Ned Rutledge's Minding the Store *PREOWNED*

RARE and LONG OFF THE MARKET - VINTAGE 1960's
From the collection of a retired professional magician.

Ned Rutledge (1928-1999) was an American magician who had some success in the 1960s with a 30-minute mentalism act.
Specializing in cards and mental magic, he wrote two books on magic as well as inventing several mentalism effects like this one that "packed small but played big".

NED RUTLEDGE'S ADVERTISING COPY FOR THIS EFFECT:
The mentailist admits he sometimes does the grocery shopping, and even has his most recent shopping list with him.
In fact, he produces the list, and reads aloud some of the items listed.
He then hands the list to another spectator who will act as the assistant and will manage the list.
Absolutely ANY three people chosen by the audience are asked to call out any digit between 1 and 10.
Let us say the first spectator calls out 4.
The next person names 2.
The third calls out 9.
Thats 4 - 2 - 9 - numbers freely thought of, at that moment, by members of the audience.
Now a fourth spectator is asked to call out ANY of those three digits.
Suppose he selects 9.
The assistant who is holding the list, counts immediately down to the 9th item on the list.
He reads the item aloud: CORN FLAKES.
Standing on a table at the assistant's side is a grocery bag.
The assistant is asked to rech into the bag and remove the ONLY item inside the bag.
It's a box of CORN FLAKES!
The assistant then verifis to the rest of the audience that if the fourth person had named any other number, that number would have corresponded to a DIFFERENT grocery item, and not the Corn Flakes!
But wait- there's more!
The magician has been standing about 10 feet away from the grocery bag the whole time.
Yet he now asks the assistant to reach into the bag again, and remove whatever else is in there.
The assistant finds only one other item- the cash register receipt that the cashier tossed into the bag with the groceries at checkout.
The assistant reads aloud what is written at the top of the receipt.
"A-AND-P, MAR 3"
Someone in the audience has a note that was entrusted to him before the show started.
That person now reads the note aloud.
It is the performer's statement that, this night, he has attempted to project into the minds of three people THE EXACT AMOUNT OF HIS GROCERY BILL!
The assistant, who is still holding the receipt, now reads off the total printed on it.
The amount is $4.29
WHICH ARE THE THREE NUMBERS, IN ORDER, CALLED OUT BY THE THREE SPECTATORS AT THE BEGINNING OF THE EFFECT!

NO CONFEDERATES NEEDED
ANY SMALL GROCERY ITEM CAN BE USED
YOU ARE MAKING YOUR OWN COMPONENTS, SO YOU NEVER RUN OUT