I'm confused about the origin and performance of this routine. Are there two different routines called "The Homing Card"?

The version I know is the Francis Carlyse routine (in STARS OF MAGIC as well as in Giobbi's CARD COLLEGE vol. 2), a kind of card-to-pocket effect.

I've never seen or read Fred Kaps' version. But I've watched Larry Jennings perform a routine called "The Homing Card" (on "Classic Magic: The Larry Jennings Video") in which an Ace of Spades keeps returning to the top of a deck despite Jennings' attempts to set it aside.

Is that the Kaps version?

Are these two truly different routines that happen to share a common name?

Pete Biro, if you're listening, could you weigh in on this one?

Steve

The Homing card from The Jennings video is like the effect Kaps did. You can find the original in the Hugard/Braue book Show Stoppers With Cards.

Yes the two effects are very much different.

One thing about the homing card Kaps did is you have to be able to act very well to have it go over well. Kaps was the master of this type of thing and in his hands the homing card was a master piece.

Thanks, RS. I figured someone out there knew the answer. It had me confused for a while until I finally realized that they're two completely different effects.

I should mention that the homing card that Kaps did is the one from Show Stoppers With Cards. Find that book and you will have what Kaps did.

I've actually seen Kaps on a video performing the Homing Card and it's great. A friend showed it to me and I think it was at an Ed Sullivan's show many years ago (it was saved at his PC, so maybe you can download it somewhere). The advantage of that trick is that you can show it to a seated adience (of course not TOO big) couse' it's very visual and it's very easy to follow. You don't need the entire deck, only the four red cards and the "homing card". It's not easy to perform though, as it needs a very good presentation so it doesn't seem too boring. Kaps was a genius for that.

Cheers

And there is
Tenkai's Card Flight on which "Homing Card" is based, see R. Parish, Six Tricks By Tenkai, Chicago 1953, p. 15

Reinhard

The SECRET to the Kaps Version of the Braue Homing Card was his acting.

Bob Sheets currently markets a very nice version--he did it during Koornwinder and My Kaps Lecture at the past FISM. It is done with oversized (not quite Jumbo) cards and has a stronger finish than the Braue/Kaps version.

There's a version of the Homing Card by myself (Rough Return) and references to a number of others in print(including with jumbo cards) in the book "Small But Deadly".

Paul.

Steinbock- There are many versions of this effect. The one Pete refers to is my visual ending to Trevor Lewis' version of the Homing Card. It's also sometimes called the Recurrent Queen. There was a pretty good version in Joshua Jays column in MAGIC.

Great routine. Have fun. bob.