St. Martin's Press

forced to appeal to the Milwaukee Hebrew Relief Society for coal to see them through the winter. Ehrich

Legend insists that Ehrich opened his first lock while in pursuit of a piece of pie secured in Cecilia’s kitchen cupboard. It’s known that one afternoon in October 1883, when he was nine, he earned 35¢ by making his debut as a trapeze artist called “The Prince of the Air” in a Milwaukee circus, and that he later gave a series of impromptu performances around town in which he demonstrated his ability to bend over backward and pick up a pin from the floor with his teeth, among other feats of physical agility

Ehrich was on the premises one day in the summer of 1885 when a policeman came through the door escorting a fearsome-looking man in shackles. The man had just been found not guilty in a court hearing, but somehow the key had broken off in the lock of his handcuffs, “and judging from his language, which was ripe, he wasn’t happy about it.” Seizing the moment, the eleven-year-old produced a thumbnail-sized metal buttonhook from his pocket, worked it around inside the lock, and snapped open the cuffs within a minute.