A Mudshow Season

Enlarge

Hard to believe the show has been open for a week now. Today Longview, tomorrow New Boston, we end the weekend in Pittsburg. That's TX, y'all.

Enlarge

Today Paris, TX, the closest we come to being back home until late autumn. Weather forecast is ominous with a possibility of severe storms in the late afternoon. Working on a circus can be harsh. Some people have said that a circus is like an old sailing ship. It takes discipline because with all that canvas aloft you are literally at the mercy of the winds. Hard work, little sleep, especially early in the season some people decide the romance of the show isn’t what they thought it would be and they walk away. It’s called blowing the show. A couple workers blew the show after last weekend. With stormy weather threatening for the next few days the tent crew doesn’t get a break. Imagine, we’ve been fighting the weather for 70 years. There are days you’re glad that nobody keeps score.

Enlarge

Sometimes rain, and rumors of rain keep people at home,
indoors, even if the first showers don't arrive until
it's time to strike the tent. So it was in Hubbard on
Monday. On Tuesday (Gun Barrel City) two circuses
were playing only a handful of miles apart. That
happens some years when Carson & Barnes, the Kelly
Miller Circus, and the Culpepper-Merriweather Circus all
decamp Hugo around the same time. Soon enough things
sort themselves out. Kelly-Miller heads north and
east, while Culpepper rushes west to make California
before the really warm weather heats up the Central
Valley. Routing a circus is an imperfect science. As
long as there have been tent shows there have been
opposition difficulties when too many circuses are
competing for the same audience in the same town or
region. While some circuses play the same routes and
same towns every year, others are always on the lookout
for greener pastures. There have been seasons when
seven or more shows have squeezed into New England at
the same time, with only the "regulars" playing their
historic routes making any money. Other years the
contested ground could be in California, or in
Michigan. In Texas the Hugo shows aren't really in
conflict, but a few weeks each spring there just isn't
room enough for this much circus. It's great for fans
though. How often can you theoretically see three
circuses in three days? If you love the bigtop there's
no such thing as too many clowns.

Ben

Enlarge

Arlington, TX March 24-26 proved to be a strong date for opening the 2006 circus season. With sell-out shows on Saturday, Sunday’s three scheduled performances just weren’t enough. A fourth performance was added for 9:30 on Sunday. Adding shows is great news at the box office. It’s a bit tougher on performers, who are already tired, and for a new ringmaster whose voice is his livelihood. Circus folks aren’t called "troupers" for nothing. Everybody pulled together giving Arlington a circus weekend they will long remember. Hours after the rest of the show had gone to bed, the tent crew was still hard at work stowing away the seats and pulling down the bigtop. It was the wee hours of Monday morning before their work was done, and at 5:00 AM everybody was up and ready to move from yesterday’s town to today’s town to do it all over again. Today’s town, tomorrow’s town, yesterday’s town, if you’re confused by the vernacular, welcome to the circus. Playing in 200 or more communities every year, it isn’t that LaPlace, LA or Kokomo, IN look the same or that circus folk can’t tell them apart. We all have our favorite places, and yes we know their names. The circus isn’t just about those magical hours under the bigtop when we show off our talents and our spangles. The circus is a daily logistical battle moving entire community from yesterday to today and setting it up and tearing it down again. Years ago when troupers often marched all night down mud tracks following the fence rails for miles and miles between this hamlet and that it became apparent that all towns are destinations, whether you remember them by name, or remember them only by geography. Frequently we connect places to the people we meet. So Kokomo become's Sue Ellen's town, the nice woman who ran the coin operated laundry, and LaPlace is Carl's town, the great guy who served as Circus Chairman for the hosting organization. We like to say that circus is about family. We aren't being pithy. It's true. Our families and yours, we're in this together. We could just as accurately say that circus is about friendships. The friendships we made yesterday, or today, or will make tomorrow. The friendships that you may have made arriving at the lot early enough to watch the workingmen raise the tent, and then sticking around late enough to see it all get packed away again. So we may not recall the name of the town, but we remember the Wal-Mart down the street from the fairgrounds, and we remember you and we remember your name. And you may not remember the name of a particular performer, but you remember the circus and you remember the nice lady who sold you a ticket and suggested the very best place to sit to get up close to the elephants. Yesterday's town was Hubbard, TX. Today's town in Gun Barrel City. I know tomorrow's town too, but then I'd be getting ahead of myself.

