by Jerry Apps
Mt. Sterling, Kentucky. Fine day. Arrived early. Parade out on time. Everything is working as smoothly as if the show had been out for months. Everyone has learned his place and the clock-like regularity so much wondered at by the thousands who view the working forces handle the trains, horses, tents and other departments, has assumed its mid-summer aspect. The show grounds were lined with snack stands from which colored folks dispensed hot coffee, barbecued shoat,’ possum cake, fried fish and Washington cherry pie. Weather fine. Business good.39
Reception in the East was positive. When they played in Troy, New York, on a Monday at the end of May, all the businesses and factories closed, “and the city was veritably given over to the circus.”40
The 1898 season had its usual assortment of accidents and unusual happenings. While playing in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, on June 7, everyone heard a terrific explosion about 8:00 p.m. War fever was high, and someone said it must surely be a Spanish bomb. In fact, a tank of gas used to feed one of the lights had exploded, blowing two workers over a tent wall for a distance of twenty feet. No one was reported killed.41
When the show played in Jackson, Michigan, on August 13, the Brothers suggested to the warden of the nearby prison that they do a show at the prison. The warden accepted the offer, and several performers made their way to the huge building inside a walled compound. Alf T. Ringling described the event this way:
After passing through numerous corridors and passageways, they were ushered into the open court, or prison common. It was a grotesque procession—the musicians with their instruments, the clowns, bedecked in grease paints and attired in their mirth-provoking costumes … a motley assemblage of “troopers” indeed, and one that recalled the days of wandering troubadours who strolled from place to place giving exhibitions. On reaching the courtyard a sight never to be forgotten greeted our eyes. The prisoners were massed on the green sward. … [T]he ringing of bells caused a hush to fall upon the assemblage as the “troopers” walked in. All was quiet for a moment and then, out of the afternoon air burst a glad shout of welcome which echoed and re-echoed down through the long corridors of the prison.42
Alf T.’s Farm
In 1898 Alf T. Ringling traveled in Europe and spent some time in a chalet in Switzerland. He fell in love with the setting, and upon returning to the United States he went looking for a place that was similar. He learned from a friend that only six miles east of Baraboo, in Greenfield Township, was such a place. On December 3, 1901, Alf T. bought 120 acres for $5,800; the following March he purchased an additional 20 acres for $1,000.1 In 1903, 1905, and 1907 Alf T. bought additional nearby land, making his total holdings 280 acres. There he built a chalet and a guest/carriage house, where over the years he entertained such well-known celebrities as Buffalo Bill Cody, Tom Mix, and Babe Ruth. (The Aldo Leopold Foundation of Baraboo currently owns the property.)
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NOTES
1. Greenfield Township, T.11, R.7 E., Section 2. Land ownership records. Aldo Leopold Foundation, Baraboo, Wisconsin.
Circus Families
Many Ringling clowns joined the Puff Club, shown here in 1910. PRINT COLLECTION, CWM
Circus people traveled, worked, and ate together for up to seven months of the year. Many formed close friendships and even makeshift families.
Some of these “families” devised names for themselves. The “Pot Gang” consisted of animal caretakers who gathered in the evenings around a campfire after the closing of the menagerie to eat, tell stories, and pass the time before loading the trains for the next stand. And the “Puff Club” consisted of the show’s principal clowns; one of the club’s rules was that each member must use a powder puff as part of their making up. The initiation fee was twenty-five cents.1
The residents of Ringlingville shared joys and suffering like any family. When there was an accident or a death, it touched everyone in Ringlingville. While the show was in Athol, Massachusetts, on June 4, 1898, an employee’s son died.“The sad news of the death of little Georgie Conners, who passed away at 4 o’clock this morning, in the Springfield hospital, from appendicitis, fell like a pall over the entire show. … He was the only child of Mr. and Mr. George Connors, an unusually bright and lovable boy, who had grown into the affections of many of the members of the show. Many hearts ached with loving sympathy for the sorrowing parents in this, the dark hour of bereavement. … The following day the body was tenderly laid to rest in the cemetery at Springfield. Mrs. Al Ringling and Miss Ida Ringling attended the funeral obsequies.”2
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NOTES
1. Alf T. Ringling, The Circus Annual: A Route Book of Ringling Brothers, Season 1901 (Chicago: Central Printing and Engraving, 1901), p. 37.
