits from the crowds fleeing the theater in panic. [The troupe member commented]: "That's totally untrue. To the best of my knowledge, George Boston never even saw the trick performed. If he had ever seen the routine, he never could have written what he did."
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