| No date on this Barnum & Bailey picture but you will notice that the stage these men are standing on is situated between the center pole and the quarter poles and if this is an eight pole big top, they would be able to present nine acts in one display. |
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
More Circus Canvas #2
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5 comments:
I believe this 8-pole tent turned up on B&B around 1915. It continued in use there but never on the separate but commonly owned Ringling show. The 8-poler was used on RBBB around 1919-20 (It shows in one of those Cleveland lakefront panoramas).
Unless one had a seat in the middle of the tent, the acts in the rings and stages at either of the far ends would have been virtually impossible to see.
Col. Sturtevant wrote about the 8-poler in the Christmas 1941 White Tops. Said the Colonel - -
"One of the largest appearing canvases was the great eight center pole top ‘Happy Jack’ Snellen designed for the Barnum & Bailey Show and used for several year before the consolidation in 1919, being a 200 with five 50’s and two 30’s.”
Somewhere I have a photo of these two smaller stages being knocked down before the end of the show to make room for the chariot races at the conclusion of the preformance.
Not sure, but I think in later years these two outer stages didn't get set up till after spec.
P.J.Holmes
Buckles or Richard or some informed person could you tell us the sizes of the large Ringling or Barnum tents so us we would have an idea what we are looking at.
I remember reading somewhere that Ringlings largest was 200 by 600, true or from some press agent????
I think Cole Bros during the war years had the best looking tent ever the blue with the stars and stripes in side. There were some color movies I have seen that show the blue tent but the old Kodachrome was not fast enough to show the inside of the tent.
Thanks,
Harry Kingston
I asked George Werner the size of the 1951 Ringling big top and he said it was 208' across with four 58' middle pieces.
Oscar Cristiani mentioned to me that when their show was on the rise their main competitor was the Beatty Show and despite his objections it was imperative that they buy that size tent.
After the deed was done they were informed that they had purchased a short 150' whereas the Beatty Show top was a full 150'.
As I understand it, this means that the RBBB tent would have been 208' when spread out on the ground and
200' when in the air.
The Barnum & Bailey 8-pole tent was 310 feet between the first and last center poles. Add another 100 at each end to reach the sidewall and we have a tent of some 510 ft.
The big RBBB 6-poler had five 60 foot middles and was 200 ft. wide. So, that should be 300 ft. from the first center pole to the last. Add another 100 ft at each end to get to the sidewall and you had a tent 500 ft. long. I guess the 600 ft might be made by adding the distance to the stake line at either end though I do not know if that would be as much as 50 ft. on each end.
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