 All I know aboht this show is what I read in Bandwagon, as I recall the owner was a promoter named Martin Arthur. Pretty neat the way he got Tom Mix's name on the show, four years after his death. They must have done well because the show was put on rails for the 1945 season using Hagenbeck-Wallace equipment that had sat in California since that show folded in 1938. |
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
Arthur Bros. Circus 1944 #1
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Somehow my entry here got lost, and I'm trying again. This Mrs. Mix must have been Mabel Hubbard Ward, Tom's fourth, to whom he was married from 1932 until his death on 12 October 1940. Mix had just filled up with gas, when he sped off and lost control on a curve outside Florence, Arizona. His car slammed into a ditch. The impact was instantly fatal, and evidence shows a heavy briefcase above his back seat propelled forward, striking him in the back of the head. Mix had $6000 in cash in his pockets. A monument to his death still stands at the site in Florence. Which, of course, has nothing to do with Arthur Bros. Circus.
Some of the old Hagenbeck-Wallace equipment remained on the Goebel property during my time there, indicating what was taken back on the road was tediously selected, as not all of it had value. The place was Jungleland by then, and when the cats in my charge were eating breakfast, I often took that hour to roam the old hulls of the past. Some quarter and side poles were left behind, a bail ring or two, main falls, broken props and pedestals, all quietly returning to nature. Two or three wagons lettered "Clyde Brent Circus" stood as silent reminders of the Martin & Lewis film THREE RING CIRCUS, filmed on the 1953 Beatty show, in Phoenix. Extraordinary history of circus and film came to Thousand Oaks because of Louis Goebel and his fabled Compound. My five years there remain an indelible blessing.
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