Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Al G. Barnes Circus 1935 #6



Now on the lot in Alhambra, elephants still in harness are watered while the water wagon driver takes a nap.
Seems an odd place to mount the spigot Posted by Picasa

Posted by Buckles at 12/12/2006 05:57:00 AM

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is this the Alhambra in Illinois?

12 December, 2006 08:37
Buckles said...

California.

12 December, 2006 08:52
Anonymous said...

Can anybody ID the year / make of that truck?

12 December, 2006 11:10
Anonymous said...

The way the guy is holding that cigarette in his left hand it has to be wntrqtrs as he is holding roll your own Bull Durham and they would pass makins out in qtrs. along with maybe two bucks a week.Thats the way you hold a roll your own. Bull Durhan wasn't bad, but Dukes Mixture was terrible.

12 December, 2006 15:28
Anonymous said...

Buckles,

I am currently a resident of Alhambra, CA 91803. Please don't tell anybody, as I may owe a few people on this list a little doe-ray-mee!.

12 December, 2006 15:29
Anonymous said...

I take that back about wtqtrs. I see flags on the poles.

12 December, 2006 15:30
Anonymous said...

The truck has to be a Mack.

12 December, 2006 17:35
Anonymous said...

I bought a machine to roll cigaretts once. Sure beat twisting the ends by hand. I also remember the days when the circus crew got $2 and tabacco, meals and a cot. Winter was great as they drew unemployment and lived high on the hog. I remember standing in the unemployment line in Hugo in the winter. Everyone did the same thing to sign up as soon as the show closed.

13 December, 2006 11:16
Anonymous said...

To J Goodall: Right you are. Its a Bulldog Mack, since its cab resembled the face of the dog. It was the Mack boys' third truck model, the Mack AC, rolling off the line in 1915. You sent me looking, and an exquisitely detailed article by Bill Rhodes appears in the May-June, 1988, BANDWAGON, titled "Ringling-Barnum Bulldogs."

13 December, 2006 12:43
Anonymous said...

Off the subject of Macks, but:

The Unemployment people in Florida hated it when the shows came in. We all lined up after that 1980 Beatty-Cole Winter Tour. It was almost as if we had agreed on a standard line. They'd ask couldn't we learn another kind of work, and we'd all say, "Good God, lady, it took me 20 years to learn THIS!"

13 December, 2006 12:57
Anonymous said...

Steve Flint sent this information to me regarding the Mack truck. Ifound it interesting and hope you do.

John, I read your comment concerning the Mack truck on Buckles' blog site yesterday. If my notes are correct the truck is a 1927 model AC4 used on the Barnes show (numbered 1) until 1939 when it was absorbed into the RBBB fleet of trucks and assigned #125. The 4 cylinder gasoline engine was replaced with the Cummins diesel in 1942. In 1943 and 1944 it was stored in Sarasota winterquarters. In 1944 the original redwood tank was replaced with a steel tank (diamond plate) and re-numbered #231. It was used on the show up until 1951 when it was retired and replaced by a new model Mack LJ #234.

Thanks, Steve. I am sharing this with Buckles readers.

13 December, 2006 13:38
Anonymous said...

I have days when friends tell me I look like I have been ran over by a MACK truck.

13 December, 2006 16:32
Anonymous said...

This blog sparks me to some digging I might not have thought to do. Another article, brief but filled with facts, is "Tractors and Trucks on Circuses", by historian Fred D. Pfening, Jr., appears on page 16 of the January-February, 1965, issue of BANDWAGON. Fred chronicles the old Knox tractors and our present subject of the old Bulldog Macks, known for their tough durability facing extreme lot conditions.

14 December, 2006 00:30
Anonymous said...

great notes by John Goodall & co.

14 December, 2006 08:13

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