index


1897-1899
1900-1902
1903-1904
1905-1906
1907-1909
1910-1919
1920-1924
1925-1929
1930-1931
1932
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938-1939

Autograph request

Postcard sent to Bray by "Datas" on 11th January 1907 bearing his autograph.

James Maurice Bottle (1875-1956) was billed as Datas, the Memory Man. He was the star of the English music halls from 1901 with his amazing memory feats. Basically, his act was that he could answer ANY question, which he accomplished through his own personal system of memorization. He wasn’t a flashy or even interesting entertainer — he simply answered questions. In 1904 he toured American vaudeville for the first time, whereupon he was examined by American doctors who declared his brain to be the largest they’d ever seen. He published a self-titled book in 1932 wherein he talked about his system, and became immortalized in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 film The 39 Steps as Mr. Memory.

Source: https://travsd.wordpress.com/2020/07/20/the-memory-man/

Curios and Autographs
Autograph Postcard Types
Where he lived
Some photographs
Scrapbook
Cigarette Cards
Cartoon by Michael Leigh