Monday, May 28, 2007

From Fred Dahlinger


SAVE2709, originally uploaded by bucklesw1.

hope that you are all reveling in the freedom and security represented by Memorial Day.

The attached images should clinch the Bridgeport identification of the Ira Watts and sea elephant photo in the current Bandwagon, page 34. These are from the set personally taken by Bob Good in the 1920s, well circulated and in many collections.

The top image is taken from the south central area of the quarters, looking ENE. The low structure on the left is the building in the background of Buckles photo. You can make out the same brick pilasters, window details, etc. Buckles' photo was taken on the east side of the building on the right, the replacement wagon shop, looking northwest. There was a large door on both long sides of the structure, in the panel south of the second chimney. On the far right side you will see the single curved lead that led to the storage track where the sleepers are parked in Buckles photo. You can see some stocks and sleepers on this track in another of the Good photos, one of those showing all of the baggage wagons jammed together in a very fire-prone manner.

The bottom photo shows the central shop area. You will note that the ventilators on it are what are recorded in Buckles photo. This is not the Car Shops as I originally hypothesized. The multiple tracks shown here were on the west side of that center shop building. You can also note where there was a power pole to either side of this structure, in the same north-south position. You can see this line going across the property, E-W, in another Good photo.

So, with Watts on RBBB 1927-1929, Henry Gentry piloting Sparks in 1929, it's the sea elephant Colossus temporarily at Bridgeport in the spring of 1928, as Richard pointed out. What's remarkable is to learn that there was still a connection between RBBB and Bridgeport following the "closure" and "departure" in the spring-summer-fall of 1927. Completely detaching from the site was obviously an extended operation, even after quarters were established in sunny Sarasota.

Fred

Posted by Buckles at 5/28/2007 02:00:00 PM

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

Richard Reynolds says - -

The reason we see a sea elephant (“elephant seal” in modern taxonomy) at Bridgeport in this photo is that he was a standby animal. John Ringling had invested a ton in promoting sea elephant Goliath for the 1928 show, let alone the money he had to pay the Hagenbeck firm to buy the beast itself. What was he to do if Goliath went to the sea elephant graveyard before sufficient revenues could be realized to justify the investment? The answer - -buy a standby just in case. And that is what we see in this photo. The second animal arrived in NYC at some point in the late spring or early summer of ’28 . He was sent to the old Bridgeport winter quarters which had not yet been completely emptied of circus properties. (You can see some sleepers in the background).

In time, this second sea elephant became know as Colossus. He was shipped to Sarasota at the end of December to join Goliath who had made the 1928 tour. There seems to have been some quandary as to just how to keep the sea elephants in Sarasota. When the show got back there after its ’28 tour, there was no place for Goliath so he stayed for a time in his special rail car in the WQ rail yard. It was finally decided to build a pen out on St. Armand’s Key. It had a beach and access to water. Large pilings were sunk and a fence built to keep them in. Goliath made the 1929 tour after which he died rather suddenly. He seems to have been attacked by a shark or swordfish which got into his pen (the accounts differ), and he died from the injuries. Thereafter, Colossus was the RBBB sea elephant, and he made the 1930 and 1931 tours, always billed however, as Goliath. I have the impression that he was not as large and impressive as the original Goliath.

With RBBB having exhausted the pulling power of “Goliath” (actually Colossus), John Ringling sent him to join Sell Floto for the 1932 season. He spent the winter of 1932-33 in Peru and was sent with Hagenbeck –Wallace to Chicago for its ’33 indoor opener in the Coliseum. He then went to the Cincinnati zoo for the summer and thereafter spent time in the Philadelphia zoo and Atlantic City. From there he was sent back to Germany or at least that is what his one time keeper, John Sabo, said.

And that’s it on the sea elephants.

29 May, 2007 15:58

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