Kent Cummins
Magic Camp
http://www.MagicCamp.com
Articulate, overachiever, and passionate does not even begin to describe Kent Cummins. A former restaurateur, US Army Veteran, and MBA, Kent has had a lifelong love affair with magic, puppeteer, and juggling. While having breakfast one morning, a police officer friend who ran the McGruff Crime Prevention program in Austin, Texas, for which Kent volunteered, suggested he combine his expertise in puppeteer, magic, and juggling into a kids summer camp. Kent responded with "that's very interesting." 'No, that's not interesting, it's a business plan!” responded the officer. Taking the advice of his friend to heart, at age 50, and wanting to give something more back to his community, Kent founded Magic Camp, to teach life skills to children while they learned magic. He enlisted friends and family and was able to start this project with almost no capital and was in profit his first year. His most important advice; "do what you love."
When you speak with Kent it becomes obvious that his business is not only unusual, but the perfect outlet for his love of magic, passion for helping children, and giving back to his community.
Kent is an excellent example of how one can use their talents and hobbies and creatively put them together to create a thriving business.
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I was born in Del Rio, Texas, on January 6, 1943…the day of “the coming of the Magi” in Christian tradition, and the year of the magnetic penny (because copper was needed for the war effort).I knew that I wanted to be a magician when my dad gave me an A.C. Gilbert Mysto Magic set about the time I was starting school. My mom made me two puppets that same year (Santa & Rudolph), and I was torn between magic and puppetry as my “favorite hobby.” I did puppet shows in the back yard, but my first “Big Show” was performing magic at my dad’s dance recital in 1952.
After the 4th grade, we moved to New Orleans, because of my dad’s love of Dixieland jazz. Next was Shreveport, Louisiana, where I built a huge puppet theatre into the garage and sold tickets to neighborhood puppet shows. But when we moved to Baton Rouge, I had to leave the puppet theatre behind. I put the hundreds of puppets into boxes, and—sadly--never saw them again. In 1955, I started the 7th grade in Baton Rouge (my future wife, Margot Grandjean, was in my home room class). Since I didn’t have my puppet shows, I taught myself how to juggle.
I continued in Baton Rouge High School and LSU, earning extra money by performing magic and juggling shows. When I performed in LSU’s Troupe Internationale, I was billed as “the only foreign student from Texas!” Meanwhile, my mom joined the Puppeteers of America and started making more puppets and performing on her own. When I earned my BA Degree in Communications, in 1965, I also got married to Margot and became a Second Lieutenant in the US Army. While in the Army I ran officers clubs in such exotic places as Germany, France, Vietnam, Korea and New Jersey. The Army also sent me to the University of Texas at Austin, where I got my MBA Degree in 1972.
In 1976, after eleven years of active duty, we (Kent, Margot, and now Kevin and Kim) moved back to Austin, Texas, where we ran “the SamWitch shops,” a restaurant chain that we had started while I was in graduate school. While running the sandwich shops, I took time off to become a “Certified Juggling Instructor” through the Juggling Institute of Seattle. I continued in the Army reserve, and am now officially retired as a Lieutenant Colonel.
Beyond The Box Tip
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On January 1, 1986, we sold the SamWitch shops and I realized my childhood dream of becoming a full time professional magician.
The Kent Cummins Magic Camp is a day camp in Austin, Texas, that uses the fascination and fun of magic to teach life skills to elementary-aged children. It was profitable from the first year, 1993, and has grown to become the most important project of my life. Our slogan is, “We work MAGIC with kids!” The magic words are, “Can Do!”
Let me explain that we do not try to turn children into wizards. (Harry Potter fans know that you have to be born a wizard!) What we want is to turn the kids into better Muggles (ordinary people.) In other words, as noted by Cody Fisher, our Camp Manager, “It’s a life skills camp.” By learning how to perform magic tricks, kids find it easier to give book reports in school. Hand-eye coordination improved through learning magic and juggling also improves handwriting, reading, music, sports, and many other activities. Shy kids can learn to perform through the anonymity of puppetry before they work up the courage to perform magic. And everyone can learn “The 3 R’s of Respect: Respect yourself, Respect property, and Respect others.”
Children also learn to celebrate diversity. We are a mainstream camp, but we welcome any child who has a desire to attend. We have had successful campers with ADD, ADHD, OCD, Down Syndrome, Tourette’s Syndrome, Asperger’s Syndrome, autism, bipolar disorder, juvenile diabetes, cerebral palsey, severe emotional disturbance, attempted suicide, mental retardation, prostheses, blindness, deafness, and other disabilities that are not necessarily obvious at first glance. These children with special needs want to be loved, want to succeed, and want to have fun. So do the rest of us!
The secret is simply to treat everyone with respect. Rather than have standards that everyone must meet to succeed, we accept campers as who they really are, and encourage them to continue to learn and grow.
