This is the idea of squeezing the deck to place minute space between each pair of cards, thus making the deck appear thicker than it really is. The idea was recorded by Lin Searles in The Card Expert, 1938, p. 29. Credited to Alladin, the technique was used as part of a weave shuffle and not to increase the apparent thickness of the deck. A clear example of its use in the latter manner appears in Jerry Andrus's Andrus Deals You In, 1956, p. 132. Another early description is found in New Phoenix, No. 321, Dec. 1954, p. 92, where it is implied that it is Martin Gardner's. Gardner, when asked by John Lovick, denied the idea was his.

* Category in Denis Behr's "Conjuring Archive"