Ben

Enlarge

It seems only appropriate to say a liitle more about Hugo, OK. Why? Because Hugo, a tiny town with less than 7,000 people may be America's greatest circus city. What's a circus city? It's a place that circuses call home. In the early years of the American circus the east side of the Hudson river in New York and nearby CT saw the rise of the first circus towns. Somers, NY is sometimes called the Cradle of the America Circus. Over a fifty year period beginning around 1820 dozens of circuses were framed by the "Flatfoot" circus syndicate based in Somers. Aaron Turner created the first circus "bigtop" there, and P.T. Barnum was a ticket seller on the Turner show. Later circus towns moved west with the frontier. Girard, PA on the shores of Lake Erie was home to at least four shows, including the Dan Rice Circus. In his day Dan Rice was the most famous entertainer in the U.S. Ohio was home to the famous John Robinson Circus, a title that toured for over 100 years, and to the Sells Bros Circus, and later to the Mills Bros Circus. By 1870 Delevan, WI could challenge Somers as the center of the circus world. Baraboo was home to the Ringling show. Bridgeport, CT home to the Barnum enterprise. Early in the 20th Century Peru, IN emerged as the greatest circus center of them all. The Great Wallace Circus, the Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus, and later the five big circuses that made up the American Circus Corp all called Indiana home. By the 1930's more and more circuses found that warm winter climates were a big advantage in the off-season. It costs a small fortune to heat an elephant barn in Wisconsin. Beginning with Ringling the Gulf Coast of Florida became a hub for circuses. But not every circus headed for the Sunshine State. The Miller family originally wintered their circus in Arkansas, until a local community leader invited the show to stay in Hugo, OK. Since the 1940's Hugo has seen a dozen circuses depart from Oklahoma every spring. Some of those titles are nearly forgotten, but in 2006 Hugo is still the home to four major tented circuses. Circus Chimera, The Culpepper Merriweather Circus, Kelly-Miller, and the biggest traditional show of them all, our own Carson & Barnes Circus. Choctaw County isn't just famous for circuses, it's a recreational wonderland, a quiet place just a few hours away from the hustle of the big cities of OK, and TX. We're thrilled when you see us in the circus. We're delighted when you visit our hometown. Ben

Enlarge

Some days just make for perfect circus days. Like Saturday in Arlington, TX when the weather was warm, and families crowded the circus grounds for all three shows. It's families who make circus worthwhile. On the other hand when you're the ringmaster, after eight shows in three days, by Monday it's time for some hot tea with honey and lemon. There are no days off in the circus and keeping your voice is very important.

Enlarge

The 2006 edition of the Carson & Barnes Circus opened in Arlington, TX, on the left side of Dallas on March 24th. It may still feel like winter in the northern states, but when mudshows, traditional tented circuses begin their season you can be sure that Spring and Summer will indeed arrive; and that nobody working under the bigtop will rest again before November.

Ben

Enlarge

Obert Miller began training ponies and dogs for the circus, family pets, way back in the 1920's. In 1937 he and his sons Kelly and D.R.. founded the Al G Kelly & Miller Bros Circus. The wonderful pictures from the Buckles Woodcock Collection document many of the early years. In the 1960's that show was merged with the original Carson circus to become today's Carson & Barnes. Barbara Miller Byrd, D.R. Miller's daughter was born into the circus world. Her own daughters, and now her grandchildren are on the show.

Ben

Enlarge

For eight months of the year the circus is a city moving each day from town to town. In winter Carson & Barnes Circus returns home to our own small town of Hugo, OK -- where everyone, elephants included settle back into village life, recharging, rethinking, reinventing the biggest tented show in the world for another season.

Ben

Enlarge

Sometime before May 1st, 2006 Aaron Broderick the 21 year old Ringmaster for the Carson & Barnes Circus will begin sharing stories from this, his first year on the show. "First of May" is an old circus term for a trouper beginning his or her initial mudshow summer. In the old days, by May 1st the roads were dry and the wagon shows could begin their annual campaign. Carson & Barnes is beginning its 70th Season.

B.E.Trumble