Freaks in Circuses — The Attraction of Monstrosities

1910

FREAKS IN CIRCUSES

People Are Strangely Fascinated by the Monstrosities

When the "Domesticated Gorilla" Got the Show Into Trouble — Hot Water Spoils a "Mermaid" to Uncover Fake

London — It seems strange that freaks, from the legless wonder to the two-headed calf, should possess such a strange fascination for nine people out of ten, yet this is undoubtedly the case.

Of course, there are many so-called freaks which have no business to be called by such an unpleasant name, for if one argues from the dictionary a freak is a monstrosity, and a monstrosity, in the generally accepted sense of the word, is something horrible. The giant and the dwarf are interesting and unusual, but certainly should not be called "freaks."

Hunchbacks were an exception to the rule, for all kinds of powers were attributed to them. There are some very sensitive people to whom the sight of anything in the nature of a monstrosity is absolute pain, and women are fortunately few and far between who fall in love with a monster because of his monstrosity, as in the case of Victor Hugo's "L'homme qui Rit."

The ordinary individual comes across very few physical freaks, and one cannot but wonder whence the showman's rank and file are recruited. Perhaps, if the truth were known, more than half of the show freaks are "fakes." There are many good stories told of these sham freaks, who, owing to some contretemps, have "given the show away." The two following are good examples:

Among the freaks of a certain show was a "domesticated gorilla," to quote the handbills, and he proved one of the finest draws the show had ever had. After the performance no one could have recognized the gorilla, as he then took the shape of a very quiet, ordinary little man. The public particularly enjoyed seeing the gorilla swing from the horizontal bar by his tail, an appendage which is very slightly developed in the species as a rule.

This tail was a masterpiece of ingenuity. It was made of flexible steel, and so contrived that when it took a turn around anything it locked into position until it was released by the gorilla touching a spring concealed somewhere near his waist. The thing worked splendidly for a long time, until one day the gorilla put his tail through the bars of his cage, and a lady standing by took hold of it. Well, the tail acted automatically, as usual, and of course when she felt it tighten around her wrist the lady screamed. The gorilla pressed the hidden spring to no purpose. To make a long story short, the men standing by came to the lady's rescue, took hold of the tail and pulled it off. When the people saw the leather fastenings and buckles they "cleaned out the establishment."

The second story concerns a mermaid. She was no ordinary mermaid, but a "really high-class article," a very handsome young woman encased from the waist down in blue and gold fishskin. The water in which she smoked, and sang, and sat on a rock combing her hair was kept tepid so as not to give her a chill, and this was what gave her enemies — the beautiful Circassian girl and the dwarf — a chance to injure her.

They were jealous because she attracted more attention than they did, so they hatched a plot, which the dwarf carried out successfully. One day he pretended to be ill, and got a day off, and just before the mermaid's performance he hid himself in the boiler-room. After the man had been down to see that there was not too big a fire, the dwarf set to and stoked for all he was worth.

The mermaid soon felt that something was wrong, but she stood it as long as she could. At last, however, she had to choose between being boiled or giving the thing away, and naturally she preferred the latter alternative; but, as the showman put it, the public said things that were "very discouraging" and the show had to move on.

An Old Man's Leap to Death — A Thrilling Suicide

1878

An Old Man's Leap to Death

A thrilling suicide took place one forenoon recently at St. Louis, an unhappy mortal leaping from the railing of the great bridge to the water, 110 feet below, meeting instant death.

A few moments previous to the occurrence the man started across from the eastern shore, leaving a letter in the hands of the ticket-seller on the other side addressed to a friend in East St. Louis, in which he deplored the circumstances which led to the suicide, and gave directions to be made of the few effects he left behind.

