Emmett Leo Kelly was an American circus performer, who created the clown character "Weary Willie", based on the hobos of the Great Depression in the 1930s.
The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, also known as the Ringling Bros. Circus, Ringling Bros., the Barnum & Bailey Circus, Barnum & Bailey, or simply Ringling, is an American traveling circus company billed as The Greatest Show on Earth. It and its predecessor have run shows from 1871, with a hiatus from 2017 to 2023. They operate as Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey. The circus started in 1919 when the Barnum & Bailey's Greatest Show on Earth, a circus created by P. T. Barnum and James Anthony Bailey, was merged with the Ringling Bros. World's Greatest Shows. The Ringling brothers purchased Barnum & Bailey Ltd. in 1907 following Bailey's death in 1906, but ran the circuses separately until they were merged in 1919.
Jane Barnell was an American bearded lady who worked in circus sideshows, dime museums and carnivals, who used various stage names including Princess Olga, Madame Olga and Lady Olga. In her only film role in Tod Browning's cult classic Freaks, using the sideshow stage name Olga Roderick, she was billed as the "Bearded Lady".
The Doll Family was an American quartet of sibling entertainers with dwarfism from Stolpen, Germany. They were popular performers in circuses and sideshows in the United States from the mid-1910s until their retirement in 1958. The family members—Gracie, Harry, Daisy and Tiny—also appeared briefly in films; they were best known as members of The Munchkins in the 1939 MGM film The Wizard of Oz.
James Lindsay Almond Jr. was an American lawyer, state and federal judge and Democratic party politician. His political offices included as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Virginia's 6th congressional district (1946–1948), 26th Attorney General of Virginia (1948–1957) and the 58th Governor of Virginia (1958–1962). As a member of the Byrd Organization, Almond initially supported massive resistance to the integration of public schools following the United States Supreme Court decisions in Brown v. Board of Education, but when Virginia and federal courts ruled segregation unconstitutional, Almond worked with the legislature to end massive resistance.
John Nicholas Ringling was an American entrepreneur who is the best known of the seven Ringling brothers, five of whom merged the Barnum & Bailey Circus with their own Ringling Bros. World's Greatest Shows to create a virtual monopoly of traveling circuses and helped shape the modern circus. In addition to owning and managing many of the largest circuses in the United States, he was also a rancher, a real estate developer and art collector. He was inducted into the Florida Artists Hall of Fame in 1987.
Fred G. Johnson was a prolific sideshow banner artist whose career spanned 65 years. His banner paintings were displayed at the Chicago World's Fair of 1933, called A Century of Progress, and by circuses such as Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey, and Clyde Beatty. He has been called the "Picasso" of circus art.
The Sells Floto Circus was a combination of the Floto Dog & Pony Show and the Sells Brothers Circus that toured with sideshow acts in the United States and Canada during the early 1900s.
Gertrude Ada Davies Lintz was an English-American dog breeder and socialite known for keeping exotic animals, including chimpanzees and gorillas, in her Brooklyn home. Her gorilla Buddy was sold to a circus and renamed Gargantua. Her gorilla Massa was sold to the Philadelphia Zoo, eventually becoming the longest-living documented gorilla. Her 1942 memoir Animals Are My Hobby inspired the 1997 American film Buddy. Lintz was played by Rene Russo in the film.
The Ringling brothers were five American siblings who transformed their small touring company of performers into one of the largest circuses in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Four brothers were born in McGregor, Iowa: Alfred T., Charles, John and Henry William, and the family lived in McGregor for twelve years, from 1860 until 1872. The Ringling family then moved to Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, and finally settled in Baraboo, Wisconsin, in 1875. They were of German and French descent, the children of harness maker Heinrich Friedrich August Ringling (1826–1898) of Hanover, and Marie Salome Juliar (1833–1907) of Ostheim, in Alsace. While there were seven Ringling brothers, Alfred, Charles, John, Al and Otto Ringling were the main brothers in charge of the circus shows. All of the brothers were Freemasons. In 1919, they merged their Ringling Brothers Circus with America's other leading circus troupe, Barnum and Bailey, ultimately creating the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, which has operated continuously since except for a hiatus from 2017 to 2022.
Samuel Lockhart (1851–1933) was a famous Victorian elephant trainer and the second child of the famous Lockhart circus family. His work with elephants took him all over the UK, including Royal command performances in front of Queen Victoria, Europe and in the USA, where he worked for the famous Ringling Brothers Circus from 1896 to 1901. He has appeared in several historical books on the circus, including one children's book completely dedicated to him, and the English town of Leamington Spa has several areas named after his most famous group of elephants "The Three Graces".
Feld Entertainment Inc. is an American live show production company which owns a number of traveling shows. The company began with the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus before expanding into additional live events, including Disney on Ice, Monster Jam, Monster Energy AMA Supercross and Sesame Street Live. The company is family-owned.
Al G. Barnes Circus was an American circus run by Alpheus George Barnes Stonehouse that operated from 1898 to 1938.
A freak show is an exhibition of biological rarities, referred to in popular culture as "freaks of nature". Typical features would be physically unusual humans, such as those uncommonly large or small, those with intersex variations, those with extraordinary diseases and conditions, and others with performances expected to be shocking to viewers. Heavily tattooed or pierced people have sometimes been seen in freak shows, as have attention-getting physical performers such as fire-eating and sword-swallowing acts.
Harry Lewiston was an American showman, freak show director, and barker. He wrote his memoirs under his stage name, published posthumously in 1968 as Freak Show Man: the Autobiography of Harry Lewiston, as told to Jerry Holtman.
Clarence Chesterfield Howerton, also known as Major Mite, was an American circus performer who starred in the sideshow for over 25 years, 20 of which were with the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. He was 2 ft 4 in (0.71 m) tall and performed with several groups from the early 1920s through the late 1940s, billed as the smallest man in the world. His small physique was often contrasted alongside larger circus sideshow acts, such as the juvenile obese and the excessively tall.
Muse is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:
Tattooed ladies were working class women who acquired tattoos and performed in circuses, sideshows, and dime show museums as means for earning a substantial living. At the height of their popularity during the turn of the 20th century, tattooed ladies transgressed Victorian gender norms by showcasing their bodies in scantily clad clothing and earned a salary considerably larger than their male counterparts. Tattooed ladies often used captivity narratives as a means for excusing their appearance, and to tantalize the audience. The popularity of tattooed ladies waned with the onset of television.
Beth Macy is an American journalist and non-fiction writer. She is the author of four published books, including national bestsellers Factory Man (2014) and Dopesick (2018).
Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America is a 2018 non-fiction book by American author Beth Macy. The book covers the origin and evolution of the opioid epidemic in the United States beginning primarily with the 1996 release of the drug OxyContin, and examines its effects on small town America and the Appalachian region in particular. It was well received by critics and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Science and Technology. In 2021, the book was adapted into a Hulu miniseries starring Michael Keaton.