2. Red Wagon: Route Book of The Ringing Bros. World’s Greatest Show, Season 1898 (Chicago: Central Printing and Engraving, 1898), p. 47.
After a series of acts, the 854 prisoners had a chance to see several elephants put through their paces. Alf T. wrote:
At its conclusion, the prisoners marched into the prison, the band leading and playing “Auld Lang Syne.” The air was taken up by the convicts and they sang with feeling almost indescribable. As they filed by the expression depicted on the long line of faces showed joy, excitement, pleasure and pain. Here and there a tear stained face betokened the mission of the players had not been in vain. On entering the corridors the men marched silently and took their places in front of their respective cells. The great gong sent out a deep detonation, the cell doors opened and each prisoner entered there to resume the dreary monotonous life of a convict.43
As the circus crisscrossed the country, the quality of the show lots varied considerably. In Huntington, West Virginia, the lot was covered with big sewer pipe, and the lot in Syracuse, New York, was a dumping ground filled with ashes, tin cans, “hoop skirts and a worn out washing machine.” As Alf T. reported, “The aroma rising from this odoriferous combination was unlike anything we have ever met before. The English tongue, comprehensive as it is, fails to find anything in its vast vocabulary that can begin to express what was wafted o’er the ‘dump.’”44
The weather remained an unpredictable factor in circus life as well. In 1898 the rains began in late summer and continued into November. Many of the show lots were in miserable condition, making everything about showing difficult and at times nearly impossible. The only bright spot was a five-day stand in New Orleans, where good crowds turned out. But even the New Orleans lot was far from ideal. On Thursday, November 17, upon returning from their parade in a heavy rain, the circus workers found the lot under water. They hauled in cinders, hay, and straw, placed planks in the menagerie tent, and built walks from the streetcar lines to the show lot. And people flocked to their performances. As Alf T. wrote, “It is said that our business surpassed that of any circus that has ever visited the city and this fact alone is a source of much satisfaction to the management.”45
For 1898 the Ringlings had planned their longest season yet—opening in St. Louis on April 11 and scheduled to close on December 8 in Kosciusko, Mississippi. But the weather caught up with them. They closed on November 28, canceling nine stands in Mississippi and Alabama. “Show closed and shipped to Baraboo, canceling … stands on account of mud, cold, rain, and conditions of lots and roads.”46 Even with the cancellations, the Brothers played two hundred stands for the season, including ten days in St. Louis. The John Robinson Show played 167 stands. Thus, with two shows, the Ringling Brothers offered 367 circus stands in 1898.
The Ringlings opened the 1899 season at Tattersall’s in Chicago and then went under canvas at Rockford, Illinois. Here the circus prepares for the parade before the Rockford shows. CHARLES S. KITTO CIRCUS COLLECTION, CWM
After the two shows closed in November, the staff sorted the equipment and shipped that belonging to Robinson back to Cincinnati. However, the Ringlings had been so impressed with some of the Robinson wagons that they bought four of them. These “cottage cages,” resembling fancy dwellings w
ith pitched roofs, dormers, bay windows, domes, and corner towers, were some of the most unusual circus cages ever built. The quaint wagons appeared in many of the Ringlings’ subsequent parades.47
The boys continued to expand winter quarters in Baraboo. On October 24, 1898, they paid $275 for another plot of land on the river immediately to the east of the land they acquired in 1897.48 They also bought the former Lavoo Hotel, which had been across from Stewart’s Lumber Yard, and began remodeling it for winter housing for workers.49
For the 1899 season, with the Barnum & Bailey show in Europe, the Ringlings had clear sailing. They seemed content to go on the road with their main show only, and the Robinson show went out of Cincinnati on its own that year.
