Friday, October 30, 2015

To Patricia


Posted by Buckles at 10/30/2015 03:53:00 PM

2 comments:

Dick Flint said...

I remember Emily Hedder (number 8 in the photo). She joined the Siegrist-Silbon act in 1906 and remembered the day very soon thereafter that James Bailey died. She also told me remembering how someone came around in the following months to buy Mr. Silbon's stock in Barnum & Bailey Ltd. This would have been done as part of the settling of Bailey's estate and the subsequent sale of the show to the Ringlings. I doubt if anyone else is alive that heard such stories first hand from eye witnesses! Mrs. Silbon and her husband Jack Hedder (part of the Four Comrades act on the Barnum show) lived in the Orange Trailer Park in Sarasota. May Wirth was the person that directed me to the Hedders who, in turn, introduced me to others from the old Barnum show. What memories and how fortunate was I!

30 October, 2015 16:22
Roger Smith said...

OK--I'll be among those who are uncertain of who's who in this numbering. But at No. 14, down front and center, sits Alfredo Codona. The man above his left shoulder is his catcher, brother Lalo Codona. Directly above Alfredo stands Clara Grow, whose surname is sometimes given as Gron. She became his first wife, who left him when his eye strayed to the self-seeking Ringling favorite, Lillian Leitzel. Clara caught them together one too many times, and at last, it is often told, Leitzel bought Clara's departure with $1,000. Clara lived out her life in seclusion in Cincinnati, refusing interviews with those dogged enough to find her. Read the chapter "Love Story - Leitzel and Codona", in Bradna's THE BIG TOP. Then read Dean Jensen's greatly detailed work, QUEEN OF THE AIR, which takes us to the core of this deeply involving story.

30 October, 2015 16:34

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