USBS: The Greatest Show on Earth

You are listening to another bonus episode and this isn't your typical one nation under crime. This is USBs where we discuss the historical BS of the us, but are we ever really typical? No, never. We are atypical. True. These are the episodes that cover a wide variety of topics could be a person, could be an event either way. It'll be a good time. I'm Kayla and I'm Leah. Let's get into it. We're always a good time. Well, yeah, it doesn't know what this week's episode is about. 

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00:00:43

Sometimes I tell her ahead of times, but this one I have not told her about. I would say I'm on the edge of my seat, but I am so sitting back and relaxed with a cat on my lap, actually she's on my feet. Well, Leah's going to be happy about this, this one, this wiping happy. So, and as Christmas week, we only have a couple of days left until Christmas. This is coming out on a Wednesday. So if you're getting your presence wrapped, get them wrapped up and you're cooking, cooking, whatever, whatever that may be, use our soothing wonderful voices to guide you through or this happy or stressful time. 

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00:01:24

I mean, if you're, if you're hiding from your family, you know, we're really good to take long for that too. So just throw in some headphones and driving's fine. And this is going to be a full fun episode. So, so maybe nobody dies. There's a little touch here and there of some like cringe kind of things that have happened. But as far as most things, it's a fun topic. And I don't think a lot of people know some of the store knowledgeable. Do you know, in some aspects you might be you'll know, you'll know what everybody else knows. 

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00:02:15

That's what I'll say. And you'll see why our sources for this week. We have Smithsonian magazine, always a good one, always helpful the Hollywood reporter. And I can't tell you the name of the next one. I'll just say it's a museum. So you might hate him. You might love him. Oh dear. Either way. He left a legacy that will be known and shared for years to come. The BS we are getting into this week is Phineas Taylor Barnum. 

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00:02:57

Oh, yay. Most people have seen the movie, the greatest showman, and there are many aspects of the movie that are accurate. It is a fantastic movie. If you've not seen it, I give you full permission to turn this episode off right now, go to Disney plus watch it. And I saw it in theaters twice. 

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00:03:18

Yes. And the second time was, has to be a single to be 

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00:03:22

Amazon, but we did get a free movie out of it. We did 

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00:03:24

Because there were no word there aren't 

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00:03:27

But we already knew the words. So it, 

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00:03:30

And we met some really, really cool new friends. 

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00:03:33

It was fun even though this is the 

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00:03:38

. Okay. You're welcome 

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00:03:45

Ladies and gents. This is the moment you waited for anyways. Weirdly enough. Isn't so good. Weirdly enough. And Hugh Jackman, Zac Efron. <em></em> Zen day. It's just Michelle Williams. Amazing. 

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00:04:07

Did his chin yeah, they, they did own, I mean, amazing. 

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00:04:12

Amazing, absolutely amazing. So if you have seen the greatest showman and I didn't put this in here, but this is just knowledge that I know. If you have seen the greatest showman, the character does India plays and it was not real. She was creative for the movie and Phillip Carlyle, AKA Zach Efron was also not right character. So a great movie, right. There are, I will say the greatest showman is a very romanticized. 

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00:04:46

Sure. Well, I mean, you, you have that creative Liberty to Story. You want to tell a lot of it is 

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00:04:55

Sure about his dad is true. Kind of how his dad had his job did not see where his father died, where he was young. I didn't see anything about that part or that he, you know, did anything after that. It's very interesting. So either way, the greatest showman, such a good movie, the music is amazing. 

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00:05:26

And I can't remember the lady's name, but the lady that is the bearded lady with, is it Kayla settles? It's Kayla. I can't remember. Her name 

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00:05:37

Was in waitress. She's the first cast of waitress on Broadway. Her. 

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00:05:43

Oh boy. Oh my goodness. She is, 

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00:05:47

Is that was a real character. So she's amazing. She's she is amazing. She was very good. The story of the bearded lady is not the same, so we'll, we'll get into it. Yes. 

