 Shorty Shearer’s Gorilla, Jon Pierre From Richard Reynolds: Prompted by Harry Kingston, I started plowing through my mass of gorilla-related files. Lo and behold I came up with following item from Amusement Business for June 7, 1969. Here is Shorty Shearer in front of his handsome ape show. “The new [1969] African Safari ape show debuted in Texas on the Carson & Barnes Circus. In the ticket box is W. V. “Shorty” Shearer who supervises the circus’ front end.” Then I found a note from Shearer as sent to Harry Kingston in June 2001. In it Shearer states: “I purchased the gorilla, Jon Pierre, from a Mr. Robert Baudy of Florida. He was around 19 months old when we got him and has reached about 500 pounds. We toured on the Carson and Barnes Circus with him as well as some fairs in the later years. If you are interested we also have the Orangutan, Herman, who was purchased in 1963 in Thousand Oaks, California from Heinz Ruhe. He finally learned to stop spitting on people. As for what happened to all of them they have retired as well as Oklahoma Shorty Shearer.” Since Shearer said he got the gorilla in 1970, he would not have been in the ape show when the above photo was taken in 1969 - - -Unless Shearer was a year off in his statement and actually got the gorilla in ’69. Another June 2001 note from Harry Kingston states - - “I think the gorilla is dead because Beulah (presumably Mrs. Shearer) said Shorty cried like a baby when they lost him.” Animal dealer Frank Thompson confirmed to me that Baudy did deal in gorillas. In his book, Baudy the Animal Man (1996) Baudy wrote (p. 520) - -“ I’d imported many gorillas before the Endangered Species Act . . . I sold most of the gorillas that I imported, but I kept several specimens on the compound to exhibit [Center Hill, FL]. I even had in mind working a gorilla act. However, the technical requirements obviated the feasibility of such an act.” In July 2001 Mike Cecere chimed in with this - - “[Shorty Shearer’s] gorilla is long dead - - Think he died somewhere on tour. They got into a major league beef with USDA in the late 1970s on Carson & Barnes and went on carnies.”  |
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Circus Oddities #1
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
7 comments:
I saw this primate exhibit on Ford Bros. Circus in Dec. of 1983 when they toured Florida. (I'm not certain who was operating it.) Bobby Gibbs was on the show, and told me how bad the conditions were inside for the animals, and Bobby was 100% correct.
This was just about the time that the animal rights groups were starting to wage their war with the circus.
Those of you who know me, are familiar with the loyalty that I have toward circuses with animals, and how often I have defended the circus against the AR groups. But in this case, I could only agree with them.
I am very bothered when I hear or read the majority of animal rights statements about the circus that we all know are wrong. I am even MORE bothered when on those few occasions, I know they are right.
Fortunatly there are many people in the circus industry who are dedicated to the responsible and proper care of animals. They far outshine those who are not.
Richard,
A million thanks for your great information on Oklahoma Shorty Shearer's real live gooorilla.
I was really sweating this as I thought I was going to get in trouble on this one.
Carson and Barnes was all over Texas when it opened and I always visited the Circus.
I became good friends with Shorty and Beulah. I said that was a big darn varmit he had in that cage. I watcched him feed them as I did not want to get spit on or something else thrown at me???
When they were with other circuses and in my area they always called
me and told me the location.
They sent me one of Shorty's spinning ropes for my circus collection that I am very proud of.
They both were real old time troopers.
Harry Kingston
There was a time when animals were commodities, something you could replace if you didn't take good care of it. When you look at longevities and accounts in Lee Crandall's original book on managing wild mammals in captivity it's pretty clear that even the best zoos saw at least some animals that way. (And still do to the extent that renting pandas from China to boost attendance might be viewed as pandering.) I think these days most of us would agree that some animals just don't belong on circuses because even with the best of care from well intended managers the stress is too great and they won't thrive. Stress can be an enormous issue with some kinds of hoofstock, and some primates. It's too bad that as late as ten years ago there were still a few shows where animals were "wasted." More often than not when I read APHIS reports the negatives are clearly organizational issues, or clerical issues, or manpower/training problems. Even a "bad" inspection in no way implies intentional neglect or abuse. Then you stumble on the rarer real cases of neglect and you just wonder what the hell those showmen were thinking? Did somebody really think that they could save a few bucks and nobody would notice, or care? A decade ago the whole industry was demonized over a dead elephant in the back of a truck in Albuquerque, and we've never fully recovered. Even when your animals are well cared for, God-forbid you suffer a mortality on the road -- even the most conscientious show gets raked over the coals.
Would you have any photo's of"Chiko",
Barnum&Bailey's "Gorilla"
circa 1893?
There was some controversery in the press at that time whether Chico was really a gorilla or just a huge male chimpanzee.
Richard Reynolds answers - -
I do not have a photo of Chiko, However he was definitley a chimp. He was obtained in Lisbon in 1893 and sent to B&B for the '93 tour. He died on the road in 1894.
Meanwhile Bailey got a female chimp, also from Portugal, named Johanna who started truping in 1894. She and Chiko were claimed to be gorillas (also orangutan in Chiko's case) but the naturalists who inspected them were definite - -they were chimps.
Now there is a photo of Johanna at CWM. No doubt about it, she was a chimp. She died at Nuremberg, Germany in 1900.
According to newspaper accounts in 1893,Chiko had been captured around 1885 on the
Island of Papua,which I believe is is in/near New Guinea.
Im not sure if great apes even (naturally)inhabit there,possibly they may be referring to Indonesia.
If so he certainly was not a Gorilla or even a Chimpanzee both of which only inhabit in the wild Sub-Saharan Africa.
Reportly Chiko stood erect at five feet seven inches tall and weighed
160 pounds(much too light for a Gorilla)Chiko was believed to be about 11 years old in 1893.
Richard Reynolds adds - -
Yes, I've seen those claims about a SE Asia origin for Chiko but they were just so much bunk.
Papua is indeed a territory on the island of New Guinea around Port Moresby - eastern end of New Guinea. But that is far away from any great ape habitat. Orangutans are no closer than the island of Borneo. I think Papua was just a press agent's invention.
The scientists who expamined Chiko were positive - -a chimp. Moreover his arrival from Portugal is well documented.
The Barnum & Bailey press books of the time are replete with stories about both Chiko and Johanna.
Bailey did not like the designation "chimpanzee" - -too pedestrian. In the case of Johanna he claimed, when confronted by irrefutable evidence, that if she was not a gorilla then she was an intermdeiate form between chimps and gorillas.
Post a Comment