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BY BRIAN WILLIAMS
Times Staff Writer | Saturday, June 14, 2003 | (No comments posted.)
VALPARAISO -- Harry Houdini may have been rolling over in his grave.
But if so, it wasn't in dismay at having his name evoked so often at Friday night's "Great Escape" from the Old Jail Museum. He would simply have been itching to do some escaping of his own, inspired by the derring-do of amateur escape artist Mark Schwartz.
Dressed in authentic Porter County jail garb, Schwartz was bound in padlocked chains and marched to one of the 130-year-old jailhouse's 10 original cells. He had been patted down by Porter County Sheriff Chief Deputy David Lain and found "clean" of any aids to his escape.
The cell was inspected by a handful of observers and the door was swung shut and locked. Then the waiting began. To protect Schwartz's trade secrets, spectators were not permitted to watch the actual process.
Earlier, Schwartz warmed up his audience at the neighboring Memorial Opera House by making quick work first of handcuffs locked behind his back and then a straightjacket Lain had strapped and pulled tight.
One technique that Schwartz shared with his audience was an ability to dislocate his shoulder in his contortions. And there was an awful lot of ungainly thrashing in Schwartz's successful attempt to shake free of the straitjacket in less than two minutes.
Schwartz, a Northwestern University archaeology graduate student, brought his brand of escapism to Valparaiso to help raise funds for the historical museum, called "a really neat diamond here in Porter County" by the evening's emcee.
And within 15 minutes of his binding incarceration, Schwartz was somehow back among the crowd enjoying refreshments outside the 1871 jail.
Debby Cook of Valparaiso had no idea how he did it. She attended with her daughter, Shannon, 10, and family friend Samantha Pluard, 10, who thought Schwartz may have cheated -- "sort of."
"I don't think it was rigged," Cook said. "It was fun, rigged or not."
The threesome had made their first visit to the museum earlier in the day.
"(The girls) had no idea what a chamber pot was before today," Cook said. "They had no idea you had to spin thread."
That's the sort of thing Shirron Soohey, co-manager of the museum, hoped to achieve with the event.
"Half the people who come into the museum say, 'I didn't even know this place existed,' " Soohey said. The event's proceeds, she said, would go to keeping the museum open, free and continuing its mission of preservation and education. "It's to keep Porter County history alive," Soohey said.
After his feat, Schwartz said he did not "cheat" in any way, defining that as receiving outside help or being in a cell that wasn't really locked. He declined to share any tricks of the trade other than to emphasize the importance of physical control. And he added cryptically, "The obvious way is not the only way."
Schwartz said escaping has always been a hobby of his and that he learned much of his stuff from a magician whose father had worked with the great Houdini.
"There's something about Houdini ... that's always struck a chord in me," Schwartz said. "He's kind of my hero."
Brian Williams can be reached at bwilliams@nwitimes.com or (219) 762-4334.
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