Evening Star Newspaper, May 4, 1930, Page 105

THE SUNDAY'STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, MAY 4, 1930. 15 Champion Story Teller of the Big Top For Forty Years Dexter W. Fellows Has Ballyhooed the Sawdust Ring, and Here He Gives You His Prize Yarns of CtrcusPeople BY GILBERT SWAN. Sketches by George Clark. HE “big top” is on the move again . « - moving to the music of creak- ' ing wagon hubs and the click of steel rails . . . moving to the flick- . er of torches and arcs; up with the dawn and gone with the night . . . moving under storm and star . . . dragging through spoke-deep mud and skimming over ice-smooth highways . . . meeting a thousand adver- sities, and getting a thousand breaks: And always moving on, for the song of the big top is this: “I am the circus, here today and gone tomorrow.” Along dusty country roads, barefoot boys still stand in excited awe before the gaudy and alluring posters of the wonders to be unfolded in the big town which liss down the road. Meanwhile, as master of ceremonies of this * glamorous pageant, goes one Dexter W. Fellows, the world champion circus exploiter, a man grown gray in the service of tinsel and carni- val. No one individual in all the United States knows so many people. The newspaper editors and the newspaper writers from one end of the land to the other greet him like some lost brother. His arrival in any newspaper office is signal for half the stafl to jump from type- writers and rush up with a greeting. And Dexter never forgets them. Three years after a visit, he’ll ask some obscurc editor about how his sick wife is progressing. When he first arrives in New York to pave the way for the “grand opening” of the season in Madison Square Garden, it's the signal for half the writers in Manhattan to rush over to his hotel and exchange gossip about all the - newspaper affairs of the Nation. To be sure, they exit with some few items about the tem- permanental elephant and the tattooed wonder, for Dexter has had some 40 years in which to absorb the tales of the circus and its folk. IRST,” began Dexter, “I'll answer a few questions that people have been asking. “There’s been a lot of talk about motcriuing the circuses. Yes, some of the smaller outfits now travel in motor trains. But we’'ve stayed circus and will. Elephant and horsepower still haul our wagons over the lots, and the trained elephants still carry our stakes and poles. 1 don’'t know, but when ycu hit one of those muddy lots with a motor-driven vehicle you're always getting stuck. It takes elephants and horses to drag 'em out. And then there’s a circus flavor about the big horse teams. “That reminds me of a story. “A few years ago we had an old fellow with the big show who Was a particularly great horseman. When it came to teams there were few to beat him in the world. A 10 or 20 horse team was nothing to him. And all his life he had nursed an ambition. He wanted to drive a 40-horse team. The time came when he got his chance. And was he proud? You couldn’t keep him away from them. “Every day he'd perch up in his seat, take the reins and away he would go, the proudest man in the world. Well, he was gefting pretty old, and it got to be part of his life. He'd bore every one to death with the story of his horses, like a father talks about the smart things his child says. “WE went nto Winter quarters. All the horses were sent out, and the old fellow was all by himself in Bridgeport, which was then the Winter camping ground. All through the Winter months he brooded. Each day ecame and he’d worry about his horses. We began to be bothered about him. But he got worse and worse-—and one morn- ing they found him dead. He'd just naturally broken his heart because he'd been separated from his horses. The circus is full of stories to match that one. “By the way, did I ever tell you the story about the Baroness de Barcy, our bearded lady? No? Well, she was literally @riven from the circus, and we've never had a bearded lady since. Bearded ladies, by the way, are getting pretty scarce. > “After we lost her, we sent word all over. And one day a woman came in who had been a bearded lady, and reformed. I mean she had removed her beard. She'd had & romance with- one of the performers and had shaved off her beard. But to show us that shc could become a bearded lady again if we wanted her, she let the beard grow for a few days. Her husband raised so much cain about it that she changed her mind. UT that'’s getting away from the baroness. They used to say she really had been a member of a royal family and that her title was not phony. Anyway, I happen to know that she could speak three or four languages _'nuently and was more than ordinarily clever. “All went well until she got into some sort ot a personal feud with the fire eater. Don't laugh—a lot of people hlve;lluzhed at this one. But it’s true, every word of it. Didn't - she quit the circus to avoid a nervous break- - down? The thing had slowly been driving her mad for a whole season. “No ot ever found out what the feud was - about; they only knew that the fire eater had it in for her and was determined on some form of vengeance. In the course of the season's tour, they were placed chair to chair in the side show. “THBN it was that his extraordinary plot took shape. One day, just before he took his mouthful of fire, he whispered to the Baroness, ‘Now I'll get you’ Wherewith he S 4 shot his stream of flame directly at her precious- beard. She dodged just in time. There was an odor of burning hair, and at one of the . Sullivan, the boxing elephant. “Old John made the whole trip on foot; laid the wreath on the grave and walked back to the garden. I think that was the strangest jaunt an elephant ever took.” edges the beard was slightly singed. You see, the fire eater knew well that she had one of the most valuable beards if the circus business. “It was her stock in trade. It was quite a while