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, Circus People Susceptible To Uncommon Superstitions• • • •FRIDAY THE 13th/hat of people in show usiness? We shall dwell at ne moment on the subject f certain fears of circus folk i general. They can differ omewhat from the more amiliar superstitions o f itizens outside oicircusdom. 'or instance we had some esearch jinxes and taboos on hose of the G.S.O.E. ap-ropriate for today’s date leemed unhicky Friday by some people.Black cats, broken mirrors ind Friday the 13th hold no errors for the seasoned roupers at Ringling Bros, md Bamum Bailey Circus. However there are hordes of ther superstitions peculiar tothe world of sawdust and spangles to which every performer in the pursuit of lis risky livelihood i srespectful. A lengthy list of proscribed activities exists, and few among the artists at The Greatest Show on Earth are foolhardy enough t ochallenge them. Any Circus veteran can tell you that putting a hat on the bed is strictly taboo. Other activities to be avoided are whistling in the dressing room; dropping peanut shells on the floor in that area. Setting shoes on the shelf in the dressing room is considered another invitation to disaster, and finding an abandoned pair there is clearly a bad omen.HARMONICAS and camel-back trunks are also scarce backstage at The Greatest Show on Earth since both are considered unlucky. Whenthere’s no audience in the arena, Circus performers will never sit on the curb of a ring with their backs to the empty seats. And if there's someone knitting in the first few, r^ws during a performance, beware! Should some part of a costume be inadvertently donned badkwards, Circils people believe that it portends trouble to put it on correctly, and will even perform wearing the article of clothing still reversed.THERE IS also a strong belief that accidents come in threes, and after a mishap, performers anxiously wait for the next of the three.Yellow is universally con-- *tvsidered an ill-fated color, since a famous flying trapeze act, clad in yellow tights, suffered a fatal accident. Since so many colors were jinxed, either due to bad lighting or caprices of fate, white soon became the lucky costume color for aerialists and acrobats. “White at night under the lights is always right,” is a lengendary sawdust saying.MERLE EVANS KNOWS THE ICY FINGERS OF SUPERSTITION even affectthe Circus Musicians. Sarasota’s Merle Evans, the illustrious former bandmaster and conducter of The Greatest Show' on Earth’s musicians, had an aversion to playing ’’Light Cavalry” for many years. On three separate occasions after his band had played this selection, disaster befell the Circus — two railroad wrecks and a fatal accident. Good fortune seemed to return with the omission of this number. The playing of “The Stars and Stripes Forever” is the sign of impending disaster, and “Twelfth Street Rag” signals the efowns to come into the arena and distract the audience in the event of an accident. And when you attend a performance of Ringling Bros, and Barnum Bailey Circus, the band never plays Home, Sweet Home” under any circumstances until the final night of the season. To ■ play this number prior to the last show of the season is to invite trouble.HOW AND WHY thesesuperstitions came into existence goes back as far as the first acrobat to perform for the Pharoahs, and the oldest painted wagons that bumped and jostled from one town to another. The people at Ringling Bros .and Barnum Bailey Circus can’t give any enlightening explanations, but they can tell you that their well-being rests heavily on the proper attention to these traditions.And one who has never swung high over the arena from a slender metal bar or faced 17 snarling tigers alone inside a cage can possibly dispute their word.SOUTH SUN COAST44I
Newspaper Details
Sarasota Herald Tribune
Sarasota, Florida, US
Fri, May 13, 1977
Page 11
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
USA 18 May 2020
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