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00:06:02

But wait, mean it, we couldn't talk about the mood without naming nurse cares because the talent, the talent in that movie, I mean, it's amazing. And the music, I mean, look, if I'm having a day, I mean, I'll put in Hamilton a lot. If I'm having a day, I may have, I may have had a moment last week and I may have texted Kayla in the middle of target and said, Hey, I'm at a 7.5. I can't pray. You know, all the things just came crashing down on me. And so I had to 

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00:06:35

Drop both had moments like the last 

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00:06:37

Week we did it. Wasn't the same day 

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00:06:40

We were in sync with one another. It was like a day apart. 

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00:06:44

Yeah. That I, I put on Hamilton on the way home, but the greatest showman is another really good soundtrack because like for me, I have to get, I have to distract myself. And I also like singing. It's a physical way to get that energy out. For me, that is one way that I have found that I can get some of my anxiety and my nervous energy out if I'm having those moments and y'all, I had to drive home and it was like 30 minutes. And you know, you got to get home and you got to get that anxiety and that energy out. And so, you know, Caitlin was like, just breathe. I was like, I put on Hamilton, that's, you know, I'm getting that out. And then she told me to try to perfect guns and ships. 

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00:07:26

I was like, no, that will get me all the way to a 10. We don't want that. But yeah, we're the greatest showman would be a really good one for me to put on 

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00:07:36

The movie is just a, not even so much the movie, the cinematography, like when they, when Finn and in the movie, she calls him fan. But when Finn and charity are dancing in the beginning and she like goes 

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00:07:53

Show all the 

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00:07:54

Rory, oh my gosh. 

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It is the progression of their love story. Yeah. 

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00:08:00

Beautiful. Yeah. And I love Michelle Williams in that movie 

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00:08:05

Made you stop to go watch 

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00:08:07

What's on Disney plus. So go like go. I mean, I would say, I'll give you my password, but I won't. I already have a lot. I already have a lot of people that locked in. 

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00:08:20

No people don't use your log. As you just lock into a lot of devices. 

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00:08:25

I live in a lot of places all at once. It's crazy. I'm a witch. She turned me into a ghost. It's just how I live my life, you know? And it would be rude of someone to judge that. So there you go. So yeah, go watch it. If you haven't. It's so good. Soundtrack is amazing. Everything's amazing. All the good things. It's just such a good and it's a good, so when I watch movies a lot of time with daughter, I will ask her what is not so much, like, what did that teach you? 

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00:09:05

Or like, what is that? But if it's a movie that there is like an underlying lesson to the movie, I'll ask her and I'll say, well, what do you think about, you know, this? Or what do you think should have happened? Or what if she gets it? And so like with, she loves the nightmare before Christmas. And so I'll, I'll, you know, I'll ask her not every time, but sometimes I'll say, well, what does, what does that mean for Jack? Like what does that mean for Jack at the end of the movie? And she'll go that he should have just been himself all along. And I'm like, exactly, you always need to be yourself. And then like with the greatest showman, she knows too, as I said, you know, what does this tell you? 

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00:09:50

What is this movie kind of, what do you think in shows she was watching it? And she goes, I mean, really? He he's really nice. I don't like money now. It's like, not quite, but it was funny. So yeah, usually, but it is a very good story of, don't forget your roots. Don't forget where you came from. Right. And don't forget the people who got you there. Right. 

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00:10:29

And it's such a good just story throughout from now. I know. Oh gosh, such a good song. It's just, it's amazing. Lot of really good stuff in there. So Phineas Taylor Barnum, a K a P T Barnum was born in Bethel, Connecticut on July 5th, 1810. We did talk about his births and his births is two bursts, I guess. And the episode that we had in 1810, his mother was Irene Taylor and his father was phylo Barnum. His dad was an innkeeper Taylor and a storekeeper. And in the greatest showman, you see that he's a tailor. 

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00:11:11

He was named after his grandfather, Phineas Taylor, who was a legislator, landowner, justice of the peace and lottery schemer. Huh? Just that, just that they all went together until that last thing, young Barnum began school at the age of six. And he excelled in math often using the excuse of quote, head work as a way of avoiding farming duties on the family farm. He didn't love the idea of farm life and often dreamed of more for himself, which led him to own a sheep and calf. At only the age of 12, he sold cherry roam to the soldiers and he was hired to help herd a cattle to Brooklyn, weird cattle in Brooklyn. 

