The Final Confession of Mabel Stark: A Novel (An Evergreen book)
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Finally, I interviewed anyone I could find who knew Mabel Stark in the latter days of JungleLand (and who would also agree to talk to me). Clearly, it was Stark's opinion that a personality clash with the new owners was the reason for her firing. While this may or may not have been true, this book was written to express her point of view, and for me this was enough justification to use this rendition of events.
The rest is fiction. The characterizations of the more famous people-Al G. Barnes, John and Charles Ringling, Lillian Leitzel, Louis Roth-were the result of research.
A few more notes.
In my book, Mabel Stark has an early brush with the mental health system as it existed at that time. Though this is speculation, it is not speculation made lightly. We know that something fairly significant caused her to leave the respected profession of nursing to become a cooch. Those who knew her at JungleLand said she always lied about her age, the suspicion being that something happened to her early in her life that she worked hard to obscure. In the book Wild Animal Trainers of America, a circus writer named Joanne joys claims that Mabel Stark's departure from the nursing profession was due to a nervous breakdown. Given the way that Stark's life ended, this seemed to account for the highest number of mysteries concerning her early years.
I massaged a couple of minor facts in service of the story, which I will mention as there are many circus aficionados out there, and it is not my wish to anger them. There were not one but two Rajahs (named, incidentally, Rajah I and Rajah II). As the first was by far the most important to her career, I eliminated the second. Second, Mabel Stark did marry one more time, for a few years in the early sixties, to another old menage boss named Eddie Trees. Finally, Al G. Barnes died in the state of California, and not in Oregon.
The Al G. Barnes Circus performed its last date on November 27, 1938, in Sarasota, Florida, on a bill shared with Sells-Floto, John Robinson and the Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus.
On July 6, 1944, during a show in Hartford, Connecticut, the paraffin coating a Ringling big top caught fire, killing 168 patrons. For years, the show survived in a state of near-bankruptcy, owing to damages awarded against it. Today, the Ringling Circus is the biggest in the world and tours the United States and Canada in two units.
Mabel Stark committed suicide on April 21, 1968, through a combination of self-asphyxiation and barbiturate overdose. Her exact age was unknown.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
While many people assisted with the research of this novel, there are five individuals without whose help this book would not have been possible. Roger Smith of Houston, upon whom the Roger Haynes character is based, helped immensely with my depiction of Mabel Stark in her later years. Fred Dahlinger, head librarian at Circus World Museum, unhesitatingly shipped me numerous old circus books, many of them fifty years out of print, with nothing more than my promise to return them unharmed. Michael Hackenberger, an animal trainer and owner of the Bowmanville Zoo in Bowmanville, Ontario, taught me many of the early training techniques presented in the book. Al Stencell, an ex-circus owner and girl show expert, told me everything I'd ever need to know about cooch dancing. Finally, Barbara Byrd, of the Carson & Barnes Circus, invited me to travel for a week with her circus through rural Texas, even though I made it clear I would not, in any way, be able to promote her show with my book; this, I submit, is what troupers mean when they describe someone as being "both with it and for it."
I'd also like to thank those who read the book and offered suggestions along the way: Susan Greer, Jackie Kaiser, Jocelyn Lawrence, Jan Whitford and Robert Young. My thanks also goes to those who've supported my writing in the past, either by giving me magazine gigs or critiquing earlier, unpublishable works of long fiction: Lynn Cunningham, Angie Gardos, Wayne Gooding, Angel Guerra, Marni Kramarich, John Macfarlane, Dianna Symonds, Linda Williams. Finally, my complete and unreserved gratitude goes to my editor, Anne Collins, who upon receiving highly abbreviated, yet-to-be-fleshed-out drafts never failed to say what a writer most wants to hear:
"It's getting there. Now give me more."
Table of Contents
The Athenian Tailor
The Young Psychiatrist
JungleLand
The Southern Cotton Mogul
The Hungarian Military Officer
The Bengal Punk
The Handsome Bigamist
The Ringling Accountant
The Ex-Polar Bear Man
The New Menage Boss
Art
Lucky Barnes
Research Notes
Acknowledgements