Thursday, April 13, 2006

Cook Brothers Circus 1918 #1


"Serpentina" making the side show bally with Cook Brothers Wild Animal Circus and Wild West.
This show is completely new to me, I have heard of Cook & Cole Circus maybe this is the same.
On the back of each picture my dad stressed that this show moved overland (horses pulled the wagons from town to town).
As you can see this is an unusually nice looking show. All the people and even the spectators neat in appearance.

Posted by Buckles at 4/13/2006 06:46:00 AM

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

Six years ago a dealer in Binghamton, NY -- a guy who specializes in carousel horses -- auctioned off a Cook Bros baggage wagon that had been sitting in a barn somewhere for eighty years. It ended up selling for very little. The current owner is a carnival collector who has it in another barn in SC. I've been trying to buy it from him for several years now. When i talked with him, the NY dealer knew a bit about the show. I have some notes somewhere. I think maybe typhoid killed it as I recall.

13 April, 2006 12:13
Anonymous said...

Ben, where in South Carolina is the wagon. I'm in Orangeburg, near Columb ia.

13 April, 2006 13:44
Bob Cline said...

Hello gang,
Interesting that Ben mentioned having some notes. I scrounged around a bit today through some of my stuff and this is what I came up with.
The show was owned and managed by D. Clinton Cook. I believe they called New Jersey home as a lot of news pieces came out of the Trenton, NJ area.
It was a motorized show by 1919 and perhaps sooner, I don't know for sure, that spent tons of money on it's equipment. Mr. Cook has been interviewed in several newspapers and strongly felt that when the public saw the equipment's quality they would then be reassured they were about to see a good show as well.
They opened the 1919 season on April 24, in Trenton, NJ. as the Cook Bros. World's Greatest Show. On May 1st, their big cat handler, John Henry was killed by a lioness when he entered her cage to pet her cubs. She escaped into town and was naturally destroyed by the townsfolk. That happened in Woodbury, NJ.
The show advertised Forest bred Lions, Schools of Tigers and Pumas, Big Bear Actors, Educated ponies and a Wild West show. One performer, Frank Smith was a wonderful rope artist and finished his act by lassoing 4 horses and riders at the same time.
Viola Root displayed horsemanship and Parker Anderson was in charge of the ponies. They had trapeze artisits, the Human frog, as well as many horse turns. The advertisements show a cage act.
By 1920, the show was folding and the June 24, 1920 Indiana, Pennsylvania newspaper reports the show closed on Monday and disbanded in Mahaffey, but I can't figure out what state that is.
I haven't found any mention anywhere of exotic animals other than the big cats.
On another note, there was a gentleman in the Spartanburg /Greenville, SC area that was trying to sell a wagon from Circus World Park in Florida a couple years ago. I saw the photo a couple times and didn't recognize the wagon and it certainly wasn't a RBBB wagon.
Bob

13 April, 2006 14:14
24-HOUR-MAN said...

Bob, Did they mention if the Frog was from Wisconsin?(that's a private joke, a few years back there was a female contortionist who was introduced as "A Frog from Wisconsin")
There is a Mahaffey in Penn.

13 April, 2006 14:49
Anonymous said...

Mahaffey is about 2 miles north of Bethlehem,Pa.

13 April, 2006 17:44
Bob Cline said...

Thanks!
Bob

13 April, 2006 18:07
Anonymous said...

Guy who bought the wagon is in the general Columbia area. If I find some time I'll look for my Cook notes this weekend. I "think" they'd be on a floppy disk somewhere. Leaving Monday and won't be home again until late November but when I'm in Upstate NY I hope to have a chance to see the dealer when originally sold the Cook wagon. He's worked pretty hard to put together a history of the show. At that time (2000) he also had a bunch of equipment from a CT based two car show I'd never heard of. I was flush then and tried really hard to convince the smarter half of the household that I could fly to NY, buy a straight truck and bring everything home. She politely asked me where "home" might be if I did that? I'd still like a baggage wagon if I could sneak it into the garage under the cover of darkness.

13 April, 2006 20:46
Anonymous said...

Reading the comments about the Cook show. 1918 was the year that Influenza killed over 600,000 Americans. All shows went into quarters very early that year. I would think it had alot to do with how shows would do in the next few years, People where nervous to go out.
Pete Holmes

16 April, 2006 11:18
Anonymous said...

The Cook Bros. Circus owned by Clinton D. Cook was first out in 1917 as a 15 car railroad show. The show opened at Lambertville, N. J. April 21 then went across Pa., Ohio, Michigan, Ind., Ill., and closed Aug. 16 at Galena, Ill. The show closed suddenly due to bad business and was offered for sale at the winter quarters at Trenton, N. J. I do not have any comfirmed dates for 1918. The show was out in 1919 opening at Trenton. N. J. April 24 & 25, and Clinton D. Cook was listed as owner. The show made short jumps through New Jersey, Pa., and New York, then back to New Jersey, Del., and Maryland closing in mid-October. For the 1920 season it opened April 15 at Trenton, N.J. and then played through Pa. Closed at Mahaffey. Pa. in June.
FYI - There was also a Cook Bros. in 1929 that opened April 6 at Dakota City, Neb. In 1935 a show called Atterbury Bros. Circus changed the title to Cook Bros. to avoid some heat. An elephant ran killing a young girl on June 6 and the show changed the title to Cook Bros. Circus as a few August dates in South Dakota note this title.
I think that the dealer in Binghamton, N.Y. has some of the material from the Hoffman Circus that was out of Bridgeport, Conn. He was selling a ticket box and some other items on ebay about a year ago. I was fortunate to pick up the records of the Hoffman Circus, and the other shows that it was involved with. Presented a paper on the Price & James Circus of 1897 at the CHS in Nyack, N.Y.
John Polacsek

17 April, 2006 17:29
Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
01 August, 2010 09:23
Unknown said...

D. Clinton Cook was my grandfather. He owned an ice business (alter ice cream business) in Trenton, NJ, and I've been told he purchased the circus for "fun". I have pictures of it, and also pix of Buffalo Bill Cody and Annie Oakley, who I was told performed there. I also grew up with the nightly adventure of having to pass under a head and skin of a lioness that my mother said belonged to a circus lion who had been killed after she killed her trainer! I don't know how much of my memories are true, but thought I'd add what I could. I also would love to find other stories of this man and his circus. Kathryn

02 August, 2010 11:54
rod blair said...

My Grandfather was in that show as a bronco buster I have his travel trunk and some pictures from that era (1914)

28 September, 2012 14:28
Unknown said...

to Rod, I would love to see those pictures. I too have some from the show, but don't know names, etc. My grandfather, D. Clinton Cook, supposedly bought this circus for "fun". I think he did it for love of the circus

Kathy Stewart

28 September, 2012 22:54
R Long said...

I recently came into possession of a travel chest that my father (who passed away 30 years) ago had received from his father . Apparently it belonged to one of his siblings, Harry Lareno Long who was a "Showman with the Cook Brothers Circus: when he was 25 and I'm told he was a contortionist. I would love to know more.....

R. Long

28 May, 2018 23:06
Unknown said...

I wish I knew more about your grandfather. My grandfather, Dewitt Barker Cook, bought this circus in the 1910-15 era, and ran it locally in Trenton, NJ for several years. I have pictures, but no names, except for Wild Bill Hickcock and wish I knew more!!!

14 August, 2018 14:51
Unknown said...

oops - my grandfather's name was DeWitt Clinton Cook! Sorry!

14 August, 2018 14:52

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