sideshow

{{See also|List of circus skills#Sideshow attractions}}

File:Old sideshow ad, firebreathing man.JPG, Florida, 1966]]

Image:Elly del Sarto.jpg

There are four main types of classic sideshow attractions:

• The Ten-in-One offers a program of ten sequential acts under one tent for a single admission price. The ten-in-one might be partly a freak show exhibiting "human oddities" (including "born freaks" such as midgets, giants or persons with other deformities, or "made freaks" like tattooed people, fat people or "human skeletons"—extremely thin men often "married" to the fat lady, like Isaac W. Sprague). However, for variety's sake, the acts in a ten-in-one would also include "working acts" who would perform magic tricks or daredevil stunts. In addition, the freak show performers might also perform acts or stunts, and would often sell souvenirs like "giant's rings" or "pitch cards" with their photos and life stories. The ten-in-one would often end in a "blowoff" or "ding," an extra act not advertised on the outside, which could be viewed for an additional fee. The blowoff act would be described provocatively, often as something deemed too strong for women and children, such as pickled punks.
• The Single-O is a single attraction, for example a single curiosity like the "Bonnie and Clyde Death Car" or Hitler's staff car,{{cite web |title = The 'Warren Car' aka 'The Bonnie and Clyde Death Car' |publisher = Texas Hide Out.tripod.com |url = http://texashideout.tripod.com/warrencar.html |access-date = 2008-07-27}}{{cite web |last = Robinson |first = John |title = Hitler's Car or should I say the real Hitler's Car please stand up! |publisher = Sideshow World.com |url = http://www.sideshowworld.com/atshitler.html |access-date = 2008-07-27 |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20081201142203/http://www.sideshowworld.com/atshitler.html |archive-date = 2008-12-01 }} a "Giant Rat" (actually usually a nutria) or other unusual animal, a "What Is It?" (often a convincing but artificial monstrosity like the Fiji Mermaid) or a geek show often billed as "See the Victim of Drug Abuse."
• A Museum Show which might be deceptively billed as "World's Greatest Freaks Past and Present," is a sideshow in which the exhibits are usually not alive. It might include tanks of piranhas or cages with unusual animals, stuffed freak animals or other exotic items like the weapons or cars allegedly used by famous murderers. Some of the exhibits might even be dummies or photographs of the billed attractions. It could still be truthfully billed with the claim "$1,000 reward if not absolutely real—please do not touch or feed the animals on exhibit". The Single-O and the Museum Show are usually operated as "grind shows," meaning that patrons may enter at any time, viewing the various exhibits at their leisure.
• A Girl Show was sometimes offered in which women were the primary attraction. These could range from the revue (such as a "Broadway Revue") with fully clothed performers to the racier "kootch" or "hootchie-kootchie" show (a strip show) which might play either partly clothed or "strong" (nude).{{cite web |title = History Page year 1948 |publisher = Strates Shows.com |url = http://strates.com/history4.htm |access-date = 2008-07-27 |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070927075237/http://strates.com/history4.htm |archive-date = 2007-09-27 }}

{{See also|Freak show}}

Sideshows in North America have significantly fewer or no human oddities, and few to no traveling girl shows, due to both a changing public opinion and local laws prohibiting the exhibition of disabled people or animals, as well as stricter regulation of nude performance and designated locations they can legally occur.

In Michigan, since 1931 it has been a misdemeanor to display deformed or disabled humans as part of an exhibit, whether for free or by charging for tickets, except as part of medical education.{{Cite web |title=MCL - Section 750.347 - Michigan Legislature |url=https://www.legislature.mi.gov/Laws/MCL?objectName=mcl-750-347 |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20250505083803/https://www.legislature.mi.gov/Laws/MCL?objectName=mcl-750-347 |archive-date=2025-05-05 |access-date=2025-06-03 |website=www.legislature.mi.gov |language=en}}

In Florida, as of 2024 it is a misdemeanor offense to display deformed animals in any place where a fee is charged.{{Cite web |title=Statutes & Constitution :View Statutes : Online Sunshine |url=http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=0800-0899/0877/Sections/0877.16.html |access-date=2025-06-03 |website=www.leg.state.fl.us}} There is currently no law in Florida prohibiting human oddity exhibition.

