Thank you for the information Margaret
BEATTY TO BAR TYRONS IN 1937 BIG CAGE ACT
Chicago, Jan. 2 (UP) - Clyde Beatty, the 135 pound wild animal trainer, will not show "tyrons" in his circus or his moving picture this year.
The "tyrons" he said, are crosses between lions and tigers, but Beatty found them "disappointing." The two he sought died in Munich before he arrived there, but they would have been valueless for motion pictures, anyhow, because their stripes are too indistinct to register on films.
Only three of the strange hybrids have been born. The third is still alive at the Berlin zoo.
American circus goers have been overly entertained in comparison with European shows said Mrs. Beatty who last year began taking lessons in mastering the savage lions, tigers and elephants.
"European circuses are tiny things compared to the shows here," she said.
[The News-Sentinel, Saturday, January 2, 1937]
PING PONG KEEPS HIM FIT CLYDE BEATTY RELATES
New York, Mar. 27. - Clyde Beatty, a slight and handsome little fellow who tames lions and tigers for a living, sat in his dressing room at the Hippodrome today and discussed life - and death - in the name of Cole Bros.-Clyde Beatty circus from Rochester, Ind.
He had just come out of a cage filled with 37 of these gentle creatures. He had been running at top speed, parrying their huge swift claws with a chair and yelling like a madman.
"I still get a great kick out of every performance," said Beatty, who has been in the business 13 years and is now 32. "And I still think I'm less scared and in better shape than any prizefighter who has been in the ring that long."
"Courage and bluff and experience," he said, "are the great things in this business. If you back up they'll follow you. The thing to do is rush right at them."
Beatty explained the lion is something of a bully himself. "He makes a lot of noise, but if you stand up to him and yell right back, your chances of beating him are better," he said.
Beatty at the moment is trying to produce something new in wild animals by breeding a male lion with a female tiger. If successful the issue would be called, says Beatty, a "liger." He explained they have bred a male tiger and a female lion in Germany and produced what they called a "tigon."
Asked what sport he played to keep in shape for lion taming, Beatty said "ping pong."
[The News-Sentinel, Saturday, March 27, 1937]
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
For Mary Ann--Regarding Beatty and ligers/tiglons/tyrons
Posted by
Wade G. Burck
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5 comments:
Wade, thank you very much for this. Would you happen to know who has the records for Clyde Beatty's Jungleland Zoo - Fort Lauderdale, Florida? I know that it's difficult to track down records for defunct zoos because I have have attempted it in the past. Thank you so much.
Mary Ann
Margaret, thank you very much for this.
Mary Ann
Mary Ann,
I can only assume most all of it would be word of mouth.
Wade
Wade, if that's the case, it would be like looking for a needle in a haystack, since apparently this zoo was only open for one year c. 1960, and was obviously a private zoo. Sometimes the records of a defunct public zoo will pass into the hands of the local government, but my guess would be that for a private zoo, they would become part of the estate?
Mary Ann
i believe jungleland was operated for several years in the early-mid 1940s in ft. lauderdale. i'm not sure about the history, though in one of his books beatty wrote a chapter about a hippo escaping from the zoo and the problems recapturing him. this was during harriett's lifetime as i have seen videos of her working the tiger/elephant act at jungleland. beatty also had another florida zoo around 1960 that is probably the one you are talking about. i think it was a little farther north than ft. lauderdale. i remember when it opened but i didn't hear much about it after it opened, and i don't know how long it lasted or how well it did.
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