Top 10 Interesting Facts about Uri Geller

Uri Geller in Moscow photo by Dmitry Rozhkov —Wikimedia

Top 10 Interesting Facts about Uri Geller

Uri Geller is an Israeli British illusionist and magician television personality. He was a self-proclaimed psychic and is famously remembered for his television performance of spoon bending and other illusions.

He uses conjuring tricks to simulate the effects of psychokinesis and telepathy. He was born in Tel Aviv, Israel in 1946, he performed feats of stooping the hands of watches through paranormal means.

He started his career in 1969, after demonstrating his telepathic abilities and becoming a full-time professional performer.

He was further assisted in his career by Andria Puharich, a parapsychologist, who conducted a scientific investigation of his phenomena. Here are the top 10 Interesting Facts about Uri Geller.

1. He started his career at an early stage

He was born on 20 December 1946 and his mother and father were of Austrian— Jewish and Hungarian —Jewish backgrounds respectively.

Geller claims he is a distant relative of Sigmund Freud, the famous psychologist from his mother’s side of the family.

He first became aware of his unusual abilities when he was just five. It was during a family meal in which a spoon curled up in his hand and broke, though he hadn’t applied any physical force.

He went to live in Cyprus when he was eleven years and remained there till he was seventeen. On his return to Israel, he served as a paratrooper in the Israel army, in the six-day war of 1967, in which he was wounded in action.

He worked as a model and was photographed for many different campaigns.

2. He has worked with the FBI and CIA

Uri Geller worked with the FBI as well as the CIA, in a small operation, later given the code name “stargate” project.

The intelligence body looked for the potential psychic phenomenon in military and domestic intelligence.

The experiments concluded that Geller’s involvement in the process was a success. The records show that he had a perceptual ability in convincing ambiguously.

Geller underwent several tests, where he was isolated in a room and asked to copy a picture drawn by a person or computer that he couldn’t see. Though he failed the tests several times he managed to bring enough similarities to the test objects. 

3. He was a successful writer

Uri_Geller_and_Jack_Sarfatti_by_Mark_Pilkington photo by Mark Pilkington —Wikimedia

Geller’s first book was published in 1975, and the book was an attempt to reconstruct some of his psychic events, it even highlighted the scientific skepticism of his performance methods.

In 1984, he began a successful career as a writer and teacher. He wrote another book “I can feel you thinking” and he co-authored with Ray Hyman. This book account of how when a sandwich was left on a table he could tell who touched it through telepathy.

His third book was called presence and published in 2004, which is an exploration of the human mind.

4. He believed his abilities were from extra-terrestrial beings

Parapsychologist Andrija Puharich put Geller under hypnosis, he claimed that extraterrestrial beings had brought him to earth from a spacecraft 53,000 light-years away.

He later dismissed the allegations of space imagination but his fans held on to the idea. Though Geller claimed his powers are the product given to him by aliens, critics such as James Randi disapproved and stated that his tricks can be replicated.

 5. He advocated severally for mental health awareness

Uri Geller beim Löffelbiegen photo by Aquarius2000 —Wikimedia

Geller began an eight-month performance touring 2004, to promote awareness of mental health.

He performed in England, and also visited the U.S and Mexico to help mentally ill patients to receive better care.

6. He sued the Nintendo company

Geller sued the computer giant Nintendo for allegedly using his image in its best-selling Pokémon game without his consent.

He claimed a Pokémon card was based on him, the pocket monster illustrated on the game card comes with two bent spoons in its hands and its character profile describes it as a magician and psychic.

What ticked off Geller, was how his name was allocated to the Japanese version of the card without his awareness and he took it as an insult and mockery to his name and his hard-earned career.

The trading company stopped printing Kadabra cards ever since the lawsuit in 2003. Geller finally changed his mind in 2020 and apologized for the lawsuit and even vowed to lift the ban.

7. He bought an uninhabited island

Geller bought an uninhabited island off the coast of Scotland called the lamb in 2009. The island is associated with several mystical themes. It’s believed it lies in a triangle formed by three sites associated with the Knights of Templar and other mysterious sites.

The knights of Templar are viewed as having vast mystical powers. Geller pointed out that the lamb island was visited by princess scota, sister of the pharaoh Tutankhamen leaving behind countless treasures.

He announced plans to excavate the island to find the treasure, in 2010 he was visiting to do some dowsing and hasn’t commented anymore on his private island.

8. He has received several awards

Uri Geller though not considering himself a magician has been awarded several trophies of achievement.

He was very glad to accept the David Berglas International Magic Award in London in 2008, for his services to the upgrading of Magic.

 In 2010, he received in Los Angeles the prestigious Dunninger memorial award. In 2015 Uri acknowledged The Wizard Trophy, for his influence on the magic world.

9. He inspired the creation of the spoon gorilla

The_’Spoons’_Gorilla_in_the_sculpture_park photo by The joy of all things—Wikimedia

In 2013, the British ironwork center was inspired to create a gorilla fully made of spoons. Thousands of spoons were donated, even one that once belonged to Winston Churchill.

The project gained world fame and over 40,000 spoons were donated and a stunning piece of gorilla art was constructed out of it.

The statue was unveiled by his royal highness prince Michael of Kent in 2014, Geller was the inspiration behind the stunning spoon gorilla statue.

10.There is a Uri Geller museum

The museum is owned and operated by none other than Geller himself. The museum is located in old Jaffa, an old Ottoman-era building that once used to be a soap factory.

The most prominent spoon is displayed outside, it’s a massive size steel tablespoon and has been recognized by the Guinness book of world records as the largest spoon in the world.

Geller is a man of extraordinary abilities, despite the many criticisms that shadow his work. A magician or not he has impacted the magic world and has been an inspiration to many people.