Most traveling burlesque dancers now work in dedicated legal venues such as cabarets or strip clubs, rather than as part of a carnival midway as was typical in the 20th century.{{Citation needed|date=June 2025}}

{{See also|Ugly law}}

{{See also|Circus#History}}

By the 1830s, "outside shows" began to be established alongside travelling circuses.{{Cite book |last=Nickell |first=Joe |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/65377460 |title=Secrets of the sideshows |date=2005 |publisher=University Press of Kentucky |isbn=0-8131-7179-2 |location=Lexington, Ky. |oclc=65377460|author-link=Joe Nickell}}{{rp|9}} Initially, the circuses distanced themselves from the sideshows, but in 1850, a relationship was established between them.{{rp|9}}

"Working acts" often exhibited a number of stunts that could be counted on to draw crowds. These stunts used little-known methods and offered the elements of danger and excitement. Such acts included fire eating, sword swallowing, knife throwing, body piercing, lying on a bed of nails, walking up a ladder of sharp swords, and more.

File:Side Show gorilla poster, Florida, 1960s.JPG, 1966]]

Interest in sideshows declined as television made it easy (and free) to see the world's most exotic attractions. Moreover, viewing "human oddities" became distasteful as the public conscience changed, and many localities passed laws forbidding the exhibition of freaks.{{cite journal |last1=Fordham |first1=Brigham |title=Dangerous Bodies: Freak Shows, Expression, and Exploitation |year=2007 |url=https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1g32z0dx |journal=UCLA Entertainment Law Review |volume=14 |issue=2 |doi=10.5070/LR8142027098 |access-date=23 February 2019|doi-access=free }} The performers often protested (to no avail) that they had no objection to the sideshow, especially since it provided not only a good income for them, but in many cases it provided their only possible job. Emmitt Bejano, a man with lamellar ichthyosis who performed as “The Alligator Boy”, said: “[Sideshow work] keeps me off the relief line.”{{Cite web |last=Rivera |first=Doc |title=Percilla Bejano The Monkey Girl |url=https://www.docsmidwaycookhouse.com/historical-circus-carnival-videos/percilla-bejano-the-monkey-girl/ |url-status=live |website=Doc’s Midway Cookhouse}}

With legal restrictions on human oddity exhibitions, most modern sideshows feature performances of trainable stunts and body modifications, which can but do not necessarily require congenital abnormalities.

In 2013, Gary Turner, born with Ehlers-Dalnos syndrome, performed as Gary Stretch with The Circus of Horrors, alongside other performers such as Jesus Aceves, a man born with hypertrichosis billed as “Wolfboy”, who walked on swords as part of his act.{{Cite news |date=2013-09-08 |title=Freak show revival as attraction heads to West End |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-23812971 |access-date=2025-05-30 |work=BBC News |language=en-GB}}

John Haze, owner of the show, said of their sword swallower with body modifications Hannibal Helmurto:

"He wore a normal suit and had no tattoos. Ten years later he turned up at the Hackney Empire and he had completely changed his body."

In modern times, sideshow performers are often individual professionals or groups. A greater number of "Single O" attractions still tour carnivals.

In the 1940s, Ward Hall began the World of Wonders Amazement Show, which is still running today. It is the oldest carnival sideshow organization in America and is currently owned and run by Thomas Breen.{{Cite web|url=https://showmensmuseum.org/ward-hall-and-the-world-of-wonders-sideshow/|title=Ward Hall King of The Sideshow and his World of Wonders|website=Carnival History| Old Circus Photos| Sideshow History| Showmen's Museum}}

