In 1936, Bert Nelson moved over to the Barnes show, where he co-starred with Mabel Stark and Terrell Jacobs, all very much in their prime. This great billing stand for Bert is testament to his prominence in his day. Indeed, in his letter to me of September 11, 1970, he was poignant and reflective, writing, "Sometimes in looking back, I envy you youngsters, but then 'every dog has his day' and I had mine. I don't envy 'youth' per se, as I think my generation had the best of it, but I envy the activity that belongs to the young." |
Friday, May 20, 2011
Bert Nelson Al_G_Barnes 1936
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
7 comments:
WOW will we ever see Billing like this again love the big Dates
Robert Perry
Australia
Dave,
Please tell us what size this bill is?????
And is the date and 8 sheet????
If so the bill ought to be a 20 sheet???????
Now this is how to bill a circus.
Harry in Texas
Harry: This is all three-high paper. The bull date is a six sheet- remember a six is the only square poster, at least among the standard sizes of the old days.
The title part of the main bill is a nine-sheet and the picture part of Nelson is another six, giving us fifteen sheets for the title and picture.
I break it down this way because I suspect the title was sometimes posted without the picture, depending on the size of the area being posted.
Note there is some more paper at the far end that we can't see very well, so the entire daub is more than twenty-one sheets.
I look forward to Ol' Whitey weighing in on this - but to me it looks like the date is a six sheet (two three sheets making up a square six sheet). The PORTRAIT of Mr. Nelson also looks like a six sheet square. Could the text be a nine-sheet (three three-sheet panels?)
I first met Bert when he visited Mabel Stark at Jungleland. She gave him a hearty welcome when he walked up to her tiger cages that day in 1966. As noted with the photo, they co-starred with Terrell Jacobs on the Barnes show in 1936. Hubert Castle had wanted Nelson as a circus partner, but upon returning from WW II, Bert retired from the cage, and segued into a lucrative career in real estate. The word best describing him was elegant. He was freshly barbered and his three-piece suits were sharply pressed. Mabel teased him, saying, "You come around here and get a whiff of that wild manure, you'll be back."
In long conversations with him, I expressed my desires for the cage. He listened carefully, and told me then what he stated later in this letter. His generation indeed had the best of American circus seasons, and his concluding thought was delivered as gently as he could make it. "Roger, for what you want and hope for, you were born forty years too late."
To answer Mr. Perry's question, in my own way: To see billing like this again, even if there are acts with sufficient public impact, you must have owners with the foresight to realize the value of stardom, and not to fear it. Some impresarios thought if circus names became well-recognized, as did Clyde Beatty's, they wouldn't be able to handle or keep the act. Thus, many great acts remained relatively anonymous to Everyman, who revered stars of the celluloid but rarely of the sawdust. Even circus names given "paper" were fleeting in general consciousness compared to the fame campaigns lavished on movie figures. Unless circus owners develop the self-confidence common to the movie moguls, their stars certainly will never know billing like this again.
So Mr. Perry's question is as poignant as Harry Kingston's comment is correct--This is how to bill a circus. I will add, and this is how to feature an act.
Chris: Bingo. Perfect score.
But we can't assume the 9-sheet title is made up of three 3-sheet panels.
All printers didn't have the same size presses and they sometimes printed larger paper in odd size sections; but at the end of the day they would fit together to form the standard size bills.
I suspect that these Nelson bills were "frozen" meaning assembled and pasted together after printing and before shipping to the advance so that the billposters could post them in one huge section. The reason I think these may be frozen is that there is no visible seam or joint where the sections come together.
Even the most careful billposter will sometimes get paper out of allignment on a big daub.
Art Beeth liked to tell the story of posting a frozen 24-sheet advertising Coca Cola across the street from Clint Finney's house in Aurora. He noticed the Colonel sitting on the porch when he drove up but he didn't speak to him.
While he was at work he heard a familiar voice behind him say, "I never saw a frozen twenty-four before." Without turning around Art replied, "The hell you haven't. I posted them for you on the Ranch show!"
Post a Comment