Copper Silver - Thought
by Brad Gordon

Brad Gordon... There's a lot I could tell you about him. I could tell you how creative the guy is, and about how he helped me get back into magic when I started up again after a couple of decades. I could tell you how, for such a nice guy, his magic packs a devious streak. In other words, I could go on and on about the man. It's better I let his ideas talk for him. This article is also available as a PDF download here, as is another very special piece of his. -- Shane

Most of us already own a copper/silver gimmick, and many of you probably know many routines incorporating this versatile coin. The following is a neat little handling that can also serve as a brief exercise in psychology .

Method and Effect: A copper English penny, and a silver half dollar are shown, both coins are placed in the participants hand, their hand is closed and turned over. The spectator is asked to think of both of the coins- “Please concentrate on both coins, the silver and the copper”. One coin is slowly removed “The copper coin” , Magician asks participant to now try very hard not to think of the copper coin, and repeated twice “Please try very hard NOT to think of the copper coin?” and then state “I am asking you NOT to think of the copper coin because I am getting rid of the coin”. Now place the coin in your pocket. The following patter follows “Isn't that kind of a strange thing? The more I ask you not to think of the copper coin, the more you have to think about it” “Another example of this phenomenon would be if I were to ask you to try very hard NOT to think of pink elephants, you would have to think about them in order not to.” After this is said you say to the spectator “for a
split moment did you forget about the silver coin” the spectator answers yes , “So did I, please open your hand”. The normal copper coin is now revealed.

Set Up: All you need of course is a Copper/Silver gimmick coin and a regular Copper English penny that matches the gimmick. You could easily replace the regular copper coin with a regular American half dollar, and then change your patter to suit, however I use the copper coin because the half dollar is more common, and seemingly easier to forget in the moment- a kind of consciously invisible detail.

In the presentation make sure the silver coin is placed on top of the copper coin in the spectators palm. Gently close their fingers over the two coins, then softly turn their hand over (palm down). When reaching in to remove a coin, grasp the coin that is lowermost. That's it... perfect.

Notes:
In addition- this patter and handling could be applied to other effects, for example I sometimes apply this presentation to the wonderful effect “Beswitched” by George Hample. The Copper/Silver gimmick coin has obviously been around for a very long time, I am currently unaware of who the originator is. Personally I first learned the sequence of this effect right out of the instructions from the Copper/Silver coin trick made by “Sterling”. I actually read a beginners book on NLP “Neuro Linguistic Programming” back in 2000 where I found the exercise of asking a person not to think of something which causes them to
think of it in order not to.

Yes, this is very basic: better yet, it's very, very easy, I honestly use this all the time every where I go, it's a great warm up effect as well as what many call a tester trick- to sort of evaluate your audience, and or get your performing juices flowing.

Brad Gordon