Phil Tilden once performed magic, mentalism, and ventriloquism for soldiers, children, and hospital patients. Tilden recently gave away all of his magic paraphernalia, and still preaches at the First Christian Church in Fredericksburg. Photo by Phil Houseal

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Magic Man

by Phil Houseal
Sept 2, 2009

“There is not much difference between doing magic for adults versus kids, except adults are easier to fool.”

Phil Tilden has spent a lifetime fooling both adults and children with “Magic, Mentalism and Ventriloquism” while raising a family, serving in the Army, running a magic shop, and working as a teacher and a preacher. These days he delivers sermons at First Christian Church in Fredericksburg, but he has given up his magic.

Shannon Anderson, aka Sunshine the Clown and owner of The Old Thyme Fun Shop, told me about Tilden, so I visited him at his apartment in Kerrville. He has endured a heart attack and stroke, yet still he rose to his feet to greet me, surrounded by clowns - in paintings, pictures, figures, and dolls.

Tilden happened to be putting together scrapbooks of his career for his two grown sons. The page was turned to a yellowed article from the Army Times, showing a young Tilden opening a bank account - for his dummy, Freddy.

He chuckled. “That got a lot of publicity,” he said. In the 1940s, Tilden dressed up his dummy like a soldier, and took him to army hospitals and children’s wards to perform shows. He pointed to another photo of him on stage with a man from the audience.

“I did one that was just a gag, but this guy really cooperated,” he recalled. “I said when I touch you on the shoulder, jump like you have been shocked. I put my hand in my pocket then touched him - and they had to catch him when he really jumped! It was just a gag.”

Tilden started doing magic as a student at Howard Payne University in Brownwood, and later at seminary in Fort Worth.

At the time he was performing pocket magic, and he repeatedly returned to the local magic store to replenish his gimmicks.

“One day the owner said why don’t you save up your money and buy some real magic props instead of this silly stuff.” So he did. “Of course then I had to keep buying!”

But he was also frugal. As the backdrop for his shows he used a plastic shower curtain.

Tilden, who admits to being a ham, keeps insisting he never was really good at magic. He used to cut a woman into six pieces, but he is more proud of his stint as a preacher, or as he puts it “working for the same boss for 59 years.” He still preaches three times a week, and recently gave away all of his magic paraphernalia to Anderson (except for a favorite color-changing knife, which he still carries with him).

He doesn’t like mixing his sermons with magic, but he confesses to using a few tricks back when he was delivering lectures to soldiers at Fort Hood.

“The hardest thing to do in the Army was keeping the guys interested while you had to lecture to them,” he said. “So I’d used tricks to keep the boys awake.”

Did he ever blow a gag?

“Oh yes,” he readily admitted. “I had a new magic prop where you produce bunnies out of a box. I got up there to do it and the bottom fell out. All the bunnies fell on the floor.” He paused. “I just pushed them back and kept on with the show.”

He also experimented with stage hypnosis, but prefers using it to help people quit smoking and reduce stress. He recounted planting post-hypnotic suggestions on a few friends, mostly dealing with the urge to go to the bathroom. He only did that once or twice.