Alexander - The Man Who Knows

Alexander, The Man Who Knows was the highest paid mystic/magician of the golden age of the 1910s & 1920s. His portrait in this poster is detailed, his face glancing upwards and focused. Alexander often adorned himself in clothing inspired by the East, and here his turban and end tassel also help to form the shape of a question mark. Alexander was born Claude Alexander Conlin in South Dakota in 1880, and rose to prominence during the Vaudeville era of American theater. While he did perform some magic tricks, Alexander’s real claim to fame was his psychic act which was made up of fortune telling and mind reading. Many credit him for introducing electrical elements to the field of magic. Like many magicians of the era, Alexander’s life is full of myth and intrigue, among them rumors he had 14 wives and participated in a jailbreak. Alexander invested much of his fortune back into creating his effective chromolithograph posters, which were his main source of promotion. After retirin