One of these videos is of the 80s Psychic fraudster James Hydrick being called out and exposed by James Randi, every time I come across it I have to watch it, though I'd never researched any further into this guys history or even where he is now, he could have been dead for all I knew, so I gave into my procrastination and did some research.
James Hydrick appeared on the show "That's Incredible!" in 1980 showing off some of his tricks, one of the hosts appeared to be pretty skeptical of his powers, rightly so as they make for some great party tricks. Hydrick was later called out by James Randi on the show "That's My Line" where Hydrick failed the task presented to him.
Not long after, Hydrick confessed to a journalist that he had no psychic abilities and that he was actually using his breath and other techniques, a lot of which he had taught himself while in solitary confinement in prison. He went onto say that because he had no attention from his parents he liked the attention that his trickery brought him, so he pretty much rolled with it.
As far as I can gather James Hydrick is in prison and also as far as I can gather for some disgusting crimes.
So that's my basic research on the fella, what's left for me to wonder is how in the hell did anyone believe his party tricks, I do most of that stuff at parties (well, apart from the phone book thing that actually looks pretty amazing) and most of the people I show pull the tricks off moments after with no explanation from me, though I guess it shows, his peak didn't last long.
Wow. I had to look him up to find out where he is now. DOH! He didn't hold up too well.
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