Tuesday, September 04, 2007

European Equine Acts (From Raffaele de Ritis)


fredy1, originally uploaded by bucklesw1.

I don't remember the name of the party who asked me on a post for "more horses from Europe".
Here follows a selection. The first is Fredy Knie, at Circus Knie 2007.

Posted by Buckles at 9/04/2007 06:05:00 AM

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Really nice to see those horse acts from across the water. Hope to see more. I was surprised to see in all those pictures not one of the liberty acts had plumes on the horses. Also note some acts were short of having even numbered horses. I can just hear Mary Ruth saying to mr "Come on John Let's get the plumes on"

Certai8nly they do some pretty great Liberty acts; Gruss, Tony, Knie, Krone, etc.i

04 September, 2007 09:47
Anonymous said...

Johnny, For what it's worth, I asked the very same thing, and got two different answer's. Supposedly survey's have been done and the public did not like plumes, on the horses, or animals "dressed" up. Second, many of the act's are seasoned act's with a newer group of horses added, so the act's always look different. Often the newer one's are not comfortable with plume's. Note 4 grey Arabs in this photo, with 4 darker less mature ones. Wade Burck

04 September, 2007 12:32
Anonymous said...

I think I see four brown horses and three white horses and no plumes. It takes about one and one half days to get them used to plumes. More effort on the trainer and the grooms if you happen to have any. Also I no0te in the latest photos ony head plumes. Looks like they are half dressed, and, if the animal rights people are a "cop out" for not having plumes, and or, harness we are in a pretty sad shape. I have had pretty well broke liberty acts over the years,[by well broke, I mean they have been on the road for a season] and to exercise them and run them thru the routine we would run them in without harness. Enough of that BS on what an accomplishment that is and I note a couple horses with checks on and if you got some tough studs you will fashion a muzzle. Even if your name is Gruss, Knie, or the rest of us who have toiled in the trenches.

04 September, 2007 17:00
Anonymous said...

Johnny, you are right on the count in the picture. But I am assuming that because it is a Fredy Knie horse act, the eighth horse is probably just out of camera range,by himself doing an incredible hind leg walk around the tent, stopping to get a snowcone, before coming back into the ring, at a high speed hind leg piroutte, ending in a back flip. If the picture had been taken 5 sec. later, we would see eight. Wade Burck

04 September, 2007 20:18
Anonymous said...

Mr. de Ritis,

Thank you for posting the horse acts--I greatly appreciate it! After observing several European liberty acts over the years, and speaking with some trainers, the harness and plumes seem to be a matter of personal preference. Plumes seem to be an American tradition, and they are seldom seen in the better-known European circuses today. However, when used at least on occasion, I think they can really add some flash to an act.
-Chris

04 September, 2007 21:40
Anonymous said...

To All:
Years ago I pulled on the lot in San Antonio Tx. way back when the Texas dates were the TEXAS DATES. As I pulled around the Coliseum I noticed in a pen there were 8 zebras, wow I thought how neat! Stepping out of the cab of the truck, a gent came running up, it was Roy Bush. I hadn't seen him since I worked for him selling peanuts in the late 50's in the menagerie at Palisades on the Hunt show. I questioned him about the zebras. He told me to go take a closer look at them. You've probably guessed by now it was Walt King's herd of ,as Gibbs called them the Snow Zebras, when the hair dye began to fade on the mules. Never the less,One of my first meetings with Walt King, he asked me a serious question and I thought he was joking. The question was to one animal man to another, "What do I do during a show if these guys all run out of the ring?" When I realized he was serious, I told him to graciously take a bow, pretend it was your last trick and keep your fingers crossed for the next show. Now do I dare say there are many reasons for not having an even number of equine during the time a photo is taken? However, they were sporting plumes.

05 September, 2007 14:23
Anonymous said...

Jimmy, there are not "many" reasons, but you can dare to say that there are a "couple". But given the fact that the "human round pen", which was graciously pointed out in past post's, was in all likelihood up, and the fact that it is Fredy Knie horses in the photo, I'll bet you 10 to 1 even those couple won't work in this situation. Wade Burck

P.S. Are you positive those were not zebras? I only question, because John Cuneo told me they were, and he had Artic Wolves in his leopard act, so he should know.

05 September, 2007 15:11

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