Great Books

A century ago, daily life ground to a halt when the circus rolled into town. Across America, banks closed, schools canceled classes, farmers left their fields, and factories shut down so that everyone could go to the show. In this entertaining and provocative book, Janet Davis links the flowering of the early-twentieth-century American railroad circus to such broader historical developments as the rise of big business, the breakdown of separate spheres for men and women, and the genesis of the United States' overseas empire. In the process, she casts the circus as a powerful force in consolidating the nation's identity as a modern industrial society and world power. Davis explores the multiple "shows" that took place under the big top, from scripted performances to exhibitions of laborers assembling and tearing down tents to impromptu spectacles of audiences brawling, acrobats falling, and animals rampaging. Turning Victorian notions of gender, race, and nationhood topsy-turvy, the circus brought its vision of a rapidly changing world to spectators--rural as well as urban--across the nation. Even today, Davis contends, the influence of the circus continues to resonate in popular representations of gender, race, and the wider world.

The lure of the circus that tempts every child has always seemed a world of never-ending fun. But Women of Illusion is a circus tale like none you've ever heard. Seldom do you come across insiders who have left the circus and are willing to tell their stories; Women of Illusion presents just such a tale. Based on hundreds of hours of interviews with Betty Huber, the eighty-year-old matriarch of the Cirkus Brumbach, and painstaking research into the history and culture of the circus, Donnalee Frega narrates a fascinating story of one circus family, the Hubers. Just as the circus audience only sees the glitter and the smiles, the Huber family only exhibits a proud face. But there is a surprising reality underneath, covered by the perpetual re-creation of self and the manipulation of identity. Frega untangles these layers and guides us through the glamour and the adventures, but also reveals what no ticket-buyer ever sees: a hard life punctuated by wandering, violence, and disaster, sometimes fatal. Drawing insightful conclusions on performance, identity, and image, Women of Illusion offers us a rare insight into a unique cultural sphere.

In April 1884, Ben Wallace, the owner of the local livery, opened the season of his new circus in Peru and billed it as Wallace and Company’s Great World’s Menagerie and International Circus. It was an instant success and soon grew to be one of the largest and most renowned circuses in American history. Over the next 50 years, many circuses found a home in Peru. Under the direction of the American Circus Corporation, an industry was created in Peru that employed as many as 4,500 people. Circuses like the Hagenbeck-Wallace, John Robinson, and Sells-Floto/Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show departed Peru by rail each spring, along with some of the best acts from around the world, including Terrell “the Lion King” Jacobs; the world’s favorite clown, Emmett Kelly; and animal trainer Clyde Beatty, who played himself in 12 Hollywood movies. In 1929, Ringling Brothers purchased the American Circus Corporation. As the country sank into the Depression, fewer circuses left Peru each season. In 1941, Ringling Brothers closed its winter quarters in Peru, ending an era.