Saturday, 14 March 2009

Take Me Out To The Fairground, Take Me Down To The Fair

Sideshow Attractions Are Part Of The Fun Of The Fair
Sideshows The Fun Of The Fair

The Sideshow and the Carnie are often thought of as American in origin, mainly because of all the films we have all seen depicting the fairs and circuses, however as this very interesting Audio Slideshow explains, its actually a British innovation.

Unfortunately the pictures are all copyrighted, so I won't post any, but they are worth a look...... they were like this when I was a kid in the early 60's. However I have found a few pictures to enliven the page .... Many of the Silent era comedians came from Circus, Music Hall (Vaudeville), Sidehow backgrounds in the UK ....... as Mr Chaplin (the Fred Karno troupe) often showed in many of his films.

Comedian In Lion Cage
Man In Lion Cage
 
During the 1940's and 1950's the fairgrounds were and circuses were big business in the US and travelled in some style.
Circus Train

 And even now, the carney plies his trade.....

Wrestling Bear Tent
Wrestling Bear Tent

However not with quite the flair of his earlier predecessors .....

Elephant Getting In Car
Elephant Getting In Car
at

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous3 February 2013 at 11:41

    Great Pictures .....

    ReplyDelete
  2. No PC30 August 2022 at 12:23

    Hmm .... sorry I never looked for comments back then (I don't really do now anymore) so belateed thanks.

    ReplyDelete

All comments are welcomed, or even just thanks if you enjoyed the post. But please make any comment relevant to the post it appears under. Off topic comments will be blocked or removed.

Moderation is on for older posts to stop spamming and comments that are off topic or inappropriate from being posted .... comments are reviewed within 48 hours. I don't block normal comments that are on topic and not inappropriate. Vexatious comments that may cause upset to other commentators, or that are attempting to espouse a particular wider political view, are reviewed before acceptance. But a certain amount of debate around a post topic is accepted, as long as it remains generally on topic and is not an attempt to become sounding board for some other cause.

Final decision on all comments is held by the blog author and is final.

Comments are always monitored for bad or abusive language, and or illegal statements i.e. overtly racist or sexist content. Spam is not tolerated and is removed.

Commentaires ne sont surveillés que pour le mauvais ou abusif langue ou déclarations illégales ie contenu ouvertement raciste ou sexiste. Spam ne est pas toléré et est éliminé.