DETROIT, Mich. — Halloween 2026 marked a full century since Harry Houdini, the escape artist who said no lock could hold him, died in a Detroit hospital bed at age 52.
Houdini knew the city well. He played Detroit 19 times, starting in 1894 as a small act near the bottom of the bill. In 1906 he leaped from the Belle Isle Bridge into the river while wearing two sets of police handcuffs and came up unharmed. Later tellings claimed he swam under ice, but the river was not frozen that day.
His last visit began badly. Days before, a college student in a Montreal dressing room struck him in the stomach several times. Houdini reached the Garrick Theater in Detroit on Oct. 24, 1926, running a fever of 104 degrees, and went on anyway because of contract and money pressure, a Detroit Historical Museum curator has said. He managed only one show and had to be carried back to his hotel.
Doctors at Grace Hospital found a ruptured appendix. After two operations he died of peritonitis on Oct. 31. A bronze casket built for one of his stunts carried his body from Detroit to New York, and the Garrick, his hotel and Grace Hospital are all gone now.
