To anyone in the New York area, I am sad to report that David's cat was taken by the police from his apartment, and is now held at the Manhattan ACC for only a few days. Then, I don't know. Neppi is 9(they have him as 5), a neutered male with all shots. He only has lived with David, and is probably shy with others. He needs someone with no kids or pets who would be patient with him. He is now in a cage, scared and alone after losing his only friend. If you can help, please please please let me know.

Update - David's cat was adopted!!

That's great. Thanks Michael, great to hear. David always loved cats. Nice going.

Yeah, good job, Doc! 🙏🏽

Getting back to the idea that David was only interested in coins. Well, not true. Magicwise he liked the endless chain, Cups and Balls, Chop Cup, Floating Cork, and the Three Ball trick, and well as cards and also bar bets. He knew a few cigarette tricks, and I'm probably forgetting something, but whatever he did he did well. Oh, I forgot Sponge Balls. He only featured coins professionally and they probably were his main concern.
Socially he was happy being single. He could leave to travel half-way around the world at a moment's notice. Also he had heard the horror stories most magicians tell of wives who grow to hate magic.
He used to tell me what Vernon told him which was to date many women instead of just sticking to one. I actually cleaned up the quote a bit. Also, David had many friends in magic, but he had interests in many things...music I mentioned, but he was "into" the Priore de Sion before Dan Brown and the Grail Mysteries and stories and the Templars. He got me interested in those too. When he got interested in something, it became infectious.
Lately he had been transcribing old letters, handwritten, into the computer in typed form for storage and reproduction or study.
Just to let you know he wasn't only interested in coins.

I remember once watching him at a magic shop work the cups & balls as good as anyone I'd seen, and he presented every trick in his Roth style, the way he presented his coin magic. Always fun to watch him work no matter the genre. I also remember sitting near him at a magic seminar in NJ, where we all were watching his old buddy, Darwin Ortiz do some astounding card magic. That was a great day for me as I met so many wonderful magicians, that up to then I had only chatted back & forth with online, like a young Eric Jones, Mano Tejeda, Mickey Silver, Jonathan Townsend, Steve Dusheck, Joe Reindfliesh, and so many fine known and unknown others. Many of which I continued long friendships with, some still to this day, some right here on the Café. Roth was not at the seminar to perform this day, but to support and enjoy the good magic of others. I saw him do this many times over the years, and I always appreciated his sense and support of the art for art's sake.

And yeah, there's some wisdom in Vernon's words, though I believe he was married? Perhaps that's how he knew best. While I can appreciate the finer points of the wisdom, there are also a lot of good things in a good woman and family as well, even if they don't like your magic (not to mention, that they will usually find something not to like about you just the same). Roth's choices as to all that are his own and led him down different roads as to his greater pursuits. As Sly Stone once said, "Different strokes, for different folks." But whatever drums he beat, he played them all well. I remember some of his last pursuits was as the Master in Residence at the Conjurors Arts Research Center in NYC... Didn't even know they had such a thing, but indeed it is, and Roth was quite the respected ambassador and historical reference as to magic there. When I called to wish him happy birthdays, it was always when he was at work there, and he would always take the call and happily stop to chat.

Warming news about Neppi finding a new home. Thanks Doc
Digging through my memory... when I saw him in the UK around the mid 90's he talked about having two cats at the time called Houdini and Slydini. The BBC produced a documentary about Ricky Jay around the same time and David was seen briefly in the film. He mentioned about how they filmed him (David) doing a routine using one of his cats as an impromptu close up pad but it never made the final cut.
Also... on the subject of non-coin magic, didn't A1 Multimedia produce a VHS on the Balducci Levitaion which was all the rage at the time? I'm sure David was on it aswell as others.

Nev

When David was young, he used to set people up for the levitation. His friends would say that David could float, and at some point they would ask David to show it. After a sufficient build up, David would perform it and blow people away.

Doug Henning, the late great Doug Henning, burst into tears and hugged David's knees and said, "I knew it was real, I knew it was real" which shows how well David must have done it that time. Or something.
Thanks Michael for reminding me of that trick. Eddie Balducci learned it from a circus performer.

