Saturday, February 08, 2020

PAT WHITE FROM RICHARD KING


10 comments:

Chic Silber said...


Very sadly Patricia died December 4th 2017

I certainly hope Richard will add comments

to identify these many photos

Thanks Richard

Bob Swaney said...

The mighty Carson & Barnes 5-Ring Circus.

Richard King said...

Sorry Chic, I lost a big box of slides dating back to then so I have nothing of my own. Because Pat was a dear friend I save everything I can find on her but no little to nothing about most of them.

Richard King said...

Ok, one more Pat White story. Last one I promise (maybe). We were in Milwaukee for The Great Circus Parade. It was Sunday morning and Pat had Topaz in the parade wagon she was going to ride in and neither one of us had anything to do so we took a walk around the staging grounds. We ran into this guy called Buckles, anyone ever heard of him? He was trying to load these leopards that belonged to this incredibly beautiful red head into their parade wagon but all the loading shoots were being used. He saw Pat and asked for help loading them without the shoot. He said they would jump right in. Pat said what if they don't? Buckles said just grab them by the tail and hang on. Pat looked at me and I looked at her and we both said we had some place we had to be. Along the way we added Doc Henderson to our little group. About 50 feet from the C&B cat trailer Doc took a long look and asked Pat how long one of her cats had had some illness and what she was giving it. I lost track of the conversation because I was trying to see the cats. Damn Doc had good eyes! I took a picture of Pat in the cage. Later when I showed it to her she took it and wrote, Rick, send bail money, Pat on it. Unfortunately in a dozen or so moves since then I lost it.

Richard King said...

P.S. Yes I know chutes is spelled chutes. Just typing faster than I'm thinking and spell check was no help.

Chic Silber said...


Although she always looked

terrific in her red blouse

& black slacks & boots

I prefer this costume on her

Richard King said...

I always liked her best in jeans and a t-shirt.

Richard King said...

OK, one more, Disney and the Felds were tight(still are). In the late 80's Disney wanted to take another shot at a Disneyland Circus. Kenny was given the job of producing it. He hired Pat to do her act. It must have killed him to pay D.R. for the cats. This was an off season thing and Pat thought it was a good way to keep the act sharp. She told me while she was there Kenny tried to poach her for Ringling. He had this idea to position her as the "female Gunther". Pat liked working for D.R. She liked her acts and she liked the people at C&B. What she didn't like was the money Kenny offered and Kenny. Animal people are usually good at reading people and she sure nailed that one. Told him no and went back to Oklahoma.

Bob Swaney said...

A tribute to D.R. and his organization. He knew how to treat people.

Wade G. Burck said...

Richard, that has to be true about the money offered. Every person you talk to, everyone to a person, claim they never worked on Ringling because Irving(they didn't realize his name was Irvin) or Kenny(only close friends and family called him Kenny)would not pay them what they wanted. Yet most people who worked for them stayed for years and said, "I can make more here than anywhere else, so why leave. Just saying.....

Wade Burck