70 years ago, the July 27, 1942 issue of LIFE MAGAZINE ran a photo-feature on the Tiebor seals, which were appearing in the 1942 edition of the Ringling-Barnum Circus. (According to the 1942 souvenir program, both John Tiebor, Jr. and his brother Roland presented seal acts in Display No. 10.) The article opens with a photo of a single flipper-to-flipper stand being performed by Charlie (bottom) and Babe (top). According to the article, the stand lasted 7 seconds and had never been accomplished by any other seals. |
Monday, August 20, 2012
Tiebor Seals #1 (From Eric Beheim)
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3 comments:
This looks like a trainers trick, would take too long to set up in the ring.
The RB performance ran at break-neck speed in those days, no conversation or explanations required.
My dad and Roland had been buddies on the Floto Show and would cut up jackpots when we played the Orrin Davenport winter dates.
Wish I had paid more attention.
Tiebors were of course the best known SEAL acts and they fielded multiple acts at one time; of course, The Jenniers, Walter, and later, Ethel (she was pictured here with seals a few weeks back), had seals, too; Diane Wilson also worked seals for years on mud shows; I don't know of ANY seals acts currently working in the U.S.--too bad as they're an audience favorite.
Roland Tiebor had more "muscle" tricks including the famous poster of Roland holding a sea lion doing a front flipper stand over his head. He really did it, I've seen the photo. Tiebors also had a sea lion who would rap its front flippers around a bar and flip itself over and over. They called it the muscle grind. I saw on the Polack show in the 1950s. A great trainer and a very nice gentleman.
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