I am the only person in my town who is legally allowed to smoke in a public place. It’s true. A city wide smoking ban was put in place some years ago, but an exemption was written in for me so that I could continue to perform magic, publicly, with cigarettes.

Before smoking was seen as the scourge of all humanity,

a favorite demonstration of mine was to borrow a $100 bill, have someone write their name on it and then fold it up. Someone would get out their cigarettes and light one. They would touch the burning end to the bill, and the bill would vanish in a flash of flame. I would take a puff from their cigarette, announce that it tasted funny, and have the paper torn away. There, rolled up inside the cigarette was the signed bill. A miracle. And one I hardly ever get to do anymore.

Or, back in the day, I would sometimes open a stage show with this: I’d make my entrance, give some opening remarks, then slowly put both of my hands in my trouser pockets. I’d pause for a second, smile, then shuffle my feet to turn my body around 360 degrees. When I faced front again I was smoking a lit cigarette. There would be a few puffs to prove it was real, a few smoke rings blown for show, and then I’d take the lit cigarette in my fist, blow a puff of smoke at my hand and the cigarette would vanish completely. This really bothered people, because the thing that vanished was burning. Think about that.

Now it bothers people for a completely different reason. Smoking is taboo. Not only that, but smoking is actually illegal in most public places, and there is almost no venue left to see the art of cigarette manipulation. I suspect I stand alone on this, but I think this is a tragedy.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m quite happy that no one is allowed to smoke on an airplane, and that I can enjoy a nice dinner and wine without clouds of blue smoke wafting over my plate. (Though I would like to go on record saying that if we are going to allow perfume on planes I’d just as soon have people smoking too.)

It’s funny now when I think back to my early training as a pre-teen magician, how many of the books I bought--written specifically for young magicians--contained a section on sleight of hand with cigarettes. My parents didn’t even blink when I asked them to get me a carton of unfiltered cigarettes at the age of 9 or 10. There is no way that would happen today, books teaching sleight of hand rarely mention cigarettes anymore, and virtually no young magicians study this wonderful and historically significant branch of conjuring.  In fact, I predict that within 50 years cigarette magic will be nothing but a memory--a wisp of smoke taken by the winds of changing social norms.

Is this really such a great loss? You decide. Try to get over your knee jerk revulsion at seeing someone light up, and take a look at a few examples culled from YouTube:

Penn and Teller

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qQX-jayixQ

Richard Cardini

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ0cnTjgcAE

Tony Slydini

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zcS_FutAvU&feature=related

Cyril Takayama

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_nGL9thTHU

José Frakson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5W8kFFra1Q

And the king of all smoking magicians, Tom Mullica

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nd5P2p0xjGg&feature=related