On April 4, 1923, a huge crowd of Angelenos gathered in downtown Los Angeles to witness the world’s most famous escape artist do this thing. Harry Houdini performed his straitjacket escape while suspended from a balcony of the headquarters of Hearst’s Herald Examiner Building at 1111 S. Broadway. Would this be the one time the great Houdini failed to escape and instead plunge to his death? Success or failure, you can be sure that William Randolph Hearst had his headline.

“Crowd at Examiner Watching Wizard Free Himself”, April 5, 1923:

Herald Examiner Building is still around. This is how it looked in April 2018.