This poster is one of a handful that were produced in the 1920s and 30s to promote the great liberty horse trainer and performer Rudy Rudynoff (Rudy Gebhardt). Rudy Gebhardt was the son of a German acrobat and circus wardrobe mistress who grew up on various European...
This photograph was taken on the Milwaukee lakefront July 12, 1986. Greg Parkinson, seen here talking to Lou Jacobs, was executive director of the Circus World Museum at the time, and had just brought 75 circus wagons on a train pulled by a steam engine to Milwaukee...
Jessica Martin was a young tightrope artist in the 1920s whose skills and beauty were no doubt the reason the Sparks Circus commissioned his gorgeous one sheet about 1928. When Jessica graduated from high school in South Philadelphia in 1923, the “class...
This photo of Clyde and Harriet Beatty was taken in 1945 at the corner of Washington and Hill – the famed Los Angeles showgrounds that will hosted dozens of circuses from the 1890s until 1955. Clyde Beatty gave hundreds of performances at the lot at Washington...
This photograph of the Barnum & Bailey midway shows “Zip The Whatisit?” playing his violin. Zip is believed to have first started working for P.T. Barnum in 1857 – and continued to perform as a sideshow attraction until his death in 1926. The...
Snap Wyatt Sideshow Banners – Clyde Beatty Cole Bros. Circus This view of the 1961 Clyde Beatty Cole Bros. midway shows not only the big top in the distance, but also the bannerline painted by the best known of sideshow artists, David “Snap” Wyatt. Originally...