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00:11:56

I can't see it. This cattle drive was the beginning of a lifelong adventure of studying the diversity and people and the diversity in major cities, PT once said about this time in his life quote, it was clear to my mind that my proper position in the busy world was not yet reached. I had displayed the faculty of getting money as well as getting rid of it. But the business for which I was destined had not yet come to me, Barnum went on to have several businesses, including a general store, a book auctioning trading company, real estate ventures. And he had a statewide lottery network on November 8th, 1829, Barnum married charity Hallot and together the couple had four children, Caroline Cornelia, Helen Maria, Francis, Irene, and Pauline Taylor. 

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00:12:53

In the same year of his marriage. He also started a weekly newspaper called the Herald of freedom in Danbury, Connecticut. His paper was geared more towards those who were a major part of the church and the articles against the elders of local churches led to libel suits that put them in jail for two months. Oh dear. He went on to sell his general store in 1834 and became a major proponent of the freedom of speech movement. Now, before we get into the story that everyone is most familiar with, I got to go ahead and say, Barnum was not an angel that the movie made him out to be. 

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00:13:35

Well, I mean the things oh, that's that's understatement. Yes. He's very problematic. In some ways there is a big argument that he exploited a lot of people for financial gain. Well, I mean, duh, but there's arguments for both sides of that as well because he also paid those people very well. So, and there's two sides to every coin. There is this first story is one that really irritates me. So in 1835, Barnum started his career as a showman at the age of only 25. 

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00:14:19

His first exhibition was a woman named Joice Heth. Slavery was illegal in New York by this point. But Barnum used a loophole that allowed him to quote, lease her for a thousand dollars. Nice. Joyce seven sarcasm. Okay. Joyce was, well, it did say lease. It did not say purchase. I don't know, but Joyce is a black woman who was almost completely paralyzed and only had the ability to talk and partially move her right arm. The posters about her said, quote Joice Heth is unquestionably the most astonishing and interesting curiosity in the world. 

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00:15:01

She was the slave of Augustine Washington, who was the father of George Washington and was the first person who put clothes on the unconscious infant, who in after days led our heroic fathers onto glory to victory and freedom to use her own language. When speaking to the illustrious father of this country, she raised him. Joice Heth was born in the year 1674, and his consequently now arrived at the astonishing age of 161 years old. Oh, ma he exaggerated a little, I think it gets worse when Joyce died only a year after she was leased to Barnum lace Barnum had a doctor named David Rogers perform the autopsy of Joyce in front of a crowd of 1500 people and charged 50 cents for admission. 

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00:16:04

That's worse than a public hanging Rogers declared the age claim of Joyce, a fraud, but Barnum insisted that the autopsy victim was another person. And that Joyce was actually alive and on tour in Europe, several years later, Barnum admitted that it was a hoax. The autopsy of Joyce was actually Joyce and she was actually 79 when she died. So there's that over the years, Barnum had a group of people that made up his troop that he called Barnum's grand scientific and musical theater. 

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00:16:44

Then the panic of 1837 came along and a few years of circumstance follow the theater. He decided to purchase the scoters American museum in 1841. And after this purchase, he improved and upgraded the attractions and renamed it Barnum's American museum at this time, amusement attractions were not even like a thought in the public eye and doing something just for the point of entertainment. Wasn't highly sought after most even considered it inappropriate and society held itself to a higher standard of moral and civil behavior. 

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00:17:26

Barnard promoted the museum as a place for family entertainment, enlightenment and instructive amusement. Soon, the museum became a Haven for advancing public knowledge for music, literature, art marvels of the natural world and specialized in natural curiosity is right beside historical and artistic exhibitions. The range of acts or exhibits stuffed animals like taxidermy, right? Animals, giants, little people, jugglers, magicians, exotic women models of cities or detailed battles and many live animals. 

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00:18:06

According to the Barnum museum website. That was the website that I couldn't say earlier. Well, make sense 

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00:18:12

Since 

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Quote, a wax figure department to produce the likeness of notable personalities of the day, a taxidermy department and aquarium, the aquarium comes later, we're an operation and an elaborate set design department satisfied the demand for an active public theater emits the performers lectures and live curiosities were a host of exhibitors demonstrating various skills and crafts as well as new technological devices. A continual stream of changing exhibitions ranging from talking machines, panoramas of Niagara falls, Paris and Peru ivory carvers, problematic glassblowers, sewing machine operators, musicians, and ballerinas, all entertained the masses. 

