Sunday, October 07, 2007

From Bill Strong


143_4390, originally uploaded by bucklesw1.

This front page Times picture from Mr. Strong points out that the elephants had no headpieces with Ringling-Barnum at this time.
When performing, the lead elephant (mount bull) in each act wore a leather strap around it's neck with a mount strap attached so the herd worker could make the mounts. That was it.

Posted by Buckles at 10/07/2007 10:37:00 AM

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wish somebody had the film of the parade that the camera man took that day. He is standing between the elephants and the crowd on the street.
P.J.

07 October, 2007 11:27
Buckles said...

Out of curiosity I checked the RBBB routes and on Sunday May 8, 1921 the show was jumping from Brooklyn to Philadelphia.
So this picture was probably taken six weeks earlier prior to the MSG opening.

07 October, 2007 12:24
Anonymous said...

Wow !!!! Can't buy that kind of press. Makes me want to buy a ticket.-BJ

07 October, 2007 23:38
Anonymous said...

Richard Reynolds says - -

This was a special parade by RBBB in NYC to benefit the milk fund, apparently a program to provide milk to the needy. RBBB had quit offering the daily street parade by then, 1920 being the last year for that.

In fact neither RBBB nor the predecessor B&B staged any street parades in Manhattan earlier in the 20th century. It had become too complex. The last one of which I have a record was by B&B’s subsidiary Forepaugh Sells that played the Garden while B&B was away in Europe. That was around 1902.

One reason was the lack of baggage stock. It was never sent down for the Garden date by B&B and later RBBB except for perhaps a few teams used to unload wagons. Stop and think - - where in heaven would one find room in Manhattan to house and feed 300+ head of baggage horses?

Most of the horse power RBBB needed in Manhattan during the Garden run they got by outsourcing to folks who owned teams and made them available. There are records of that into the 1930s.

I figure that to stage this milk parade RBBB must have sent down some parade wagons stored at nearby Bridgeport. Now, the baggage stock did go to Brooklyn for the under canvas opener. This NY Times photo was in the Sunday May 8 issue. The parade was likely staged the day before, Saturday morning May 7th when the show was doing its last day in Brooklyn. I suspect they sent the parade units over from Brooklyn using one of big bridges over the East River, likely the Manhattan or Williamsburg. That way they had on hand the necessary draft stock to pull the wagons. Note the team pulling the wagon behind the elephants. A check of Billboard would likely give all the details.

I believe there was another of these Milk Fund parades perhaps the year before.

After the ’21 Milk Fund parade, RBBB did not offer another in Manhattan until April 9, 1945 when the Big One did a street parade to boost the Seventh War Bond Drive. This one used the old parade wagons that were used in that year’s spec plus some of the cages. A mixture of horses and motorized power was used to pull the wagons. Of course some of the elephants were in it as well.

08 October, 2007 15:35

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