In 1970, John Strong Jr (son of John Strong of The John Strong 3 Ring Tented Circus){{Cite web|url=http://www.sideshowworld.com/28-BJ-Strong/thstgod-JStrong-G.html|title=Sideshow World, Sideshow Photos, Sideshow History, Memories and Stories about Jeanie Tomaini and Al Tomaini at Sideshow World|website=www.sideshowworld.com}} began a 47-year continuous run of traveling sideshow, The Strong Sideshow. Several acts and artifacts toured over the years such as the 5-legged dog, Chupacabra, a 2-headed cow, and a mummy. John Jr. performed all the live acts himself for several years including sword swallowing, fire eating, bed of nails blade box and electric chair.{{Cite news|url=http://www.sideshowworld.com/71-View/46-Carnival/John-Strong.html|title=Forty-Three years of continuous performances|last=Hall|first=B.|date=February 2013|work=Carnival Magazine|access-date=15 March 2018}} After living the lifestyle for a lifetime, The Strong Sideshow is now in residency at "The Sideshow Museum", in Uranus, Missouri.

In the early 1990s, Jim Rose developed a modern sideshow called "the Jim Rose Circus", reinventing the sideshow with two types of acts that would attract modern audiences and stay within legal bounds. The show featured acts reviving traditional sideshow stunts and carrying some of them to extremes, and "fringe" artists (often exhibiting extreme body modification) performing bizarre or masochistic acts like eating insects, lifting weights by means of hooks inserted in their body piercings, or stapling currency to their forehead. The show drew audiences at venues unknown to old-time sideshows, like rock clubs and the 1992 Lollapalooza festival. The Jim Rose Circus held its last known performance in 2013 at The London Burlesque Festival. The impact of the Jim Rose Circus on pop culture inspired a new wave of performers. There are now more sideshow performers than at any other time in the genre's history. At the same time in Canada, Scott McClelland, grandson of itinerant showman N.P. Lewchuk, formed Carnival Diablo, a show that performs frequently to this day. The success of these shows sparked a growing number of performers to revive the traditional sideshow arts, taught by sideshow veterans, and many now perform in spot engagements from rock clubs and comedy clubs to corporate events.

"Sideshows by the Seashore", sponsored by Coney Island USA in Brooklyn, NY has performed since 1983, and tours under the name "Coney Island Circus Sideshow". Circus historian and collector Ken Harck ran the Brothers Grim Sideshow, which toured with the OzzFest music festival in the summer of 2006 and 2007. Sideshow celebrity and multiple world record breaker Chayne Hultgren 'The Space Cowboy' owns Australia's largest traveling oddity museum 'The Mutant Barnyard' and along with his partner Zoe Ellis 'AKA: Zoe L'amore' they run 'Sideshow Wonderland'.

{{See also|Category:Sideshow performers}}

• Aurelio “Al” Tomaini — Once the world’s tallest person
• Daisy and Violet Hilton — Conjoined sisters and musicians
• Francesco “Frank” Lentini — “The Three-Legged Man”
• Jeanie Tomaini — “The World’s Only Living Half-Girl”
• Johnny Eck — “The Half Man” / “The Amazing Half-Boy”
• Melvin Burkhart — Human blockhead, sword swallower, magician
• Percilla Bejano — “The Monkey Girl”
• Ronnie and Donnie Gaylon — Oldest-living conjoined twins
• Sandra Reed — Sword swallower with albinism
• Stanislaus Berent — “Sealo the Seal Boy”
• William “Bill” Durks — “The Man With Three Eyes”

• The Circus of Horrors
• :Category:Sideshow performers

{{Reflist}}

• "A Pictorial History of the American Carnival," by Joe McKennon (Popular Press, Bowling Green, Ohio. Copyright 1972 by Joe McKennon.)

{{Commons category|Sideshow}}

• [http://www.showhistory.com/ Showhistory.com: History of the Sideshow]
• [http://goodmagic.com/carny/index.htm Dictionary of Carnival and Sideshow Slang]
• [http://houseofdeception.com/Carnival_Sideshow_Bibliography.html House of Deception] bibliography of sideshow history

{{Circus skills}}

Category:Circus skills

Category:Culture of the United States

Category:Entertainment in the United States

Category:Theatrical genres