The Ringlings returned to Tattersall’s in Chicago for their April 15 opening and then headed to St. Louis for a week’s stand under canvas. Special features for 1899 included three herds of elephants performing at the same time, in three rings, and John O’Brien’s horse act, which included sixty-one horses performing at once.
Even with occasional weather problems, crowds were huge as the show traveled through the West as far as Washington State, with stops along the way. Then it was back through Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, and Wisconsin (there was no show date in Baraboo). Always dependable Iowa was next with several dates, followed by Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma Territory, and the South, with three dates in New Orleans, including the closing on November 22. The Ringlings made 186 stands in 1899.
The year 1899 had been an old-fashioned, conservative year for the Ringling circus. Other than traveling to the Northwest, the Brothers tried few new things. Their good reputation and credit rating continued. The Martindale Mercantile Agency in New York (a kind of credit-rating agency of its day) received a request from the Strobridge Litho Company of Cincinnati concerning the Brothers’ ability to pay bills. The agency replied:
Referring to your request of August 12 that we obtain for you a report as to the responsibility of Ringling Bros. of Baraboo, Wisconsin, we beg to submit the following information which we have obtained from F. R. Bentley, the Attorney for this Agency in Baraboo:
The firm of Ringling Bros. is composed of five brothers, (Charles, Al, John, Alfred and Otto), … are known to be prompt in meeting their obligations. They have never failed, nor been sued, nor asked an extension. They have valuable real estate in their own name, unencumbered. They all own their own homes and have about $15,000 worth of other real estate. Their supposed total net worth real and personal, is $500,000. So far as known, they have no indebtedness, nor no judgments, or chattel mortgages.
The attorney concluded by stating that “these people are perfectly good in every respect.”50
At the end of 1899, Alf T. wrote, “It is scarcely necessary to dwell upon the great success of the Ringling Brothers’ show during the past season. Financially it has been three seasons, and as to its artistic and exhibitional achievements the comments of the press and public give the most forcible and convincing expression.”51
Ringlingville on the Road
Ringling employees picked up their mail at the Ringlingville post office—a circus wagon (shown here in 1915). PRINT COLLECTION, CWM
By 1895 Ringlingville on the road functioned like a sophisticated small city. It included sleeping and eating facilities, a huge livery, a blacksmith shop, a barbershop, a candy store, and even a post office. Ringlingville’s postmaster for many years was Jules Turnour, a clown in the circus. Because the circus’s routes were planned well ahead of time, circus employees’ families knew where to send mail. Upon arriving in a city each morning, Turnour hitched up a team and drove to the local post office, where he picked up the mail for the circus people.
Jules Turnour was both circus clown and Ringlingville postmaster for many years. PRINT COLLECTION, CWM
As Turnour wrote:
I know every performer by name, and I am the agent that brings joy or ache. Many eager hopes hang on those post-office trips of mine. The dashing bareback ladies and the daring trapeze performers look for letters that never come. Human nature is the same the world over, whether it is in the gilded palace or under the canvas of the big tent. I send away money orders for all the performers, and in this way I find out some of their secrets. The gruff strong man, whose giant muscles are the admiration of the crowd, sends part of his wages each week to his old mother in Germany; the bewildering little rider, who moves in a gay world of motion and color, has a sick husband, whom she supports. I become the friend and confidant of all of them, and it makes life richer and deeper and more worthwhile for me.1
By 1908 Ringlingville included a doctor, a chaplain, a veterinary surgeon, detectives, barbers, blacksmiths, and a storekeeper—everything one would expect to find in a small city. And as in many cities, the circus population was, as one writer noted, “a congress of nations.” In that year Ringling employees, both performers and workers, included 16 Japanese, 40 French, 10 Swiss, 30 Italians, 5 Portuguese, 4 Bohemians, 10 Austrians, 50 Russians, 65 Germans, 8 Belgians, 10 Scots, 8 Spaniards, 10 Poles, 4 Egyptians, 2 Singalese, 6 Cossacks, 12 Hungarians, 4 Burmese, 6 Welsh, 390 Americans, 460 Englishmen, and a hundred or so others of unknown origins. The writer concluded that Ringlingville on the road was “a Tower of Babel for tongues, a congress of religions, a gathering of clans and families.”2
Ringlingville on the road was a traveling city that boasted most of the services found in any rural village, including a barbershop, shown here circa 1890–1891. The Ringlings wanted all employees to be well groomed for the public. Note the razor strap and straight-edge razor in the barber’s hands. PRINT COLLECTION, CWM
The blacksmith shop was an essential service in Ringlingville on the road. PRINT COLLECTION, CWM
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NOTES
1. Jules Turnour (as told to Isaac. F. Marcosson), The Autobiography of a Clown (New York: Moffat, Yard, 1910), pp. 78–79.
