Fred Logan Article (From Don Covington)

SAVE1894, originally uploaded by bucklesw1. CIRCUS PAGES, A Family Business (Photo from Buckles) Saskatoon Star Phoenix Saskatoon, Canada by Bob Florence Water the camels. Feed the lions. For Freida Pages and family, it's business as usual today. The circus season is done for the year, but the show goes on. Stitch this. Paint that. Now is the time to get Circus Pages ready for its 20th season, starting in January. I told my daughter I'm 44, maybe it's time I retired, Freida said the other day on the phone from the circus' winter quarters in Myakka City, Fla., 30 minutes outside Sarasota. Retirement is a fleeting thought, though, the gut reaction after nine months on the road. At heart, Freida is a circus lifer. It's in the blood. I feel like I'm the last heir to my dad's legacy, she said. I want to keep his memory alive. Her father was Fred Logan. Aside from the two years he served in the U.S. Navy during the Second World War, protecting merchant ships in the South Pacific, Fred enjoyed a more than 60-year run under the circus big top, much of it performing with family. He was still appearing in the ring into his 70s. Born in Brandon, Man., in 1925, Fred grew up in Saskatoon and Moose Jaw. He attended Notre Dame College in Wilcox, playing hockey and being mentored by Father Athol Murray after Fred's father, Walter, a land inspector with CN railways, died when Fred was 10. Fred's fascination with the lights and the life of the circus began the summer he worked a hot dog and hamburger stand for Conklin Shows at the Saskatoon Exhibition. Leaving home at 17, Fred hooked up with Terrell Jacobs Circus as a cage boy, circus talk for someone who looks after the animals. He worked for peanuts at the start, making $3 a week. He didn¹t care, said Freida. He loved the road, loved the life. He not only walked with the animals, he talked with the animals. He'd grunt and squeak and squawk with the animals. And in working with Jacobs and later with Bill Woodcock, Fred apprenticed under two of the best animal trainers around. Soon, Fred had an act of his own. Captain Logan, he was called. It's said he had an ivory touch with the elephants. My mother always used to say to him: You're married to the elephants. Freida said. I say the same thing to my husband now. Freida's husband, Jorge, is also from a circus family, hailing from Cuba. Jorge used to perform with his brothers on the flying trapeze. Now he and Freida tour with Circus Pages, each season following a route up from Florida through the eastern U.S., traveling as far north as Michigan then going south again. Jorge appears in the show with two elephants. Fred taught Jorge how to train them. Circus Pages, a small, but ambitious troupe, also includes Freida and Jorge's daughter Colleen, who works with lions and tigers, and their son Jorge (they call him Georgie) who rides a motorcycle inside a big metal globe and helps with the show's music and lighting. In a family circus, everybody does everything, Freida said. And always be courteous, said Colleen, 18, a lesson she said she learned from her grandfather Fred. Freida and Jorge's oldest daughter, Vicenta, is one of the headline performers with Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey, the big circus outfit Fred worked for in the ¹40s. Vicenta¹s act features six white tigers. When Fred wasn't on the road, home was Hugo, Okla. His wife, Ora Jo, was a full-blooded Cheyenne Native from Watonga, Okla. Her father, Chief Joe Yellow Eyes, performed in wild west shows. Fred and Ora Jo raised eight children. Fred Jr., Charles, Walter, Mary Jo, Eileen, Lillian, Freida and Naomi were all in the circus as kids. They rode elephants and wheeled around on unicycles. They did acrobatics. At every town along the way, they helped with the circus set-up and takedown. Years ago (on the circuit), we were moving to a different place every day, said Eileen Osorio, the Logan girl everyone called Ike. The first thing father did was get to the lot and plan the layout: Elephants here, tent there. He'd work with the cats. He'd do a parade in town and put up banners. He'd sell the tickets. (When the show started), he worked with my brothers and sisters in three acts. Then he and mother did the elephant act. I miss those days, Eileen said, but I don't miss the travel. Eileen is a bank manager in Las Vegas, but is still connected to the circus. Her husband, Pancho, who did a high-wire act with his brothers years ago, and their daughter, Candice, both tour with Circo Osorio, based in Vegas. Two of Fred and Ora Jo's other daughters also have a link to show biz. Mary Jo, the oldest of the girls, married an aerialist, one of the flying Zerbinis. Lillian married Jim Havershorm, who was a band leader with Clyde Beatty Cole Bros. Son Walter was an elephant trainer for years, then left to become a truck driver. He died in 2005. Daughter Naomi works in a grocery store in Sarasota. Charles is a welder in Houston and Fred Jr. works for the Choctaw tribe in Hugo. Of the eight children, Freida is the only one actively involved in the circus. One of the earliest memories I have is standing in the ring with the (family in the) Kelly Miller Circus, said Freida. I was five. I didn't have to do anything, I just stood there. Dad, he had an amazing memory. His mind was a history book. He could remember where he went and when, the type of place it was. That¹s a good show town, he¹d say. The animals, the children; he loved what he did. People come up to me all the time and tell me stories about him. It's hard coming home now, with him not here, Freida said. Fred died in 2006. At 80, his life was measured not so much in duration, but devotion. Near the end, he was working as a night watchman for Hanneford Circus in Osprey, Fla. Freida said he was so looking forward to seeing his granddaughter Vicenta perform with Ringling Bros.