Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Bostock & Wombwell Animal Show #1


Capt. Jack Bonavita with a group of lions featured with the Frank C. Bostock Wild Animal Arena.
Originated by E.H. Bostock and George Wombwell, famous British Menagerists, in the 1870's.

16 comments:

Buckles said...

I agree.

Anonymous said...

Jim has a priceless picture on his blog this morning. What a group. Just looking for something to get into. Buckles S%#*(t eating grin is a clue. Who is the young man standing behind Buckles?

Buckles said...

That's James(Chico) Williams who is now in charge of the Ringling Stud Farm.

GaryHill said...

Buckles , if Chico is in charge now where did Gary Jacobson go?

Buckles said...

Technically a guy named Bruce Read is in charge overall and represents the place but Chico runs things, Gary is in charge of trainng and remains there today as far as I know.

Anonymous said...

If you look at the lions faces you can see that some of them are duplcates
I was so disapointed,as there are only 25 (my count)
Gunther,as I recall worked 20 Tigers
Charey worked 18 or 19
Wolfgang worked 19 females & 1 male lions
Big acts are what inspired me to work cat acts
now,it seems 10 is a big deal

Anonymous said...

cool picture though, eh ?








canadian blogger

GaryHill said...

Larry, in 78 Charly had 16 tigers in his act and Jewell had 15 lions.

Anonymous said...

Gary,
didn't Jewel have a lion that didn't make it on the road because of a fetish over spangles
Monarch,maybe ?

GaryHill said...

No all the cats from CW went on the road. Monarch was a spindle cat and also was one JY and Rudolph jumped over.

Anonymous said...

Capt. Jack Bonavita was famous for entering the arena with
twenty-seven lions!
They then eached jumped on their pedistal.
He wowed them with this act at the 1901
World's Fair in Buffalo New York.
Pres. Theodore Roosevelt(or soon to be president)reportly was astounded.

Anonymous said...

For more info concerning
Captain Jack Bonavita,
check out Bob Cline's reply to my question in,
How to oil an elephant #3,
6/17/2006 posting at this blog site.

Anonymous said...

For the finale of his act,Captain Bonavita left the arena with a 500 pound lion on his shoulders!

Anonymous said...

Did u know Jack Bonavita was married to a Princess?
Princess de Montglyon
(who had been married to a French nobleman,before seeing Jack Bonavta performing with his 27 lions and fell for him.)

Anonymous said...

BTW there is a real photgraph published in
THE TRAINING OF WILD ANIMALS
by Frank C. Bostock(published in 1903),where Jack Bonavita is sitting in the old arm chair with at least 12 full grown lions on all sides!

Anonymous said...

Bob Cline,

The Polar Bear that killed Captain Jack Bonavita was named'Piccolo'.
There is a photgraph of the bear with?Jack Bonavita,
over at newspaperarchive.com,
in the Jamaica Gleaner 1917-03-23.
If the man with the bear
is Jack Bonavita,it looks like the stress really got to him.He looks aged beyond his years in it.