I only met him once at a very small attended lecture in a hotel suite in S.F. It was '87. I know the year
because he inscribed the date when he signed his big book... What have I got the most milage out of his creations? Sh*ll Coins Across, Flurry, Eraser Coin, the workhorse routine Copper/Silver. His work on Deep Back Clip. His work on the Okito Box. The Retention Vanish & finally teaching me how to do a coin roll.
But more then the coin effects... David's version of the Silent Mora/Fred Kaps 3 Ball Routine. I have performed it hundreds of times. One of my all-time favorite magical routines. Thank You Master of Magic. Bless you and your incredible work. ( he also inscribed in his book " Coins do'nt like to be dropped" )

A nice tribute to Roth by Swiss:

https://jamyianswiss.com/blog/coin-magic......CAMPAIGN

Http://davidrothmagic.com/david-rangel-interview/

I saw David lecture four times over the years. Whenever I knew he would lecture anywhere near me, I was there. He largely did a lot of the same items in his lectures, but I always came away knowing something I didn't know before. The non-coin items he performed: Cards, The Three Ball trick, A cup routine and of all things, an endless chain routine were perfection.
I'm very saddened by his passing.

When David did Bar Mitzva shows he would often just do the endless chain because he could get a lot out of it with those kids and didn't like the way they reacted to actual magic. I know nothing about the endless chain except a vague understanding about what it is all about...something like monte but different. He talked about it on many of our phone calls, but I never saw him do it.

I spoke to David Roth on the phone a couple of times.

Plus, I was lucky enough that I had a chance to meet him and see him lecture and perform at a convention years ago. He was smooth and every move and nuance was perfection. He was approachable and shared anecdotes.

We're so very fortunate to have a wealth of his material, theories, and thought process available for study.

I was just thinking about something David was telling me about on a recent phone call. It has to do with David's great memory for anecdotes about magicians of all eras. I think he learned this honing of an anecdote from Vernon, and also probably Ricky. Anyway, he told me that he had a podcast or I'm not sure what you'd call it...a blog? Not sure. Anyway, I think it was somehow related to the Conjuring Arts Research Center and was called "Roth Remembers". I'm pretty sure that was the name.
If anyone knows how to access this, please let us know. David seemed to think I could listen to these. I'm not a member at the Center and assumed I wouldn't be allowed in or on this site or section of the Center. Gregg

Greggg, the best I can do for you at short notice is this online series of videos from the Conjuring Arts Research Center, hope that helps:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vGW3cb0......fyhNM02l

Yes, that's exactly what He was telling me about. I thought I had to join the Conjuring Arts. Maybe I should anyway, but thank you for posting that! I wanted people to know about David's other talent, his anecdote telling.

Thanks again for the anecdotes link. I watched them all and found them very interesting. I was reminded of one of the last phone chats I had with David about the fact that coin companies are selling the Swindler's nickles in a two coin set with one gold plated and the other a regular matching coin. These were the od nickles which had the Roman Numeral "V" on the back to mean 5 cents, but swindlers had them gold-plated and passed them off as gold $5.00 pieces.
The idea is, we as coin magicians could tell the story as patter and use Spellbound or other color change move to actually change the regular old nickel to the gold-plated one. The story could be that the swindler knew a magician (or alchemist) who changed them into gold. We both thought there was something there, but David ended the discussion of that trick as not being practical because you could only use it for very few people because spectators needed to see the details on the coin(s). Yet, we all don't perform for large groups.

Shocked and saddened to hear this. I saw David lecture here in Montreal, but my most magical memory of him was this:
I was visiting New York City around 2003 I believe, and just walking aimlessly around Manhattan when I found myself on some street and noticed a sandwich board outside a building that said Fantasma Magic Shop. I knew of Tannens, but had never heard of Fantasma. At this time, I was at the height of my obsession with coin magic, so I was excited to check out this new magic shop and to see their coin section, and maybe get a coin book. I walked up the steps, entered the rather long and spacious magic showroom, and found myself to be the only customer there. I was gazing in rapture at all the beautiful magic display counters, searching out the coin section, when I noticed a man standing behind a counter. It was the coin magic display. I looked up at him and to my surprise he looked a lot like David Roth, but I thought to myself why would the dean of coin magic be standing behind the counter of a magic store like a mere mortal? So I said to him, “You know, you look a lot like David Roth,”, to which he replied, “I am David Roth.” Well, he very graciously gave me a few coin handling tips, but I will never forget the mysterious force that led me to him that day. He will be missed.