Brainstorming Tip
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I think I am most proud of our counselor program. Every year, more than fifty young teens (all former campers at The Magic Camp) start training in January to work at the camp in the summer. They must complete our Youth Leader Training Academy, which provides some fifty hours of training in such basic life skills as goal setting, time management, dealing with change, anger management, teaching skills, celebrating diversity, customer service, and much more. This means that our camp is run almost entirely by former campers, and their enthusiasm and dedication is a sight to behold! Even my Assistant Camp Director, Gus Davis, was a camper at that first camp in 1993.
As the camp has grown, so has our participation in the community. We volunteer for community events, teach in dozens of schools in their after school enrichment programs, and even offer Magic Camp Birthday Parties!
From four weeks in the summer of 1993, with 30 kids per week, we have grown to ten weeks and hundreds of campers. And with our other programs, The Kent Cummins Magic Camp has become a year-round business. In fact, we even use the Magic Camp teaching methods in a Magic Camp for Grown-Ups, and the Magic Camp brand has been extended to keynote speeches, corporate training, and a product line of magic, juggling, puppets, books, and videos. Our corporate clients have included International SemaTech, IBM, Motorola, Dell Computers, Goodwill Industries, Yellow Cab Corporation, the International Military Community Executives Association, Area Agency on Aging, and many more.
In every activity, we help people discover the MAGIC in their lives!
In 1993, the year that I turned 50, I was married to my childhood sweetheart, had two wonderful adult children who were also my best friends, had a nice house and MAGICK Van, and was living my childhood dream as a magician. It was time to give back!
It seems to me that, when one makes life-affirming decisions, the universe opens up to provide opportunity! One morning in March, I was having breakfast with my friend, Robert Crampton, who ran the McGruff the Crime Dog puppetry program for the Austin Police Department. He said, “Kent, if you would put your magic, juggling and puppetry programs all together, you could have your own summer camp.” I said, “That’s an interesting idea, Robert.” He slammed his fist on the table, rattling the coffee cups, and replied, “NO! It’s a business plan!”
Beyond the Box Tip
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It seemed to me that I could teach kids the things that had made my life rewarding: magic, juggling
and puppets. We had missed the deadline for the Austin American Statesman Camp Guide listings, but The Magic Camp started that summer, with four one-week sessions in donated space in a declining shopping mall. I enlisted my best friend, “Peter the Adequate,” to help teach the magic, and my Mom designed the puppetry curriculum. As the only Certified Juggling Instructor, I would teach the juggling. We invited a young teenage magician, Jason Caballero, to be a counselor. Much to our surprise, all four sessions sold out at 30 kids per session. “The Kent Cummins Magic Camp” was born! (www.MagicCamp.com)
My dad gave me a copy of Dr Norman Vincent Peale’s The Power of Positive Thinking when I was in the sixth grade. I also remember a song that Dad listened to on one of his records, “Accentuate the Positive!” So always trying to see the positive side of things has affected the way I do everything, personal as well as professional. Not only do I see the glass as “half full,” but I know there’s another bottle in the refrigerator! My dad died of cancer over ten years ago, but his influence on my life will live forever.
For an example of how this has affected my personal life, I think back to the year that I was in Vietnam. I did not volunteer to go, nor did I want to go, but I felt strongly that it was my patriotic duty as an Army officer to follow the orders of my Commander in Chief. In other words, I did not consider defecting to Canada a viable option.
During the time I was in Vietnam, I tried to learn as much as I could about the country and the culture, and to do things that were fun whenever I could. I planted zinnias, played pick-up games of basketball, started a band, performed magic, juggled hand grenades (with the pins still in, of course!), took lessons in the Vietnamese language, and took hundreds of color slides with my old Instamatic camera. I call the slide show, “What did you do in the war, Daddy?” The slides are of everything EXCEPT the horrors of war. I didn’t ignore the reality of the war, but I didn’t let it destroy me. I looked at my canteen as half-full.
For an example of how this philosophy has affected my business life, I have only to think of a year ago when the two most important staff members of The Magic Camp left for wonderful career opportunities…at the same time. I wasn’t sure how I could continue to run the camp without them, but I could hardly resent their leaving. Looking on the positive side, I contacted a handful of my previous counselors who were now in college, and too old for the counselor program. I asked each of them if they would like to return to The Magic Camp as “Junior Staff.” They ALL said yes, and their dedication, creativity, energy and enthusiasm have brought the camp to a new level of success.
It has been said that when one door closes, another opens. My experience at The Magic Camp has demonstrated this in many ways. My thermos jug is always half-full, never half-empty.
Discover the MAGIC in your own life by spending your time and creative energy on something you really love. In other words, follow your passion, wherever it leads.
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