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00:18:59

Can 

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00:18:59

I say glassblowing 

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00:19:02

So fascinating. 

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00:19:04

Crazy. I could sit and watch. I think we were in Chattanooga and my husband and I went into a glassblowers store like shop and they, you could do your own. I didn't do that, but we, we just watched and it was just absolutely amazing, like what they can do, watching them just, it's amazing to really like I'll watch videos, I'll be scrolling Facebook and there'll be a glassmaker video. And it just amazes me. 

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00:19:37

Yes. I've seen some glassblowing that is crazy for those people who don't know. You can go to Dollywood probably in Tennessee and you can see people blow class. It's really cool. 

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00:19:55

And also my husband and I have started watching a show called forged in fire and it's blade making it's it's, you know, like blacksmith blacksmithing. It amazes me like they, they give them a specific kind of blade to make. And I could watch that all day long. It's really cool. Oh my gosh. Just it, it just amazes me 

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00:20:22

And work. Yes, really cool. Yes. The way that they do all of that, it's very interesting. Barnum's American museum was New York. City's most popular attraction for 23 years. There was a light house light that he had on the building that drew more people into the area at night and he put flags all around the building should bring more attention to it. During the day, the sides of the building had massive painted posters in the upper windows that advertise the exhibits that pedestrians could see inside the roof of the building was a garden with a view of the city and hot air balloon rides were done. Daily bucket list item for me, sounds really cool. 

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00:21:06

Barnum offered the chance to quote, explore the irrational, examine imaginative possibilities and derive opinions and truths in 1842, a creature don't know what this is with the body of a monkey and the tail of a fish known as the Fiji mermaid was introduced Barnum leased it from a fellow museum owner in Boston named Moses Kimball. Kimball became one of his best friends, confidence and collaborators Barnum justified his hoaxes by saying that they were meant to draw attention to the museum. 

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00:21:48

He said, quote, I don't believe in duping the public, but I believe in first attracting and then pleasing them. Hmm. The bearded lady's name was actually Annie Jones, which is weird because Anne in the movie. So anyways, she was born in Virginia in 1865. Jones began her career at age one. Whew. She was exhibited in Barnum's museum as the infant is so after a short but successful stint in New York, Barnum soon offered Jones, his parents, a weekly contract that included a $150 salary. 

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00:22:33

That's a lot of money back then. That's crazy. Aldrin spent much of her 36, 36 year career with Barnum in his greatest show on earth. She also came to be known for her musical talents and gracious etiquette. So part of that's true about her etiquette Barnum followed these acts by exhibiting Charles Sherwood's Stratton, the little person who was eventually called general Tom thumb, or man in miniature, he was advertised as quote, the smallest person that ever walked alone. 

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00:23:17

He was then four years old, but in advertising they put that he was 11. He was 25 inches tall and only weighed 15 pounds. Even at bore. That's still very small Barnum said about Stratton quote. After seeing him and talking to him. I am determined to secure his services from his parents and to exhibit him publicly gross arrangements were quickly made with the boy's parents to hire their son for $3 a week, which included room board and travel for the boy and his mother. While in New York, that's about a hundred dollars a week today after Sean's first month with Barham, his salary was increased to $7 or $237 a week. 

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00:24:06

And later he was so popular that Barnum was paying him $25 a week, which is the equivalent of $847 today. Most people don't make that in a week now with heavy coaching and natural talent, the boy was taught to imitate people from Hercules to Napoleon. He was drinking wine by the time he was five and smoking cigars by the age of seven, that's not cool. The popularity of the museum had grown at such a rate that Barnum arranged a tour of England where the museum company was given an audience with queen Victoria. This opened the doors to visit to visits from royalty throughout Europe, including the czar of Russia and enabled Barnum to acquire new attractions. 

