Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Lewis Bros. Circus 1934 #1


Mr. Ilfield, here are a couple of pictures of your family's show, similar to yours, from my collection. "Alice" was imported by the Sparks Circus in 1922, ten years later this show (now owned by Ringling) was taken off the road and the elephants absorbed into the Ringling herd.
This picture taken in 1934 and was "Alice" first season with Lewis Bros. having been purchased from the Ringling show the previous winter and died when the truck she was riding in was struck by a train at Conneaut, Ohio 6/15/41. I have always been of the opinion that this was the only elephant the show ever owned but several people have claimed otherwise.
Do you still have the photo of you riding the second elephant? Or might your mother remember her name? If she remained with the family as late as 1949 she might be identified.
Thanks very much for your information.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Jack Mills was a banner man on Lewis Bros just prior to taking out Mills bros. It is my understanding that Paul Lewis was the first guy to use Phones [boiler rooms] on a regular basis with a one day stand tent show and certainly Jack Mills would enhance on that and it would be the main reason for the great success of Mills Bros. Later alot of shows would get i9n the act. Especially Floyd King. I believe that they had asingle O private elephant act at one time along with the show o0wned elephant. look in your files Buckles.

Ryan Easley said...

The news article documenting the truck v. train wreck states 49 year old Jumbo Lou, 3 year old Two-Ton Tony and Paul Miller all died in the wreck. Could this be the second elephant referred?