Origin of "Murphy's Law" Pushed Back to 1911 (now OT:)

Mark Mandel thnidu at GMAIL.COM
Mon Dec 3 03:44:11 UTC 2007


Thanks, Fred, for bringing Maskelyne back to my attention. I read _The War
Magician_ a number of years ago and was very impressed. I mentioned it to my
wife just now on reading your letter, and googled the title. What came up on
top was a debunking site, Richard Stokes's http://www.maskelynemagic.com/.

m a m

On Nov 30, 2007 11:23 PM, Shapiro, Fred <Fred.Shapiro at yale.edu> wrote:

> Indeed this appears to be the case.  I have found a letter to the editor
> by Wallace R. Rust in _Science News_, Aug. 8, 1992, in which Rust wrote:
>  "As a magician, I have long been familiar with a passage in the book _Our
> Magic_  (1911, Nevil Maskelyne and David Devant, E. P. Dutton).
>

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