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00:24:54

The tour was called a quote, most surprising and delightful curiosities. The world has ever produced. During this time, he went on a spending spree and bought a bunch of other museums, including Rembrandt Peale's museum in Philadelphia, which was the nation's first major museum ever by late 1846 Barnum's museum was drawing around 400,000 visitors a year. That's just a couple then came the Swedish Nightingale, Jenny Lind. She was extremely popular already. And while on the European leg of the Tom thumb tour, Barnum quickly learned of her fame while Barnum liked professionally catering to the amusement of the masses. 

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00:25:44

He said, quote, I myself relished a higher grade of amusement. And I was frequent attendant at the opera first con first-class concerts lectures and the like barn. This is when he started getting highfalutin. Barnum approached her to seeing in America at a thousand dollars a night for 150 nights. And that's before like changing it to current math, like that's, that's, that's a whole heck of a lot of money. Lynn demanded the fee in advance and Barnum agreed. This allowed her to raise funds for charities, principally endowing schools for poor children in Sweden. 

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00:26:28

The contract also gave Lynn the opportunity of withdrawing from the tour after 60 or a hundred performances paying Barnum $25,000. If she pulled out, Lynn went to America in September of 1850, but she was a celebrity before she even arrived because of Barnum's advertisement. Almost 40,000 people greeted her at the docks. And another 20,000 were waiting at her hotel. The New York Herald declared quote, Jenny Lind is the most popular woman in the world at this point, Barnum confesses in his autobiography that his anticipation and that of the public might be too high to be realized, quote, enhance that there would be a reaction after the first concert, but I was happily disappointed. 

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00:27:19

The transcendent musical genius of the Swedish Nightingale was superior to all that fancy could paint. Land quickly realized how much money Barnum stood to make from the tour. And she insisted on a new agreement, which she signed on September 3rd, 1850. This gave her the original fee plus the remainder of each concerts profits after Barnum's 5,500 mean dollar management fee, huh? She was determined to accumulate as much money as possible for her charities. This is one part of the film that was absolutely correct. All of her money did go to charity. Well, that's good. Yes. 

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00:27:59

The Torah began with a concert at castle garden on September 11th, 1850. And it was a major success recouping Barnum four times his investment into it. So the part of the movie where he says like, it'll ruin me if you leave. That was not true. Okay. By the first concert he had already gotten back his money four times over, but for cinematic reasons and Tom, he does lose his money but differently. Right? So I'm guessing that's why. Yeah. Washington Irving proclaimed quote. She is enough to counterbalance of herself. All the evil that the world is threatened with by the great convention of women. 

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00:28:41

So God saved Jenny Lind tickets for some of her concerts were in such demand that Barnum sold them at a public auction. The frenzy of Virginia island was so high that it was called Linde mania. Barnum had up to 26 journalists on his payroll and he would specifically send them ahead to the next city to drum up more excitement for Len's arrival. Once they were done traveling in New York, they went down the east coast into the Southern states and then to Cuba. Eventually Linda became disgusted with Barnum's marketing of the tour and she invoked her contractual right to sever ties with them. 

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00:29:21

But this wasn't the end of Lynn's tours. She simply decided to manage it on her own without Barnum's name tied to it. They parted amicably and she continued the tour for nearly a year under her own management. Lynn gave 93 concerts in America for Barnum earning her about $350,000. Then while Barnum netted $500,000 equaling fifth teen $0.5 million today, pocket change, right? 

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00:30:01

Got that in the bank. Barnum's next challenge to take on was to change public attitudes about the theater, which was widely seen as a den of evil. Well, he wanted to position theaters as palaces of enlightenment and amusement. And as a respectable middle-class entertainment place, he built New York city's largest and most modern theater. And he named it the moral lecture room. He hoped that this would avoid CD connotations and attract the family crowd. And when the approval of the moral crusaders in New York city, he started with the nation's first, the attrical matinee to encourage families and to lessen the fear of crime since it was during the day he put on melodramas historical plays and he had highly regarded actors in them. 

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00:30:53

He also kind of watered down Shakespearian and the play, the book that they eventually turned into a play uncle Tom's cabin to make them family entertainment. He organized flower shows, beauty contest, dog shows and poultry contest, but the most popular were baby contests, like beauty contests, such as the fattest baby or the handsomest twins in 1853, he started the pictorial weekly newspaper illustrated news. He completed his autobiography a year later, which sold more than a million copies over the course of its numerous revisions. 

