Venice, Fla. Winter of 1973-74 #1

Scan000010799, originally uploaded by bucklesw1. From anonymous: I heard this story SECOND HAND, so some of the facts might be a little blurry... When Sascha Houcke came to GSOE/USA he did not receive or was not allotted enough ring time for his charges. Unruffled, he rounded up hay bales and made an ring and practiced to his heart's content in a nondescript part of the Tampa fairgrounds. Needless to say his charges were ready and polished in spite of RBBB red tape and politics. Here's the kicker: the "theater/tech folks" would stare in total disbelief that this horse trainer could/would/did get his job done WITHOUT their involvement. Circus trumps Theater every time. By the way, Sascha and family are friends of mine and my family, I'm not telling tales out of School. From Buckles: "During my first winter in Venice with the Ringling Show, Gunther had the elephant barn, Axel used his road tent and my Circus World herd (18) had to camp out under the stars near Charlie Smith's work shop. I was told right away that the show in rehearsal (Blue Show) had exclusive rights to the ring barn. This presented no problem to me. In this picture you can see the wagon we "borrowed" as well as the assortment of bull tubs and pieces of ring curb scrounged up from the junk pile so we could get things done. Years later Kenneth Feld was visiting with Paul Binder on the Big Apple lot and in my best smart-ass form I said, "You two guys should write a book entitled ALIBIS AND EXCUSES I HAVE HEARD!"