Friday, May 05, 2006

Tom Packs Elephants #5


Slivers and Jo Madison took over the Tom Packs elephants in 1953 and one of the first things he did was to retire "Mary" to the New Orleans Zoo since her limp was becoming more noticable. She was replaced by "Shirley".
In 1956 the act was sold to Jungleland in 1000 Oaks where this picture was taken. Then sold to Rudy Bos. Circus in 1960 where they were worked by Arky Scott and finally to Circo Bells in Mexico in 1964.

Posted by Buckles at 5/05/2006 06:25:00 AM

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

I ask a question in another place before I got down to here. Did these elephants ever make it back from south America. Trying to build a lyni, care for 43 pets all at the same time is getting me ahead of myself. Just can't leave the blog alone. Tune in at every coffee break. While I am thinking about it, Does anyone have or know of anyone who has photos of Eloise working the Kelly Lion Act?

05 May, 2006 12:08
Buckles said...

Only elephant I ever heard of coming back from Mexico was "Jennie" formerly with K-M. The show she had been sold to was showing along the Mexican border when one day she fled the scene and splashed across the river into Texas. Quite a struggle to get her back both physically and legally.
I think I have a Cistiani progam with pictures of Eloise working that Cuneo caged bear act. For some reason her name is listed as Miss Rahna Keo.

05 May, 2006 12:31
Anonymous said...

I know how ones name is printed on pictures showing another person goes. Eloises picture was used instead of mine the whole first year on Kelly Miller. ZEKE worked the bear cage act also if I am not mistaken .

05 May, 2006 14:20
Anonymous said...

Is not that illegal to use another person's name on someone else picture for publicity? Why did they do that?

05 May, 2006 14:48
Anonymous said...

Let me see if I can get this straight. On one news paper sheet I have, there are five pictures of four different performers. I worked with all these types of animals. I was billed as "EMPRESS LEOTA" That name was used for my short career. As I had no idea this newspaper exsisted[sic] for 40 years, I think it is very funny. This is why my book is titled. "WILL THE REAL EMPRESS LEOTA PLEASE STAND UP". I was also on "TO TELL THE TRUTH" so it fits. These women were also all married to JC. Can you figure this all out?

05 May, 2006 15:59
Anonymous said...

Just how many times was that man JC married? Here is Ada saying that he is married to Herta for 50 years and that they are friends and so on. Strange stories. But, I guess that is part of the fun of the circus on the road. Ask Buckles to please post your picture on the blog.

05 May, 2006 18:28
Anonymous said...

JC and Herta have been happyly married for many. many years. He just needed a little practice first. And I am sick of my pictures on the blog. Gary is the only one to have one now.

05 May, 2006 18:37
Anonymous said...

Anonymous, you must remember we are writing about things that happened 40 - 45 years ago. This is the past and fun to relive here on the blog. Most of us are in our 60s and 70s so we can laugh at some of the events that could only happen on the great world of the circus.

05 May, 2006 18:45
Anonymous said...

At one time, it was standard to use stock photos for publicity, many dating back 20 years, unless you had a superstar act such as clyde beatty, the cristianis, the wallendas, emmett kelly, La norma or pinito del oro. most publicity shots were generic pretty girls with generic elephants, horses or clowns or generic hippos or lions. if a specific act was publicized, it was the photo the show got when the act was booked, which i assume was the reason the photo showed eloise instead of rebecca. i don't know the details but at that time it would not have been unusual to call her empress leota in case she left and another girl took over. when i started doing press on sells and gray i used nothing but my own photos and despite the extra cost for photographers bill english agreed with me. while i was there, we never used a stock photo, it was always a person or animal actually on the road with sells and gray - i didn't even use stock photos of our hippo. the only thing we used press wise that was generic was the billing prince gabor for the cat act because of changes in people working the act - i think we had 4 different prince gabors, staring with junior, until johnny golden finally came in and stayed. for the cat act i never used pix of the trainer, only the lion going through the hoop. (not that it mattered - most papers used nothing but pictures of carmen del molino, chrs hudson. pat miller or phil bonta anyway and the only animal pix they used most of the time were Anna may (the harriett beatty anna may) pat's horse gray or our camel tommy with carmen. at that time the newspapers were impressed by the original photos and we got really great press because of it - they felt the pix showed credibility. i don't know what the shows are doing now sincenobody uses the kind of press people everybody had then. so there's your chapter on why different people's pictures were used -- back then press agents were trained to be long-winded because the longer the story the bigger the headline.

05 May, 2006 19:50
Anonymous said...

Hi Henry. Kelly Miller did use my photo for newspapers when I was on "To TELL THE TRUTH" and "TEEN" Magizine[/] took a picture. They interview me before the mud show actually started. It was on a winter date for Herbert Castle and I opened on my 19th birthdate. I did not know they were useing the picture until I volunteered to pick up the matts from the papers when we came to that town. The posters were already made up with Eloises picture. I do have a stack of those pictures that were used. Forgot about them. I asked the mag if they would send me a copy of the mag when this book thing started. Never heard from them. JC even worked the cage act to finish the season on Tom Packs as I was not trained to work it yet. Things sure work out different then you expect them to on the circus. I have been trying to have copys of this newspaper done for a long time. Seem no one around here has the equipment to do a whole page. Taking it in parts would not be the same effect. I got my copy from John in Detroit in a bunch of items he sent me.

05 May, 2006 20:16
Anonymous said...

Mr Edgar, thanks for that explanation. It makes sense now that you told us.

05 May, 2006 22:24
Anonymous said...

That still happens. For the past 4 years for the shrine ddate, some posters feature are large picture of the Wallenda seven man pyraimid and down in the caption it features the name of the year's flyers. The flying Espana, or the flying Cortes or the Flying Redpaths. but I know for a fact it's the Wallendas.

06 May, 2006 02:03

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