2. Duluth (Minnesota) Herald, June 24, 1908.
The Brothers had been in the circus business a scant fifteen years and had achieved success beyond anyone’s imagination. Now they were about to enter a new century. Although they had seemed content to run a rather conservative circus in 1899, could they afford to do this indefinitely? The bigger question they faced was, What would be circus’s place in a rapidly changing society?
The introduction to the 1899 route book includes these words:
The circus of today is decidedly an institution of our own country and of our own time. It has grown up with us. Early in the nineteenth century it was small, like our country, and its marvelous growth has been measured only by the equally marvelous development of America.
Society needs amusement. Human nature craves entertainment. The nerves and subtle brain forces of man were not made to stand the physical and mental strain incidental to life’s struggle, without relaxation.
To be good, mankind must be happy. The sunshine of this world inspires hopes for a brighter day.
Amusement unfetters the mind from its environs and changes the dreary monotony of the factory’s spindles to the joyous song of the meadow lark; it removes the ball and chain with which man feels himself bound to his duties and lifts him above the cares of life. …
This is the mission of amusement, and the circus, with its innocent sights of joy for the children and its power to make all men and women children again for at least one day, comes the nearest of any form of amusement to fulfilling this mission.52
By the end of the century, the Ringling circus had clearly become a giant. Would it maintain its lead among competing circuses? And perhaps more important, could it compete with the many new entertainment opportunities, especially the moving picture?
Facing a New Century: 1900–1901
“The only circus in the world covering the entire continent in one season.”1
The new century opened with prosperity and optimism. William McKinley, who had taken office in 1897, continued as president of the United States. The
first automobiles appeared; baseball was growing in prominence; barbershop quartets harmonized in village bandstands, often preceding a performance by the local band. Moving pictures were becoming the rage.2
In 1900 the average worker earned about $13 for a sixty-hour workweek; school-teachers received $325 per year. The Montgomery Ward and Sears, Roebuck catalogs were read more than any other books, including the Bible.3 In a Baraboo newspaper an ad offered for rent a modern house with furnace, bathroom, cistern, well, and barn for $12 per month. A six-room home could be purchased for $1,500. W. M. Little, a Baraboo tailor, advertised: “For that cold feeling, wear an overcoat, one of the warm kind.” Another ad encouraged storekeepers to put in telephones. One could purchase a Blickensderfer typewriter at the Baraboo News office for $40. The Bank of Baraboo, where the Ringlings did much of their business, boasted that its capital was $50,000, and the South Side Cash Shoe Store bragged that it had “The Best shoes that tread the earth.”4
That year Alfred T. Ringling published Life Story of the Ringling Brothers, a colorful report of the beginnings of the Ringling circus. He was sometimes prone to exaggerate for the sake of a good story—but a great story it was. During the winter of 1899–1900 the Brothers took stock of their menagerie, and Otto ordered several animals. A January 1900 letter from the German animal dealer Hagenbeck’s read:
Enclosed I am sending you 2 photos of an alive walrus, which I have now since 2 years 5 months in my possession. It is a wonderful beast, now about 3 years old. It did weigh in June last year over 400 pounds, and I think, by the description my man gives me, that he has now at least 600 pounds. His tusks are about 2 inches long. It is a splendid trained animal, and I am sure it would be a wonderful success, if you had this animal in your show. The very lowest price for the animal is $5,000.00, delivered free to Hoboken, duty paid by me.5
