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American
Circus (1793-1993)
For
two centuries the
circus has been
one of the most
popular forms of
entertainment in
America. Riding
on its coattails
was the sideshow-often
referred to as
the black sheep
of this American
entertainment family.
In the following
paragraphs we will
explore this uneasy
relationship.
The first circus performance, held
April 3, 1793 in Philadelphia,
PA, was nothing like the three-ring
extravaganza we witness today.
The circus street parades took
place in 1797, the big top arrived
in 1825 and by1880 the full-blown
railroad show was touring the United
States. Housed in a wooden structure
called the circus, the performance
was presented by John Bill Rickette,
and billed as an equestrian event.
Rickette's troupe toured the United
States until the early 1800s when
they departed for England. By then,
all the major shows were traveling
by rail and holding their performances
in huge big tops. They supplemented
the main show with museums, sideshows,
and displayed menageries and parades
on a daily basis. Massive ad campaigns
were conducted to support their
daily movement.
"Circus Day was an entrenched
concept in the minds of
a populace which viewed
it as the premier form
of entertainment which
visited from the outside
world."-- Fred Dahlinger
Jr., Circus World Museum.
It is thought that the sideshow
was born around 1840 when individual
acts, which make up the sideshow,
were grouped together under one
tent. It was around 1691 that Prince
Giolo, a tattooed Polynesian slave,
was brought to London to be exhibited
as a curiosity . Before this time,
midgets, tattooed people, sword
swallowers and other attractions
of this nature were exhibited singly
in pubs, theaters and the like.
A typical sideshow cast is featured
in the photograph above. This cast
includes Paul Rogers and his future
wife, Helen Rea.
James O' Connel may have been the
first tattooed man to be exhibited
in the United States in the mid
1930s. Shipwrecked around 1829
in Micronesia and tattooed by friendly
natives, O'Connel was married off
to one of the chief's daughters.
He returned to America on board
the New England trading brig, the
Spy, in 1833 where he began a circus
career that lasted twenty years.
Forty years or so later, Irene "La
Belle" Woodward, an American tattooed
woman, arrived on the scene. In
1882 a notice in the New York Clipper
listed her as "the first and only
tattooed lady." It is thought that
James O'Reilly and Charles Wagner
tattooed her. After working for
a number of years as an attraction,
she died in 1915 in Philadelphia.
She was 53 years old. These pioneers
paved the way for tattoo attractions
for decades that followed!
Tattoo Archive © 2003
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