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History: When the Circus Came to Sheridan
CIRCUS IS COMING TUESDAY, JUNE 21ST – was the headline in the Daily Enterprise on June 2, 1910. The Sells-Floto Combination to Pitch Their Tents in Sheridan. One of our leading exchanges in speaking of the Sells-Floto circus, which is billed to show in this city Tuesday, June 21, says: Thousands of people enjoyed the performances of the Sells-Floto circus yesterday afternoon and last night. Those who attended the performances were struck with the cleanliness and neatness of the people and animals connected with the organization. Everything was pleasing to the eye and to the ear. The accommodations were perfect, and the attention given the visitors by the attaches were all that anyone could expect.
The animals are sleek and well fed and in the lot is one of the rarest collections ever seen with a circus — a trio of baby tigers. There is a large herd of elephants and camels, and some very rare specimens of tropical animals. While there were many things to attract the attention of the visitor one of the most interesting was the collection of handsome horses known as the world-famed Armour six-horse team, which have won prizes in all quarters of the world.
The features of the program are the Nelson family, the flying Nelsons, the Rhoda royal horses. Flora Bedini and Florence Meers, the Bartik Russian Cossacks. Billy Melrose and Myrs Meers, the riding Rooneys, and the score of world-famous clowns.
This show has toured Mexico and Canada this year and is the only one that has accomplished that traveling feat this season. As a whole, the performances were the most entertaining and complete ever seen in Richmond, and while this was the first visit of this organization to this city, it will be welcomed again. Not only were the usual circus features of the highest class, but the band proved to be a splendid one, embracing a number of soloists of national reputation. A feature of the performance was the appearance in the arena of two clowns in the shape of a genuine American goose and an old Virginia turkey. This pair created much amusement by their antics, and kept the children interested while they were going through their stunts. This circus has been on the road since early in the spring and has covered more ground than any other similar organization.
In speaking of the circus to a Journal reporter yesterday evening General Manager Colonel Franklin said that the organization had traveled through much new territory this year, and in every instance the people were loud in their praise of the performances. “We try to give the people what they want,” he said, “and we have cut out anything that might tend to offend anyone. Ladies can see our show without feeling that something may happen to offend good taste.”
Circus is the name for a traveling company of performers. Depending on how one defines ‘Circus’, it either started in ancient Rome when they held horse and chariot races, gladiatorial combats, and displays of trained animals, or in the 1700s in England. The earliest circus venue in Rome was Circus Maximus, built around 600 B.C.
However, most writers agree that modern circuses started in the 18th century, when Philip Astley, an English Calvary officer, opened an amphitheater in Lambeth, London, in April of 1768 to display horse riding. He called this performance arena a Circle a but in time it became known as a Circus.
The first circus in the United States was founded by in 1793 by a man name of John Bill Ricketts. Possibly the largest traveling circus was “The Barnum & Bailey Greatest Show on Earth,” which toured throughout the United States from 1897 to 1902.
Of course, in Wyoming, who can forget Buffalo Bill and his Congress of Rough Riders, which could have been considered a Western Circus.
The first reference of a circus coming to town that was found in the Wyoming Newspapers was this ad from The Cheyenne Daily News, June 28, 1875
Sheridan hosted the biggest circus venues of the era. Barnum and Baily, Ringlings and the Sells-Floto Circus. Circuses were a big deal in Sheridan in 1911, with people coming from throughout the area to be entertained by the animals, trapeze artists and to see the sideshows. This from The Daily Enterprise, August 8 – 15,000 People at Ringling’s Circus Canopied Amphitheater 18 Crowded to Capacity in Afternoon. Ringling’s Circle Comprising Very Long Trains, is Largest Attraction Ever Seen Here. Ringling Brothers’ circus showed in Sheridan yesterday both afternoon and evening and people came from miles and miles around to witness the attraction. Over 13,000 attended the afternoon performance and filled almost every available seat in the canopied amphitheater. In the evening only one fourth that number was present. Three rings were used for exhibition purposes and throughout the performance one attraction followed another in rapid succession. There were no tedious waits between acts, and in fact that people hardly had time from one gasp of breath to another, so thrilling and spectacular were the acts. The thousands who attended both shows went away well satisfied and claimed they had gotten their money’s worth. The diverse side shows attracted several hundred but by far the majority sought entrance to the main show.
The zoological collection is the finest ever shown here. “Mostly all of the out-of-town people who visited the circus departed for their homes last night. People were here from all the coal mining camps north of Sheridan, from Parkman. Ranchester, Dayton, Big Horn, Banner, Buffalo. Clearmont, Gillette. Arvada, and from Birney, Kirby and Decker. Mont. In fact, the surrounding country was depleted of people for the day. The first circus train got away from Sheridan at 9:45 and was followed at 1:45 by the second section. The third and fourth sections departed from here at 2:30 p.m. and 2:15 p.m. respectively.
