Buckles Blog: #9 Al G. Barnes

Tuesday, June 06, 2017

Ms and Mr. Frank Buck.

Roger Smith said...: Buck was a star attraction on RBBB for '38. As we know, when labor conflicts closed the show in Scranton, PA, select acts joined Ringling's Barnes-Sells Floto combine to finish the season. Buck was among them. He had made a string of movies, the last of which co-starred him with Abbott & Costello and Clyde Beatty in 1949's AFRICA SCREAMS. Here he is seen with his 3rd wife, Muriel Reilly. Their marriage lasted from 1928 until Buck's death of cancer, in Houston, in 1950. He was 66.; 06 June, 2017 16:34
4pawfan said...: He didn't get paid for most of the 1938 season and was given three elephants instead . I have one of his pay slips where he wasn't paid. In 1939 he had Frank Buck's Jungle land at the New York World's Fair.
p.j.; 06 June, 2017 21:25
Roger Smith said...: The Frank Buck Zoo still opens daily in his hometown of Gainesville, Texas. It originated as the Gainesville Community Circus, in 1930, and later re-named for their famed animal trapper, film star, and author of 8 books.

The primary reason for Buck's final illness can be seen in his left hand.; 07 June, 2017 16:57
Richard Reynolds said...: On the show in 1938 he was known as "One Buck Buck" for his habit of tipping the porter only one dollar per day for keeping his car spiffed up. Most all the performers tipped at least that much or more, depending on their star status. I was told that by Paul Ringling who was on the 1938 show.; 07 June, 2017 19:53

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