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00:31:38

It said that mark Twain loved the book, but the British examiner thought it trashy and offensive and wrote that it inspired quote nothing but sensations of disgust and sincere pity for the wretched man who compiled it well. So there's that? Tell us how you think. Well, tell me how you really feel in the early 1850s Barnum decided to invest in developing his adopted hometown of east Bridgeport, Connecticut. He gave out several loans to companies to encourage them to move to the area, including the Jerome clock company. 

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00:32:18

Unfortunately, the company went bankrupt in 1856 and they took almost all of Barnum's wealth with them. Oh no. Yeah. There were four years of litigation and embarrassment for boredom and Ralph Waldo Emerson said that this showed quote, the gods visible again. And other critics also celebrated the public embarrassment that Barnum was facing, oh, that's not nice. Charles Stratton. You remember him from before he was well, who they called? Tom thumb offered his services to Barnum since Stratton was touring on his own. At that time, the two started another European tour and Barnum started a lecture tour as a speak for the temperance movement. 

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00:33:04

So no alcohol, this proved to be successful with Barnum. And by 1860 he had pulled himself out of debt and he built a new mansion called Linden Croft. And he regained ownership of the museum after it was repossessed by the bank. After this tremendous comeback, Barnum created America's first aquarium and he expanded the wax figure department of his current museum, his quote seven grand salons demonstrated the seven wonders of the world, the buildings of the museum expanded. And he published quote the guide book to the museum, which claims that it had 850,000 curiosities. 

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00:33:48

Don't know about that. Just wondering too, this was when the Siamese twins, Chang and Inc came out of retirement because they needed to send their numerous children to college. Let me explain. Wow, Chang and Eng bunker or born in 1811 in Siam, which is now Thailand. And the term Siamese twins was derived from their case. They were joined by the areas around their xiphoid process, which if you have your sternum, it's the very bottom piece of your sternum, where your ribs kind of separate. 

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00:34:28

Okay. Right there. They were conjoined right there and they have kids. The brothers were exhibited for years as curiosities and were quote, two of the 19th centuries. Most studied human beings. Originally the sentiment towards the twins was that was one of sympathy. And after three years of touring, the United States with their managers, they decided to branch out on their own thinking that their managers were stealing money from them in 1839, they quit touring completely and settled near Mount airy, North Carolina. I know something about that place. Do you know something about that place? 

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00:35:09

I don't know. That is where Mayberry is modeled after. Oh yeah. I didn't know them. Okay. They spoke extremely clear English and they became American citizens. They quote bought, I hate that word. Slaves married, local sisters and fathered 20 children. The families of the brothers lived in separate houses and the twins took alternating three days stays at each house. Once they came out of retirement, they appeared at Barnum's museum for six weeks and 1862. 

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00:35:54

He discovered giant tests, Anna Swan and Commodore nut, a new Tom thumb with whom Barnum visited president Abraham Lincoln at the white house during the civil war, the museum drew large audiences, of course, trying to seek some kind of distraction from conflict. He added pro unionists, exhibits, lectures and dramas, and he hired Pauline Cushman in 1864, who was an actress who had served as a spy for the union. And she was there to lecture about her thrilling adventures behind Confederate lines. 

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00:36:36

It makes sense 

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00:36:37

That she would be an actress. I mean that, I mean, that totally 

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00:36:40

Makes sense. Barnum's unionist, sympathies, incited, a Confederate sympathizer to start a fire 1864, dear Barnum's American museum burned to the ground on July 13th, 1865 from a fire of unknown origin as well. That's no good Barnum. Re-established it at another location in New York city, but it was also destroyed by a fire in 1868. The loss was too great. The second time and Barnum retired from the museum business. So most people might believe that Barnum started in the circus business at a younger age than he actually did. 