A jump was made from Sheridan to Billings, where the circus is showing today.
This article in The Sheridan Enterprise, August 20, 1916, describes what the circus entailed, and how many rail cars were needed to transport the animal and human performers.
Announcement is made that the ” great Barnum and Bailey circus, the largest traveling, will exhibit in Sheridan, Saturday, August 26th. instead of Friday, August 25th, as originally announced. The circus will come here from Greeley where it exhibits Thursday and will arrive here on Saturday morning. Eighty-five cars are required to transport this enormous organization, and two performances and a street parade will be given here. The circus is upon its way to the toast and the performances to be given in Sheridan will be in every respect the same as given in all the largest cities of the country.
The price of admission to the circus, including the menagerie, is fifty cents, and it is promised that the display of animals will be the largest and most comprehensive ever brought into Wyoming. All the more common types will be upon view, together with specimens of the rarer and seldom-seen animals. An entire family of giraffes, including a baby, born last January, will attract wide attention, as will fine specimens of the big horned rhinoceros, hippopotamus, Malay tapir, Thompson’s gazelle and other types.
Thirty elephants and two caravans of camels occupy places of honor in the circus zoo and the animals are exhibited (day) and night, being electrically illuminated. The circus itself, which is scheduled for two and eight o’clock p. m., Saturday, is pledged to be the very last word in excellence and the circus folk say the dictionary would be torn Into I shreds in even a feeble effort to do it justice.
In its essentials one big circus must be like another, for the public expects the circus of today to be at least reminiscent of the circus of a generation ago. It is in keeping the circus circusy and at the same time in step with the march of progress that the ingenuity of the managers is taxed.
This year’s Barnum and Bailey’s show has all the old circus atmosphere with 1916 decorations and presents what has everywhere been characterized as the most novel and diverting program of its long career.
The circus will open with a pageant which, for beauty, of design, and gorgeousness of color and costume, surpasses anything presented in former years.
It will represent in processional form the gorgeous splendors of the pageants of the Thousand and One Nights. Over 1,000 persons take part together with scores of horses and elephants. There’s nothing the Barnum show hasn’t got that any circus ever had and there’s a whole lot they will present in Sheridan, which no other circus could afford to present. It will be the zippiest, yippiest, nippiest circus that ever flashed through three solid hours of solid fun and wonderment, making memories of former circuses fade into limbo.
The Daily Enterprise June 21, 1910
In this article from The Daily Enterprise, August 4, 1911, it talks about some of the behind the scenes at Ringling’s Circus, and people who travel with the circus.
Big Circus Outfit With Ringlings Circus life is not without its reward. The work is hard, but the life is in the open while the fields and the trees are green, and the skies are distilling health for all nature. Husbands, wives, sons and daughters, uncles and aunts, travel together, and like the snail they carry their home around with them.
This home is a well-equipped and cozy Pullman train, and though modest in space, it is made to bloom cheerily by a genuine domestic pride. The most wonderful circus train in the world is owned by the Ringling Brothers. It is a Tower of Babel. The 1,280 people speak almost every language under the sun. The social side of this big family is interesting. There are card clubs, a woman’s club, and a clown society; Cosmopolitan club and a baseball team.
The feminine touch of refinement is to be seen about the living part of the circus tents as well as in the cars. The dressing tents have no hardwood floors, but soft carpets are spread over the grass, and on these each artist gathers her little parties. The Cosmopolitan club was started last season.
Very few of its members speak English, and they stumble hopelessly. It is a polyglot club working far from home and needing such fellowship. At present they are learning to speak English, under the guidance of a little American rider.
There are fifty children with the show. Many are the sons and daughters of performers — in a sense born to the business. Others are the children of relatives. Some are apprenticed. The boys and girls go to the circus school and study with greater zest because of splendid physical health and six months’ separation from school routine. Their teachers are furnished by the management. When the big show comes to Sheridan on Monday, August 7, the first thing that will be noticed is its vast improvement. From its first day of existence, it has grown rapidly from year to year, but never before has it shown such progress as during recent years.
Its history reads like a miracle. Five boys began with nothing but one horse and a wagon. They all worked like beavers. They began to grow in spite of the bitterest opposition. They grew to a tremendous size and their opponents fell away from them in amazement. They kept on growing leaving all other shows so far behind them as to be entirely out of sight. The splendid organization they are now maintaining is a model of enterprise and a pattern of excellence. They have elevated the circus business from gypsy-like methods and placed It among the arts. As a business proposition it is run like a bank. When it comes to giving comfort to patrons, no theater in the country was ever operated with more painstaking effort.
The circus was a big event in Wyoming during the early 20th century, but in 2017, The Greatest Show on Earth, and many smaller circus troupes shut down due to financial difficulties and protests from many animal rights groups, who felt the trainers mistreated the animals in their care.
Over 100 years ago, the circus was an anticipated part of the summer entertainment in Sheridan and many other Wyoming towns.
