At the end of the 1800s and beginning of the 1900s, balancing tricks with cue sticks and billiard balls were somewhat common. The most well-known of these was to balance two billiard balls on a cue stick and then balance the whole assembly on your chin, nose, forehead, cigar, or a glass held in the mouth. The invention of the trick is credited to Paul Cinquevalli, the most famous juggler of all time. He balanced the assembly on a wine glass held in his mouth.
Paul Cinquevalli
A magazine account from 1901 said the following about the Cinquevalli’s trick. “Paul considers his most difficult feat is to balance two billiard balls, one on top of the other, on the butt end of a cue, and balance the lot on another ball in a wineglass, the latter held in his mouth; then, with the faintest movement of the neck, he displaces the top ball, catches it, uses it to knock down the second ball, catches a ball in either hand, and leaves the cue in perfect balance. It took him eight years to perfect this trick and at first, after daily practice for eighteen months he was unable to maintain the top balls in position for more than a few seconds at a time. In Chicago he could not even do this, and discovered that heavy machinery working in the basement of the house in which he practiced was the reason.”
Cinquevalli insisted throughout his life that the trick was ungimmicked, That may be the case, but it is certainly true that others did it through the use of gimmicks and trickery. Some other jugglers even took the trick to ridiculous heights. German gentleman juggler Salerno performed a version where he balanced on his chin, from bottom to top, a cue stick, two billiard balls, another cue stick, and carafe at the top. This was later copied by gentleman juggler Charles Hera, who replaced the carafe with a tray of glasses. You can see Hera’s version in the photograph below.
Charles Hera
To argue that the above trick is ungimmicked is quite preposterous to me. Salerno also apparently did a version of the trick that included, from bottom to top, the cue stick, a ball, cue chalk, and two balls, all balanced on his chin.
As I stated earlier, the basic trick was definitely performed in a gimmicked fashion by many. You could even buy gimmicked sets during Cinquevalli’s lifetime to try to recreate the trick. Below you can see sets advertised for sale in 1911 and 1912.
Van Wyck Catalag 1911
Gamage Catalog 1912
As you can see from the Van Wyck ad, some performers presented the trick as a genuine feat while others chose to reveal the gimmicked nature of the trick for comedic effect.
The 1904 book Modern Magicians Hand Book by William Hilliar includes a description of gimmicking the trick. You can read it below.
The “loaded ball” method he wrote about entails putting lead into one or more of the balls, as shown in the following illustration. This lowers the ball’s center of gravity, thus making it far easier to balance.
The Art of Modern Juggling by Anglo was published in 1907 and discusses various methods of performing the feat, including the use of balls loaded with lead and balls that have spikes, which fit into holes in the balls above them. The following illustration is from that book.
The following video shows three examples of gimmicked versions of the trick.
I’ve also heard of a version using magnets embedded in the balls, but this makes dropping off the top ball much more difficult, if not impossible.
David Cain
David Cain is a professional juggler, juggling historian, and the owner of the world's only juggling museum, the Museum of Juggling History. He is a Guinness world record holder and 16 time IJA gold medalist. In addition to his juggling pursuits, David is a successful composer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and singer as well as the author of twenty-six books. He and his children live in Middletown, OH (USA).