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00:37:20

He was 60 when he established PT. Barnum's grand traveling museum, menagerie caravan, and Hippodrome Hippodrome is horse racing. I had to look that up and it was in Delavan, Wisconsin in 1870. His wife charity died on November 19th, 1873. And he quickly remarried a woman named Nancy fish the next year. Well, she was the daughter of a close friend of his John fish. Would you like to guess how much younger than him Nancy was 

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00:38:04

The way you say that? She's probably like the age of one of his kids. 

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00:38:11

40 years younger than him younger than his kids. He was rich. So he started, wait, what 

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00:38:26

I'm saying? Like that was the draw for her. Probably 

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00:38:30

He started the circus with William Cameron coupe and it was a traveling menagerie and quote museum of freaks. The circus went through several names, including PT, Barnum's traveling world fair and great Roman Hippodrome then PT Barnum's greatest show on earth in the London circus Sanders, Royal British menagerie and the grand international allied shows unite. That is all one name. Ooh, that's a big pain. So then after an 1881 merger with James Bailey and James L. Hutchinson, the name was finally settled on Barnum and Bailey. 

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00:39:14

This was the first circus to exhibit three rings. The first primary attraction was jumbo. An African elephant that Barnum purchased from the London zoo. The Barnum and Bailey circus had similar attractions to the original Barnum museum, including acrobats, put this in quotes, quote, freak shows and general Tom thumb. There were fires, train disasters and major setbacks to the operation, but Barnum insisted on pushing forward and growing the circus Barnum and Bailey took a hiatus from their partnership from 1885 to 1888 with the Barnum and Bailey greatest show on earth. 

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00:39:56

And then just the Barnum and Bailey circus, which toward the world Barnum became the first circus owner to move his circus by train. And the first to own his own train Barnum was called quote, the Shakespeare of advertising due to his impressive and innovative ideas. Barnum wrote several books throughout his life, including the life of PT, Barnum, the humbugs of the world struggles and triumphs forest and jungle or thrilling adventures in all quarters of the globe and the art of money. Getting a few years Barnum was referred to as quote the prince of humbugs and he saw nothing wrong in entertainers or vendors using hoaxes or humbug as he called them in promotional material. 

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00:40:45

As long as the public was getting value for their money. However, he was disdainful of those who made money through fraud, especially the spiritualist mediums popular in this day. He testified against noted spirit photographer, William H mumbler in his trial for fraud. And he exposed the tricks of the trade used by mediums to cheat. Those who were mourning their loved ones. He offered $500 or $8,000 in 2021 to any medium who could prove power to communicate with the dead bargain was also heavily involved in politics in his life and focused on race issues, slavery and separatism leading up to the civil war. 

0  

00:41:32

Barnum claims that quote politics were always distasteful to me yet. He was elected to the Connecticut legislature in 1865 as Republican representative for Fairfield and served four terms. He acknowledged that he had owned slaves when he lived in the south and just a bit of a trigger, just snot, great quote. I whooped my slaves. I ought to have been whipped a thousand times for this myself, but then I was a Democrat. One of those nondescript Democrats who were Northern men with Southern principles in 1875. 

0  

00:42:12

He worked as the mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut to improve the water supply, bring gas lighting to the streets and Inforce liquor and sex work laws. He was instrumental in starting Bridgeport hospital, which was founded in 1878. And he served as the first president on the board. Phineas Taylor Barnum died of a stroke in his home on April 7th, 1891. He is buried in mountain Grove cemetery that he designed in Bridgeport, Connecticut at his death critics praised boredom for good works and called him an icon of American spirit and ingenuity. 

0  

00:42:53

He asked the evening sun to print his obituary just prior to his death so that he might read it on April 7th, 1891. Barnum asked about the box office receipts for the day and only a few hours later. He was dead. Oh, the Barnum museum is located in Bridgeport today. It was conceived and constructed by PT Barnum himself. The museum has been open since 1893 and is still running today. That's cool. Currently the museum is not accepting visitors as they are working on COVID protocol measures for the state of Connecticut. Typically the museum is open year round on Thursdays and Fridays from 11:00 AM to 3:00 PM. 

