Those Amazing Ringlings and their Circus by Gene Plowden

"Sure, it's a gamble," John admitted, "but so's everything else. You'll never get ahead if you don't take a chance. Help yourself or you'll never get helped. We're smart and we can do it."


I picked up Those Amazing Ringlings and their Circus because I was interested in learning more about circus life after reading about the tattooed men and women often displayed in circuses via Vintage Tattoos by Carol Clerk.

Those Amazing Ringlings and their Circus is an extensive biography of the Ringling brothers, how their circus started, and a retelling of it's fight to keep going until the very end. It was incredibly informative and I found it quite interesting.

The Ringling brothers started off with a dream that they could create a circus to rival those big names like Barnum & Bailey. To those around them, it seemed like a goal too far away to ever be accomplished, but those people were wrong. The Ringling brothers, as you probably are well aware, are still considered somewhat of a household name, though their circus went out of business decades ago. The Ringling brothers themselves had a hand in many different enterprises during their lifetimes. John, in particular, opened a museum, created portions of the national railroad, and helped discover oil in Texas.

Overall, it's quite an interesting journey of how one family affected our nation and also, how greed makes a person become something of a villain. John Ringling may be admired for his drive and business prowess, but he was a sad, bitter old man who died with few friends still at his side. It's rather sad, in all honesty.

This book is not for everyone. It's pretty straightforward in being presented as a comprehensive history of events surrounding the rise and fall of the Ringling Circus. It took me a while to get through, though the writing is easy to read and the history intriguing. I would suggest it to anyone who really has an interest in circus history and doesn't mind a longer read.


Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥


Since the early days, circus life had had no appeal for [John]; he was a front man all the way, who liked luxury and high living. Perhaps it was more than mere coincidence that he did not show up for business conferences until the fag end of the day. By that time most men had done a day's work and were tired, thinking of getting home to wives and childen.