After leaving the ticket office on the other side, he pursued his way to the center span of the bridge, and one of the watchmen on the bridge saw him looking down into the swift current below with an abstracted air, as though undecided what course to pursue. But the watchman, never dreaming that he contemplated suicide, paid no special attention to him. Suddenly he divested himself of his outer apparel, coat and vest, and hastily climbing over the railing, he cast one imploring look upward, his lips moving as if in prayer, and then made the fatal leap into eternity.

Before the watchman, who was hastening toward him, could do anything to prevent the terrible fate that awaited the poor fellow, his body, as he made the frightful leap, was seen shooting through the air, and finally it was lost to sight beneath the muddy waters. One of the ferry-boats was crossing at the time, and the pilot took the boat near to the post where the man had alighted, but the body had sunk from view.

The bridge watchman found the coat and vest of the suicide near the spot from which he jumped, and took them, together with a pine stick which the suicide had carried, to the Third district station, where, upon examining the pockets, a letter was found addressed to Nixon or Dixon, the initials torn off, by M. O. Brown, dealer in tobacco and cigars, at Pleasant Hills, Illinois.

A few hours after the tragic act, the body was found 400 yards below the bridge. It was then ascertained that the suicide was an old man sixty years of age, named George Hickson, who has lived some time in East St. Louis, and that he had resolved upon self-destruction on account of a domestic difficulty with his son-in-law, John Girard. Hickson traveled with Barnum's circus a long time, exhibiting his son, a noted dwarf.

Dwarf Darnell Flim-Flams Little Blind Girl

Atlanta, 1902

MONROE DARNELL, MIDGET, FLIM-FLAMS BLIND GIRL

The climax of eccentricities in flim-flamming was reached yesterday, when a little dwarf was caught trying to flim-flam a blind girl out of 10 cents.

Monroe Darnell, the well-known midget, was the flim-flammer, and his victim was a little blind girl who stands at the street corners patiently waiting for good-hearted people to drop money into a tin cup which she holds in her hand.

Darnell tried to swipe a 10-cent piece which he saw in the cup, and in its stead placed a copper.

The police are constantly meeting up with flim-flam games and new ones are always coming to light. It takes novelty to make a flim-flam go, and the crooks are ever trying to invent some new scheme by which they can get hold of coin without working for it. But it took Dwarf Darnell to present the most unique flim-flam that has come before the police in many a day.

Yesterday the little blind girl was standing at the corner of Decatur and Ivy streets. Some one had dropped a 10-cent silver coin into her tin cup. Across the street Monroe Darnell, who is himself no slouch when it comes to begging money, was standing, and when he saw a coin fall into the blind girl's cup he strolled over her way and peered into the receptacle. Having ascertained that the coin was a dime, he took a 1-cent piece from his pocket, and squinting his eyes around to see if he was unobserved, he quickly swiped the dime from the cup and left the copper in its place. He might have swiped the dime and left nothing in its place, but his leaving the copper showed that his conscience was not entirely dead.

He was not unobserved, however, for a citizen saw the flim-flam and reported the matter to an officer. Darnell was caught with the dime in his hand. He admitted having exchanged a copper for it, but stoutly maintained that he did not mean to steal it.

"Now, look here," said he in his squeaky voice, "yer all knows how I like a joke. All the boys will tell yer that poor little Monroe is always full of his fun. I just meant to play a joke on the blind girl, seeing as how she couldn't see. Then I meant to teach her a lesson about being too careless with her money. I was just going to say to her: 'Baby mine, I have slipped away your dime and put a copper in its place. You mustn't leave your money in your cup so long. You must take it out as fast as you hear it drop, or some fine day a sure enough rogue will swipe your money, and he won't be as honest as poor little Monroe.' You see, I make my money by the same sort of hard licks as the blind girl, and I want her to learn how to take better care of the stuff."

The dwarf was made to restore the dime, and he generously let her also have his copper. If he had not been caught, however, the flim-flam would have been a very serious joke to the little blind girl.

–The Atlanta Constitution, Atlanta, Nov. 23, 1902, p. 5.