Since the 1860s, Manhattan has been home to a glorious world of magical mysteries and history. First owned and operated by the Martinka brothers, later by Houdini, and acquired in 1939 by Al Flosso, the Flosso-Hornmann Magic Company was the longest operating magic store in history.

Jack Flosso has sold the business to Ted Bogusta and together they have set up www.martinka.com, showcasing artifacts from the store's trove of magic history.

In the 1860's two brothers named Francis and Antonio Martinka opened a small conjuring and toy shop in the small town of Essen, Germany. It was a fabulous place, ticking with appearing and disappearing bowls of fish; handkerchiefs that metamorphosized into eggs; and tinsmiths carefully cutting the sheets of shiny tin to provide the cups (for the legendary cups and balls trick) for every mountebank (itinerant performer) in the Western World.

With the success of providing the Herrmann family (French), the Bamberg family (Dutch) and other renowned stars of the theatre of the day, the Martinkas set out in the 1870's (after nearly 12 years of service in Germany) to America, to New York City, where nearly 10,000 Europeans had recently moved.

About 1875 the two brothers from Essen opened in what is now (1993) referred to as Chelsea; or, the flower district in New York's lower West side. In the 1870's New York City was small and village-like. In the area which is now 6th Avenue between 24th and 28th streets the Martinka's opened their shop. Seven or eight employees gleefully made the tricks of the trade under the cheerful, but stern Mrs. Martinka. All customers were treated as customers; no tommy-nonsense was tolerated in this house of hocus pocus. Alexander Heimberger, Alexander Herrmann, W.E. Robinson (later to be the world-famous Chung Ling Soo), Saram Ellison, and others were allowed free access to the workshop and back rooms.

 The Martinka Bros. store even had a Palace of Mystery which was a little less grand than the title advertised; a small stage in the back became the testing ground for the wonders produced, and a continuing platform for party entertainment. The Martinkas realized the fraternal family of magicians, though, the world's first magic society, The Society of American Magicians, would not come into being until 1902 when several magicians in the back rooms of Martinka's wrote the charter and by laws.

When the century turned the Marinkas had been in business for nearly 40 years, which at that time was longer than any other conjuring shop. In New York they were frequented by many small boys who hoped one day to succeed the great Herrmann (the man who provided the classic portrait of a magician with a goatee and flowing tails).

About 1918 the Martinkas began to think about retirement, after nearly 53 years in Europe and America. Retirement would be easier though more sedate. They had done well in New York.

known of the Martinka's since his boyhood on 69th Street between First and Second Avenues (his family had emigrated from Hungary where he was born Erich Weiss in 1874).However, his proprietorship was limited by his professional ambitions to champion the cause against fraud in Spiritualism, and in 1920 he sold Martinka & Company to a certain "Professor" Otto Hornmann.

Hornmann (born as Otto Horn in 1869) had known Houdini since both were struggling to make a name for themselves in the show business of the Gay 90's. He even flirted with the idea of opening a moving picture show with the young Houdini when Houdini finished performing with Welsh Bros. circus in 1898. Hornmann had also known the Martinkas since his boyhood in Germany. He and Houdini probably shared the same stages when both appeared at the World's Fair in Chicago in 1896 where Houdini learned the famous feat of swallowing needles and thread and threading the needles with his mouth. Professor Hornmann's act consisted of passing borrowed rings onto a wand held by spectators, linking and unlinking solid rings of steel, and numerous other wonders of the conjurer's trade. The old showman kept a lively business at 304 West 34th Street, just behind the looming shadow of the world's largest store, R. H. Macy's. During the Roaring Twenties Hornmann was content with his sideshow clientele and his happy little enterprise with a famous name. It was during this time that he changed the title of the shop to: The Martinka-Hornmann Magic Co. He constantly advertised in the show business weekly, The Billboard.

