This photo is odd as all the babies don't appear to be neck chained two abreast as they are in the pictures below. Two different towns/parades? Who is the clown riding the lead elephant in a few of the pictures?
Monday, March 19, 2012
Ringling Bros. Circus?
Posted by
Wade G. Burck
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4 comments:
Wade, I don`t think these are Ringling elephants. I remember Richard Reynolds telling me that Ringling never put ad`s on their elephants for parade. Am I right Richard ?? Maybe a Corporation Show !!
Hal,
Neck chained in pair's is what led me to think it was Ringling. I too will await the walking, talking encyclopedia. The picture posted suggesting it was either he or David Orr was my attempt to "lure" him out to either deny or confirm. :)
Yeah Wade, I`m not the expert on this, but Richard, Bob Cline and myself were looking at some old Cole Bros parade pictures with the bulls having ads on them and Richard said Ringling never did that to his knowledge, and Richard sure has the knowledge !!! I can`t say that I`ve ever seen any Ringling photos of the ad banners around the inside of the big top like a lot of other shows did also.
Hal,
I only did banner's once, on the old Texas Dates. Awful job to have to perform. The Shrine sold the ad's, collected the money, and pieced out each act 100.00 and that was it. Each trainer had to give the groom's something out of that 100.00 so you know it was not a big money maker for anybody but the Shrine, who made a fortune. Lee Keener with Tommy and 5 more, Bucky Steele with 4, Larry French with Oscar Christiani's 4, and the Hawthorn 8 for a total of 22 elephants. Each banner had different ad's on the back side and after going around the track once, as you passed for a return trip the Shine nobles "flipped" them over and you continued on your way. You did 10 trips around the hippodrome, with each ad being shown twice. 44 banner ads sold in each of 5 cites on the Texas Circuit. You had to carry the banners twice, before the show and at intermission time and got 100.00 for each date, not each week.
I am glad out got "out of elephants" before the ride insanity started in the early 80's. I have always disagreed with using performing animals for anything other then performing. It just never seemed right to degrade athletes, of which performing animals are by making them perform "double duty" as beast's of burden or walking bill boards. That's just my opinion.
Wade
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