before any of us found out what had been going on behind the scenes of the side show, But the Baroness was breaking under the strain. At least once a day the vengeful fire eater would take a shot at her beard with the flame. She never knew when it was coming. “Sometimes, when the crowd had gathered in the tent, he would turn about quickly and let go. Then he would pass it off as a joke. He would make some wisecrack to the customers, who would laugh and think it funny. But to the Baroness it was no joke. “The season ended just in time to save her. She was on the verge of a complete collapse and was in the hands of a physician for sever:1 weeks. She lefgpthe circus—and I've never seen her from that day to this.” ‘HE conversation drifted to the menageric and to the animals. “Well, let’s see,” mused the narrator. “Our most famous animal at the moment is John, the veteran elephant. You have heard, of course, that Goliath, our giant sea lion, died in Winter quarters. “Way back when Adam Forepaugh was in the circus business, John was known as John L. You know, he would stand up on his hind feet, put on huge boxing gloves and step into a fight. He was . known all over the 'land, for he’s perhaps the . oldest elephant traveling with a circus. “He's at least 100 years old or more. ‘And they don’t use him for stunts. He's a great attraction for the kids in the menagerie, for I'm telling you, that old fellow knows more about the show business than I do. He knows from years of experience just how to hold his trunk to catch the peanuts; he knows when to be funny and when to be severe. “Funny thing about old elephants like that. We keep him on the pay roll, to be sure, but he's worth his weight in gold as a lead elephant. He always heads the elephant parade and leads the rest, for he no longer is bothered or acts up or shies when a dog or a rabbit or something jumps up in front of him. He's been through every trick of the trade. Things that might stampede other elephants leave him cold. And so he keeps the others together. . “But what I was intending to tell you about was the time that Old John had the proudest moment of his life. You probably know that over at Somers, N. Y., trere’s a place called the Elephant Tavern, one of the very historic spots left from the Revolutionary days. And in front of this tavern there’s a monument to Old Bet, said to have been the first elephant ever brought to America. Some cne once said that Old Bet had been John’s mother, but there’s no way of proving it. But just in case it might turn out that way some day, we decided to give John a chance to do something fine for Old Bet. “Well, we started John on a march from Madison Square Garden to the monument. Old John was carrying a wreath to put on the statue. And when we gat to Fifth Avenue the crowds became so thirk =watching John go up the street that the old feiow thought it was a parade and began doing his best parade stuff. It got to the newspaper doys quick, and pretty soon we were being traJled by taxis and special cars and photographers and special writers. . “At that time the H'podrome was running, and some bird over t ece had the nerve to challenge Old Bet’s claim to being the first elephant. But Old John made the whole trip on foot, laid the wreath on the grave, and walked back to the Garden. I think that was,- perhaps, the strangest jaunt an elephant ever took in this country.” ND so we fell to talking about tunny in< cidents, by way of contrast. “Let's see—funny things? I don't believe there ever was a funnier show put on than that staged by Buffalo Bill when he went back to his home place, North Platte. In case you don’t know it, the wild west show was born in that town. I was Cody’s press man for a long time. “Anyway, his cowboy troupe had grown until he toured the nation with it, and then went abroad. “With a world-wide reputation in his pocket, the colonel had one dream. He wanted to take his show back to North Platte and give the home folks an idea what he had done. “So we came into North Platte. And you can imagine what happened in those when there were ‘bars in them '.harhflll The colonel and the whole darn troupe hit for leading bar to celebrate. And was there,. whoopee? > “So it went until it came show time. The boys were at the grounds on time, but'the first next act was a champion rope performer, a Spanish lad. We knew that the cowboys out there would have a close eye on him. And was that lad tight? He started some of the routine tricks and inside of three minutes he wuaounsledlnhisownloopsthathealmt hanged himself. “I GOT pretty worried, for I soon found out that the ropers were missing their steers and the bronco riders were getting thrown al} over the lot. It was a riot—never anything like it. Only Annie Oakley and Johnny Baker, the crack shots, stayed sober, Even the In- dians had got hold of some red-eye. “By this time I was scared to death; began to wonder what the editor of the paper would say. I knew that if the show was panned it would break Cody’s heart, for this was his home port. “Almost out of breath, I ran full tilt to the editor’s office and asked what he was going to write. I apoligized for what had happened— and almost got thrown out for my trouble. “‘Say, lad,’ said ye ed, ‘If Buffalo Bill came home here and his crowd didn’t get tight we wouldn’t think we were.good hosts. Run along now while you're healthy. Bill and his bunch. will get theé whole paper.’ “HOW about the clowns? Yes, I know, every one likes to hear about the clowns. “There’s the tragic story of Slivers. I'h not sure any one knows all of it, but of all the laugh-clown-laugh stories ever told, the fadee out of Slivers has always secemed to me the saddest. You see, I saw Slivers on that night when he and the circus parted company for the last time. He was acting queer then and, you remember, he finally killed himself. “Anyhow, Slivers was a great clown and 8 Continued on Sirteenth Page