In the late 20's, Otto Hornmann tired of the magic business and sold his company to another magician of renown who had been running his New York Magic Company in Brooklyn for some time. His name was Frank Ducrot, although he was born T. Francis Fritz on May 7, 1872. He kept the name Martinka-Hornmann Magic Co. until he died on May 24, 1939 at the age of 67. Ducrot also had a steady clientele from his other magic shop and his many years touring the United States as a Chautauqua performer. His performance featured hand shadows, chalk talk, Punch and Judy shows, chapeaugraphy (the art of making many different hats with one small circle of felt) and many other markers of the variety performer's trade. He is known in magic circles for inventing the classic trick called the Twentieth Century Handkerchief. During his long ownership of the Martinka company, Ducrot was very successful as a society entertainer. Like many performers, he had cut his teeth at Coney Island. When Ducrot died in 1939, one of his friends from his Coney Island days purchased the shop from his estate. A sprightly, comical magician billed as "The Coney Island Fakir" named Al Flosso became the new owner of the world's oldest magic shop. Flosso had been a customer at Martinkas since he was a small boy named Albert Levinson who purchased his first trick there in 1904 as a lad of nine.

Now as a man of 44, Flosso changed the name of the store again to simplify the title: The Flosso-Hornmann Magic Co. Inc. Later he would muse, "The Martinka-Hornmann-Flosso Magic Company Inc. had too many names and letters! Where, for heaven's sake, are we gonna sell something? There's no more room left!"

This was a true magic shop -- where corporate executive didn't really mind having their dignity reduced to childish giggles by the carney grifters. It was more the rule than the exception to find a man or woman who had played six shows a day nailing themselves to a cross chatting happily with those of the corporate world who had only dreamt as children of running away with the circus.

Al Flosso ran a shop of controlled chaos. Whereas Frank Ducrot and the Martinkas had run finely tuned stores of precision and detail, Al's place made everybody feel welcome to stay a bit and schmooze. Preferred customers were allowed to dig in the "archives" in the back. At his funeral, master magician Milbourne Christopher delivered the eulogy and received a big laugh by stating, "Frank Ducrot ran a business with everything in order. Al soon took care of that."

Jack Flosso, Al's son, remembers his father by calling his shop more of a hobby for his love of magic apparatus. "My father was at heart a pro" he says. Al Flosso's record of performing 8 shows in one day in 8 different locations is still marveled at by those who trod the boards. Al Flosso's life was full of laughter, with common sense applied to all situations, and a friendly outlook toward all. Jack remembers, "My father was able to find the good in everybody, that's just the way he was. Growing up in a rough world taught him nobody was all bad." Al Flosso was a remarkable and lovely man who died peacefully in 1976. In 1982, Jack moved the store closer to Fifth Avenue, while maintaining the 34th Street location. From 1982 to 2000 the shop continued to amaze people at 45 West 34th Street in a state of controlled chaos under the expert eye of Jack Flosso.

When Al Flosso took over the shop on West 34th Street, he had to organize the years of paperwork and make some sort of order out of the current condition of the premises. In 1939 there were very few collectors of antique magic apparatus and books. However, that situation would soon change. As of 2000, The Magic Collectors Association has a robust, international membership of nearly 500.

 Two noted magicians clued Al Flosso into the lucrative trade of rare ephemera. Keith Clark and Ted Annemann arrived at the shop on the day Al walked in to begin sorting through the years of clutter. Between Al and his small assistant "Jazzbo," Annemann and Clark purchased letters from Houdini to Hornmann, one-of-a-kind pieces of ponderous paraphernalia, and choice pieces from many magicians' shows. The historian, and editor of the conjuring periodical The Sphinx, John Mulholland, found great treasures once Al opened the files. What Al had presumed as worthless, uninteresting paper has since sold at auction for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Jack Flosso comments, "If I had everything that passed through this shop I'd be sitting on ten million dollars."

Some treasures greeted visitors in the Mini Magic Museum upon entering the store. Next to a German-crafted piece from the Martinka Bros. day rests a set of cups (for the cups and balls trick referred to earlier) used by Al Flosso's father-in-law, a magician named Louis "Pop" Krieger.

As a boy, little Al Levinson apprenticed to Pop Krieger on the Bowery in Manhattan by carrying the older magician's wares in two small satchels. Krieger was a drinking man and loved to taste the grape with his contemporary, the legendary magician Max Malini. Krieger, at one time, even acted as Malini's manager, supplying him with a person to tote his bags...the future Al Flosso.

It was from this professional upbringing that certain rules pervaded the shop. Secrets were for people who paid for them, and wiseguys were not tolerated. The shop was, and has been, home to many when they stopped in New York. Visits are always laden with respect for an enterprise that has continued since two brothers from Essen, Germany had an idea -- an idea which lasted for nearly 130 years.