Saturday, March 23, 2019

LONG & CROSS MOUNTS


Posted by Chic Silber at 3/23/2019 12:34:00 AM

8 comments:

Roger Smith said...

Colleen Alpaugh and the Beatty herd - 1950s

23 March, 2019 03:58
Chic Silber said...


This photo graced the pages

of the Beatty souvinir book

for many years into the 60s

23 March, 2019 09:22
Chic Silber said...


I believe that Sid was then lead

23 March, 2019 09:32
Roger Smith said...

And this shot also appeared in Jane Beatty's juvenile book, DAVEY'S ADVENTURES WITH THE CLYDE BEATTY RAILROAD CIRCUS (Abelard-Schumann, 1965). The book was hurried into publication just before Beatty died, Jane told me, as a tribute to him.

24 March, 2019 04:50
Chic Silber said...


Isn't there also a strangely

doctored photo of Eddie Dullem

with the caption "Lopey" or

something like that due to a

financial issue

24 March, 2019 09:38
Roger Smith said...

Yes, Eddie was cast as "Loppy" in the book and the stills. He told me he got not a dime for his appearance, for making up Clyde, Jr., or for assisting with accuracy of the book for Mrs. Beatty. She asked him to alter his own makeup, and the one she chose was horrible. Eddie said he looked like a local TV clown, and he hated it.

I was there when this book was being done. While Mr. Beatty was still recovering from cancer surgery, in Billings Hospital, in Chicago, Mrs. Beatty and Clyde, Jr., were set to come to Park Ridge, Illinois, with the book's still photographer for a long day's shoot. The lot there was a showman's dream--level, firm, spacious, and covered with lush green grass. But they didn't make it until the next day, when we played Joliet. The lot was hot and windy, and the tall weeds we had to wade through imparted layers of dust on everyone, including Mrs. Beatty's elegant hose and shoes.

In a classic story of "You can't see me, but I was right over there", I was sending cats into the tunnel for the photographer, monitored by Mrs. Beatty as her husband's tunnel door man. But in the book, a 40-miler named Sonny is the guy in the photo, and my shot at immortality died at the hands of the photo editor.

24 March, 2019 19:51
Chic Silber said...


Missing that opportunity of sorts

is nothig to ever regret as that

book was pretty punk & lame

24 March, 2019 20:53
Tony Greiner said...

What is a '40-miler' ? It is a term I don't know.

26 March, 2019 13:51

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