I'm trying to locate an old fashioned pitchman's case, the kind that's like a small suitcase with attached folding legs. These used to be quite a common sight on city streets up until the early 60s.

They are called 'Kister" if that helps in your search.

Don

P.S.I was born in Baltimore and was back their just last month.I visited my old buddy Denny from Denny & Lee magic shop.I used to work at Yogi Magic Mart on north Charles St when Phil Thomas owned it back in the early 70s.Were you around than?
Don

Check out "The Medicine Show Manual" by Tom Jorgenson.
He devotes an entire chapter to building a keister.

RiffRaff I have a question. what is a medicine show? thanks.

Devyns...don't be so lazy,do a search here.Lots of info.

Don

P.S. I have a elixir that will cure lazyness (and 100 other things)...just send $19.95 to......

My old doctor had a collection in his office of the bottles and instructions with the different elixir. They had lots of alcholol in 'em and many were aimed at taming the woman during periods of stress.

There's a good picture of Jeff Smith's Keister on both his site and School for Scoundrels. It was made by his father in the '70s and Jeff uses it when he does his reenactment of Soapy Smith's famous pitch.

http://www.soapysmith.net
http://www.scoundrelsphotos.com

I'm glad you found a new doctor Santa. Sounds like that guy hadn't been doin' any professional development in the last 95 years or so...

Sometimes the old ways are the best way my friend!

It is also known as a tripe and keister. Tripe is for the tripod stand, keister is the case.

It is facinating what they sold. He had one (he is retired) that was a tapeworm to lose weight and then you drink acid to kill the worm! Another was broccoli or brussle sprout pills that cured everything. The alcohol ones were the tamers...

Thanks Don,
Yes, I used to frequent Phil's old shop, back when you, Bill Steinacher (sp?) and Dave Roemer worked there.
Denny is getting ready to move into his new location some time next month, from what I have heard it will be huge!
By the way, I just ordered your Svengali Pitch DVD, waiting for it to get here.
What I have learned, there are two different arrangements for the same purpose. The "Tripe (tripod) and Kister or Kiester(case)" consists of a separate tripod with a case that sits on top. The "Dropcase" is a case with folding legs attached.
Either would be fine for my purpose.

Didn't someone have a "Medicine Show" program published?

Wasn't a "real" medicine show, just used a medicine show husker type character to frame the magic!

My dad told me "Keister" was slang for one's buttox and the word was used for those cases because they were made of Pig skin from the rear end of the pigs.

Yup...KEISTER was slang for your butt in the midwest among the adults in the '60's...I always thought it was German. I also assumed they eventually called it a Keister because you rested your keister on it when you weren't working.

Anybody know how to look up word origins?

The Online Etymological Dictionary provides the following definition and derivation for keister: "buttocks," 1931, perhaps transferred from underworld meaning "safe, strongbox" (1914), earlier "a burglar's toolkit that can be locked" (1881); probably from British dialect kist (c.1300, northern form of chest, from O.N. kista) or its Ger. cognate Kiste "chest, box." The connection may be via pickpocket slang sense of "rear trouser pocket" (1930s).

Personally, I think the connection between "keister" meaning "chest or box" and "keister" meaning "buttocks" comes from the habit of traveling salesmen, when resting or goofing off, to up-end the keister (sample case) and sit on it. The supervisors of the sales force (or other salesmen) would yell, "Get off your keister!" to get the procrastinating salesman back to work. Similarities to the expression, "Get off your a**" in both structure and in meaning are obvious, and likely to have resulted in an equivalence in the two phrases. The only differing words of the expressions (the last in each) leads to the perception that the two words referred to the same thing.

Ed, Riffraf already mentioned the book a few posts above. It’s called "The Medicine Show Manual" By Tom Jorgenson. It is fairly easy to find. He uses the premise of (and scrip’s) an old time medicine show as the framing for a magic show. It has clear instructions on making a Keister.

The most probable derivation of the word Keister is that it comes from the Yiddish word for suitcase “kistel”. During the flood of immigrants during the 19th and early 20th century’s, parents would tell their children (husbands would tell their wives) to sit on the kister so they would not be stolen.

Traveling sales men (including medicine pitch men) used the term “sitting on your kister” (sitting on your case) to mean they were not working.

In slang the word has become “keester” meaning rear-end (buttocks).

In some dictionaries it is sometimes attributed as English slang but I suspect that even there it was taken from the Yiddish.

Sid Lorraine used to perform a magic act as a medicine show pitch. He may have put out a booklet. I know he did a booklet on a Suitcase Sideshow (magic act along the theme of a talker/barker telling what you would see inside.

Harry,

Are you thinking of Tommy Windsor, rather than Sid Lorraine? I think both Lorraine and Windsor did magic pitch acts (Windsor's was called the "Street Faker Act"), but I think it was Windsor who put out "Suit Case Sideshow," which was not nearly as successful as the Faker Act.

0pus

Yep it was Tommy Windsor's that put out the booklet the "Suitcase Sideshow".

I remember seeing Sid Lorraine do his Medicine Show Pitch Act at a convention in the day! It was done with broad comedy.

My Bad!