P T Barnum

P. T. Barnum (Phineas Taylor Barnum) , 1810-91, American showman, b. Bethel, Conn. As a youth Barnum worked at diverse sales jobs and managed a boardinghouse. He made his first sensation in 1835 when he bought and exhibited Joice Heth, a slave who claimed she was 161 years old (she was about 80) and had been the nurse of George Washington. In 1842 he opened the American Museum in New York City and immediately became famous for his extravagant advertising and his exhibits of freaks. Among his great attractions were the Fiji Mermaid (formed by joining the upper half of a monkey to the stuffed lower half of a fish), "General Tom Thumb," who was viewed by over 20 million people, and the original Siamese Twins, Chang and Eng. In 1850, Barnum managed the American tour of the Swedish singer Jenny Lind and, with his talent for publicity, made it a huge financial success for her and for himself. In 1855 he retired from show business; he served as mayor of Bridgeport, Conn., and in the Connecticut legislature. Driven into bankruptcy by unwise business ventures, he reopened the American Museum and then organized his famous circus, "The Greatest Show on Earth," which opened in Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1871. In 1881 he merged with his most successful competitor, James A. Bailey, and under the name Barnum and Bailey the circus continued for a generation after Barnum's death. The stellar attraction of the circus was Jumbo, the 6 1/2 -ton African elephant that Barnum purchased from the London Zoo despite the furious protests of English elephant fanciers, including Queen Victoria. His autobiography was published in 1855 and went through many editions. He also wrote Humbugs of the World (1865), Struggles and Triumphs (1869), and Money Getting (1883).

Bibliography: See his autobiography, ed. by W. R. Browne (1927, repr. 1961); N. Harris, Humbug: The Art of P. T. Barnum (1981); A. Tompert, The Greatest Show on Earth (1987).

Barnum P.T. (1810–1891), show man, politician, circus owner, one of America's premier show‐business entrepreneurs.Born on a farm in Bethel, Connecticut, Phineas Taylor Barnum in 1836 went on the road, selling tickets for Aaron Turner's traveling show. Tiring of itinerant show business, he in 1841 purchased a museum in New York City, where he featured a menagerie and such attractions as the dwarf Charles Stratton (1838–1883), better known as Tom Thumb. In 1850, he successfully promoted the American tour of the singer Jenny Lind, the “Swedish Nightingale.” In 1865, he won a seat in the Connecticut legislature. During his term, his American Museum in New York was destroyed by fire; and he was more than ready in 1870 to join William Coup and Dan Costello in the circus business.

Eventually buying out his partners, he combined his circus with that of James Bailey in 1881 to form the Barnum and Bailey Combined Circus, a touring show, taking advantage of the nation's growing network of railroads, that could justifiably lay claim to being the “Greatest Show on Earth”—indeed, one big enough to present Jumbo, “the world's largest elephant,” among its many attractions. Jumbo made over one million dollars for Barnum before he was hit by a train in 1885. Ever the innovator, Barnum continued to display Jumbo's hide in the menagerie of the circus. A showman to the end, Barnum lived in Bridgeport, Connecticut, where he had built a lavish mansion, Iranistan. A man who could take the smallest and the largest and turn them into wonders for young and old, Barnum enlivened and enriched nineteenth‐century America.
See also Antebellum Era; Circuses; Gilded Age; Leisure; Minstrelsy; Vaudeville.

Bibliography

Irving Wallace , The Fabulous Showman, 1967.
Wilton Eckley , The American Circus, 1984.

Wilton E. Eckley

Barnum, P[hineas] T[aylor] (1810–91), Connecticut‐born impresario, began his career (1835) by exhibiting an aged black woman fraudulently claimed to have been George Washington's childhood nurse. His career as a New York City showman he continued in his American Museum (founded 1842), which combined sideshows, stage entertainment, and exhibition of curios. It attracted crowds by extravagant publicity and advertising, in which he originated methods that became characteristic of American show business. His international reputation began with his first European tour (1844) with his dwarf, “General Tom Thumb,” and was extended when he brought to the U.S. foreign stars, such as the “Swedish nightingale” Jenny Lind, whose tour he managed in 1850–52. In 1871 he organized his circus, advertised as “the greatest show on earth,” which dominated that type of entertainment, especially after his merger (1881) with his chief competitor, James A. Bailey. Barnum's books include his Life (1855, frequently revised) and The Humbugs of the World (1865).