i always love the globe acts, quick question for anyone on here, what were the materials globes were made out of and how were they made to have elephants or any big cat balance on?
One day at Jungleland, Mabel Stark led me to her shipping crates behind her cageline. She had used these for her props in her crossings to Japan and South America. When she had me open one, she told me the 36" solid oaken globe inside was mine. I kick myself to this day that I didn't get it off the lot right then. This globe later became wrapped and stapled with rope and painted red. It went into 2 different cat acts at Jungleland, and when we were auctioned off, it was tagged for this federal sale, and I couldn't touch it. Then, in the winter of '71, there it was on the Castle show, when I took the act over from Red Hartman. The story was that Don McLennon had bought it at the auction and sold it to Castle for $12.50. I rolled Goldie tiger on that ball for 2 seasons. Larry Allen Dean told me years later that the globe went to Tarzan when he bought the Castle show, and then was sold with an act to a Mexican circus. Wherever it is now, I doubt I'll see it again, but that damn globe is still mine.
12 comments:
I hope someone recognizes
these girls as I don't know
Interesting balance & revolving
ladder single upright rigging
The Wilson sisters. Trudy, JoAnn ,And Linda
A pair of wide angle speaker horns
shown in the lower right corner
Thanks Lee
Among themselves, the Wilson girls did every feature circus act you could name, and 90% of the "2nd and 3rd" acts.
I know JoAnn & Trudy & I knew
Penny but I never met Linda
i always love the globe acts, quick question for anyone on here, what were the materials globes were made out of and how were they made to have elephants or any big cat balance on?
Early rolling globes were
of laminated blocks of wood
Later some were a fiberglass
shell or ultra high density
polyethylene filled with sand
Elephant globes wer segmented
aluminum welded together and
also filled with sand
Motorized mirrored globes
were supported by their
internal shafts & needed
no filler for weight
They only had to support
the heavy glass mirror
& not the animal above
I still have the mold for
40" fiberglass globes in
my warehouse (of course)
One day at Jungleland, Mabel Stark led me to her shipping crates behind her cageline. She had used these for her props in her crossings to Japan and South America. When she had me open one, she told me the 36" solid oaken globe inside was mine. I kick myself to this day that I didn't get it off the lot right then. This globe later became wrapped and stapled with rope and painted red. It went into 2 different cat acts at Jungleland, and when we were auctioned off, it was tagged for this federal sale, and I couldn't touch it. Then, in the winter of '71, there it was on the Castle show, when I took the act over from Red Hartman. The story was that Don McLennon had bought it at the auction and sold it to Castle for $12.50. I rolled Goldie tiger on that ball for 2 seasons. Larry Allen Dean told me years later that the globe went to Tarzan when he bought the Castle show, and then was sold with an act to a Mexican circus. Wherever it is now, I doubt I'll see it again, but that damn globe is still mine.
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