The idea of arranging the red and black cards jogged from opposite ends of the deck, so that the pack may be shown all red by riffling one end, and all black by riffling the other, was described by F. W. Conradi in “Rouge et Noir” in Der Moderne Kartenküstler, 1896, p. 69. William Robinson, writing as Chung Ling Soo, would later reinvent the idea in Goldston's Magazine of Magic, Vol. 2 No. 4, July 1915, p. 111. The trick, titled “Wonderful Separation of Cards,” was published without a byline or credit. Will Goldston, in a note in the following August issue, credited it to Chung Ling Soo, p. 133.

It would not be surprising to discover that the idea of alternately jogged red and black cards, and of special decks made up of pairs of long and short cards, are older than the published sources above, given the age of the Blow Book, which uses the principle of long and short trimmed pages and dates back to the sixteenth century (see Prevost and Scot, both 1584).

See also: Svengali Deck & Ribbon Spread Hideout after Faro Shuffle.