Visual Materials
Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Combined Shows
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Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey : the greatest show on Earth
Visual Materials
Image of numerous circus acts including acrobats, aerialists, tumblers, clowns, equestrians with horses, elephants, camels, and dogs performing in a large arena under a big tent in front of an audience; "The Greatest Show on Earth" globe logo at bottom right.
priJLC_ENT_000026
Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Combined Shows : Gargantua the great
Visual Materials
Image of a fierce gorilla holding an African warrior over his head as other warriors with swords and shields run away; date sheet for a June 28, [1940], show in Springfield, Massachusetts, pasted below image.
priJLC_ENT_000043
P.T. Barnum’s greatest show on Earth, & the Great London Circus combined with Sanger's Royal British Menagerie & Grand International Allied Shows
Visual Materials
Image of a circus chariot featuring "The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe" pulled by a team of horses on a dirt road with rolling hills in background; with a panel of small portraits of P.T. Barnum, J.A. Bailey and J.L. Hutchinson at left.
priJLC_ENT_000024
Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Combined Shows : presenting one hundred and fifty horses in “the fete of the garlands.”
Visual Materials
Image of male and female equestrians riding horses through garland arches held up by other riders in a tented circus ring.
priJLC_ENT_000045
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Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey. (Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Combined Shows)
Visual Materials
This collection contains more than 650 printed items that relate to circuses in the United States from the 1850s to the 1990s. The collection consists of advertising and promotional materials, business records, and illustrations produced for or pertaining to circuses, their tours and shows, staff and performers, acts and exhibits, and animals. Materials are arranged in three series: small-size prints and ephemera (11 x 14 inches or less); large-size prints and ephemera (more than 11 x 14 inches); and broadsides and handbills. The collection has 206 large-size items comprised mainly of lithographic posters containing brightly colored images of featured circus acts, performers, and animals that were typically posted outdoors in advance of the circus coming to town. Small-size items in the collection number more than 320 and are comprised mainly of advertising and promotion ephemera and business documents such as trade cards, programs and souvenir books, route cards, envelopes, tickets, songsters, and printed billheads and letterheads. The 130 broadsides, handbills, and related advertisements consist primarily of long, narrow broadsides printed on newspaper paper in black ink using letterpress type that advertised upcoming circus shows and were intended to be distributed by hand, left in stacks in public places, or posted on walls, fences, or in windows in advance of the circus's arrival in a town. This collection provides a resource for studying the history of the American circus and its impact on popular entertainment and advertising in the 19th and 20th centuries. As graphic materials, the items offer evidence of the development of printmaking techniques and trends, and of the artists, engraves, lithographers, printers, and publishers involved in the creation of these prints.
priJLC_ENT_000061
Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Combined Shows : world's biggest menagerie
Visual Materials
Image of a hippopotamus in a lake with mouth agape, and a rhinoceros just behind in grasslands; "The Greatest Show on Earth" globe logo at lower left.
priJLC_ENT_000065