Library
Harry Ransom Center
Research library and museum holding a Gutenberg Bible, the first photograph, and Houdini's magic archive.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas in Austin follows Harry Houdini not as a performer but as a collector, and the tangled archive he left behind. It traces how his materials merged with those of collector Messmore Kendall and crossed to Austin in nineteen fifty-eight, staying mixed together for decades. Along the way you will hear about a first edition of a sixteenth-century witchcraft book and a diary once belonging to the actor David Garrick. Best heard near the lobby, in view of the Gutenberg Bible and the first photograph.
This audio guide was created using AI.