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00:43:34

And admission is free. While donations are appreciated as for the circus, you may be asking yourself after 146 year run the world famous Ringling brothers, Barnum and Bailey circus closed for good. In 2017, the emotional retirement of the beloved circus came after years of trying to distance itself from a problematic history. Most notably the care of the animals featured in the circus show, but the greatest show on earth is coming back. I have to tell you, 

1  

00:44:15

Jody and I, my sister and I have taken her older two boys to the circus several times, but her youngest who came along several years after her older two were born, we've never taken him to the status. And I have many times lamented the fact that we've never taken him to the Ringling brothers Barnum and Bailey greatest show on earth. You know, I guess that's something that we've done with the boys. And I've always been so sad that we've never done that. So please do go on. 

1  

00:44:55

I'm intrigued and excited. I 

0  

00:44:58

Figured you would 

1  

00:44:59

Be very, do you see my eyes sparkling? And 

0  

00:45:03

I will say there will be no animal performers. And under the parent company, Feld entertainment, the show will have immersive technology and human performers. Feld entertainment is known for Disney on ice and monster jam shows around the United States, including the Marvel action, you know, live action. And all of that special effects are going to help carry the show forward with projection mapping in place of live animals like they do in their Jurassic world show. So it's going to have the illusion of animals while not physically having animals. 

0  

00:45:45

I mean, 

1  

00:45:45

That's cool. 

0  

00:45:47

Well, they got, yeah, it was just the only way that they could bring it back, was doing it this way. Hondo. 

1  

00:45:54

It'll still 

0  

00:45:55

Be really cool though from everything that I saw, it, it looks like it's going to be pretty unique as far as what it was before. And it's going to be very similar with the same acts like the motorcycles and all of that will be very similar. They're just not going to have it says specifically live animals. Yeah. So I'm assuming it's because they said like drastic world, which is a very, like, it's massive projections of like huge things. So I'm guessing that's what it's going to be more of. 

1  

00:46:31

And my mom and I went to an exhibit called beyond Vango yesterday and, oh my goodness. If you are in a city that this exhibit comes to, you need to go, God's amazing. It's the artists van Gogh and they take his works first. You walked through and it tells kind of the history of his life, lightning, you know, how he grew up in some quotes from letters between him and his brother and stuff. And then you go into a room and it's, I guess, 20 feet tall. I don't know how tall I don't measure well, and it's projections of his artwork, but they also kind of an a made it in a way and it's immersive and you 

0  

00:47:15

Are, that's what it sounds like. 

1  

00:47:17

This is going to, so me, so it sounds like it's going to be pretty cool. Yes. And I'm excited, but I mean, y'all the elephants at, I mean, and I understand that there is some mistreatment and, and that is on the road all the time. That is, that is a sad, stressful, stressful. And I get that. I totally do. 

0  

00:47:37

It is a bit of nostalgia. Exactly. Think back to that and you know, 

1  

00:47:44

Courses and I mean, it's really, yeah, 

0  

00:47:47

It's really cool. But you know, and then too, like you said, we also understand because at most, sometimes they're in the same place for maybe two weeks and then they're gone again and 

1  

00:47:59

It's, you know, they don't get to be out in the grass and 

0  

00:48:04

I'm okay with it. I I'm, I'm curious to see what it's going to be. It's going to be curious 

1  

00:48:08

And I'm excited that it's coming back. Yes. 

0  

00:48:11

The company announced that the show will be returning in 2023 and the official announcement of show dates will be in 2022. 

1  

00:48:23

I am here for 

0  

00:48:24

That. And that is the story of Phineas Taylor Barnum. That's a good 

1  

00:48:30

Note to end on that is I thought 

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00:48:32

That it was it. I thought that it was fun. So we have a website where you can find anything USB SN all OEC information. You were looking for. It's one nation under crime.com. And honestly, you can find anything that you need to for us there, as far as how to get in touch with us, how to reach us, where to follow us, go leave us a five star review on apple podcasts. We do have a Patrion that this show is moving over to in the next two weeks, actually. So if you want more of these episodes, which we know that you do, 

1  

00:49:04

Who doesn't want more of us 

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00:49:06

Go over to Patrion and go ahead and become a subscriber. So you can be the first one to get those episodes. Thank you guys for listening to another bonus episode of USBs. We will see you here next time with more BS from the U S and always remember there isn't always Liberty and justice for all. Goodbye. Bye.