Who is credited as being the first magician to pull a live rabbit out of a top hat?

Louis Apollinaire Christien Emmanuel Comte (June 22, 1788 – November 25, 1859), known simply as Comte, was a celebrated nineteenth-century Parisian magician. Comte became the first conjurer on record to pull a white rabbit out of a top hat.

Comte performed for Louis XVIII at the Tuileries Palace and was made a “Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur” (Knight of The Legion of Honour, the highest French order of merit for military and civil merits) by Louis-Philippe. He was sometimes called "The Conjurer of the Three Kings" (Louis XVIII, Charles X, and Louis-Philippe).

Comte was greatly admired by another famous French magician, Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin (1805 – 1871) whose magic skills were such that he was sent by Napoleon III to Algiers to stun the Arabs with “miracles” in order to keep a strong French influence in the area. A slightly later French magician, Alexander Herrmann (February 10, 1844 – December 17, 1896) better known as "Herrmann the Great", further developed the rabbits-from-a-top-hat trick that was started by Comte.

Harry Kellar (1849 – 1922) was a famous American magician known as the “Dean of American Magicians”.