Strange, a huge number of people wandered in here on Sunday. What's up? Just as lost and confused as I -- if you are a circus fan feeling deserted?
Are you already missing the Circus Report? The ROUTES? It's been all of what, a month?
Out there on abandoned grass, once resplendent with tents, no longer even giving off traces of old popcorn boxes or cotton candy sticks, peanut shells neither --- the linking lights of Don Convington are still on, as he continues to send out links to circus stories. Maybe 20 people on his list.
I once suggested to Don that he might fill in some way when CR headed for the museum. He did not exactly say no.
I've also floated the idea --to almost no one until this moment, right here, right now -- that he and Ernest Albrecht join forces to produce something original and relevant. Well, have you a better idea?
Oh, boy! The Super Duper Bowl is now I think in progress. Sorry for my disrespect. Or is it Hit-Attraction Envy? Millions tuned in around the world.
Know what? I am afraid to bring up the Carson and Barnes website, fearing the worst.
Need I say any more?
See you down the road, luvs, as Billy Barton would once write. Rest in peace, Billy.
Showing posts with label Don Marcks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Don Marcks. Show all posts
Sunday, February 02, 2020
Tuesday, December 31, 2019
Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: End of the Road
Seventh and last in a series
The day was Sunday. Don Marcks did not know that I spent my 50th birthday with him, at his house. I did not play up my birthdays. I had more intimate friends, and there was always that reserve about Don, but we shared circus, the reason for my having invited myself over, as I had many times before.
Now, that is how I intended to open this post, but that is not exactly true. I discovered, when returning to my weekly At-A-Glance booklet for the year, a more specific reason for my seeking Don’s company: This I wrote: “Why Marcks? Because I’ve known him longer than any of my other friends, and we share circus”
I point this out because, memory alone can be a careless editor, which is to say that some things in these posts may be inaccurate constructions of what actually happened. Oh, how a single document can be such a beautiful thing!
Our personal lives were rarely if ever discussed other than Don now and then talking about a woman he was trying to date, or more likely, hoping to. His romantic pursuits felt to me a bit more like a pattern more than a passion.
The most intimate encounter I ever had with Don was in the ICU at Doctor’s Hospital in Richmond, only a few miles from where he lived. He had survived some medical crisis — he would suffer many — and was hopefully on the mend. I could tell it had shaken him to the core. He looked into my eyes almost with tears, and practically reached out to hold my hand, and, as if making a sacred vow, promised to continue on and make Circus Report even bigger and better than ever. I knew it was the great love of his life.
He almost never took a vacation. And rarely, to my knowledge, exercised. The only time that Circus Report subscribers missed copies was when Don was hospitalized, usually announcing in advance of having to take so many weeks off. He suffered many medical problems through the years.
Don did have an ego. He coveted his position in the CFA, as a prominent and maybe senior member of the Joseph Andrew Rowe tent. So prominent, that when another local fan, new I think to the CFA, made waves about wanting to reboot the dormant group, Don spoke harshly of the fellow – as if a move was afoot to topple his position.
Don grew suspicious of people offering to help out with Circus Report. Two locals from Berkeley wrote him with such an offer, the implication being that there would be someone to carry on when his time had passed..
Nov. 6, 1983: “She says I ought to relax the strings a bit and not work so hard, but I’m not in favor of their helping out ... I keep getting the feeling they just want to see how things are done and go get a chance to see what money comes, in. etc.”
The next time I visited Don he brought up the matter, pulling out the letter. I encouraged him to consider that their motives might be genuine. And there before my eyes, he tore it up almost in a peevish fit, and threw it into a waste basket.
The greatest compliment he ever gave me was to bring up the subject of my book, Behind the Big Top, and to tell me how books like mine had never been written before. More than that, how it seemed to me like he had made a conscious effort to force himself out of his comfort zone in order to make his recognition known. I regarded this as a supreme compliment, coming from Don. Touched by the adulation, yet there had been other books, by Dexter Fellows and by William Coup, that candidly covered some of the darker aspects of circus life, such as grift and animal abuse. Another time, Don offered me my own regular space in the paper for a weekly column. I wrote to him of my gratitude, telling him of my fears that I would write something that got us both in hot water. I had not contributed a single piece since my Irvin Feld story.
In his last letter to me, dated Dec. 3, 1995, Don ended by talking about a showboat model he had been working on, having discarded one and now considering a second try at another: “Only recently found some folks who have knowledge of the thing, because of their study or River Boats - who knows, it might arise from the ashes, as they say.”
We never arose from our own ashes. I have no letters from him during all of 1996, not a single one. Which even intrigues me to try recalling what might have silenced our dialogue
My subscription came up that year for renewal in October. $40 a year. I had grown, frankly, a little disengaged by the papers particular style — unless there was something he had done that set me off and hastened the cancellation. In the last issue I have, Oct. 28, 1996, Billy Barton’s column is missing. Perhaps he had been gone for some time.
And so I decided to spend my money, instead, on the Bandwagon, and in a brief note, dated 10/22/96, made this known to Don, singing off “Good luck on CR’s future ...”
Yes, I know, the sound of betrayal.
Seven years later, on April 3, 2003, Donald Salisbury Marcks passed away at the ageof 80. He left behind his widow, Martha. I believe she was the woman at the post office who had through the years been of great support to Don in his weekly send outs.
A Circus Auctioned to the Wind
Truly saddest of all, Don left his model circus to Richard Tuck’s then-in-the-planning Playland Not at the Beach on San Pablo Avenue in El Cerritos, where it would be displayed in separate cases. And when the museum closed in 2018, the circus, like every thing else, was auctioned off in sections. A terrible pity that it could not have been offered to a single entity, such as one of the circus museums.
The house at 525 Oak Street is no longer recognizable as the one I knew when I visited Don. The large side yard of grass upon which stood the old shed where his model circus was kept, is now a faded pink, one-story motel-like apartment house. In that long-gone shed, a twelve- or thirteen-year-old boy had once stood in rapt awe while the builder of the wagons opened large trunks to take out one, and then another, for the boy to see and to hold. To his eyes, they were the most magical objects he had ever seen. And from that same house on Oak Street, for thirty four years there had gone out a weekly circus paper to subscribers near and far.
Don in the 1970s
The day was Sunday. Don Marcks did not know that I spent my 50th birthday with him, at his house. I did not play up my birthdays. I had more intimate friends, and there was always that reserve about Don, but we shared circus, the reason for my having invited myself over, as I had many times before.
Now, that is how I intended to open this post, but that is not exactly true. I discovered, when returning to my weekly At-A-Glance booklet for the year, a more specific reason for my seeking Don’s company: This I wrote: “Why Marcks? Because I’ve known him longer than any of my other friends, and we share circus”
I point this out because, memory alone can be a careless editor, which is to say that some things in these posts may be inaccurate constructions of what actually happened. Oh, how a single document can be such a beautiful thing!
Our personal lives were rarely if ever discussed other than Don now and then talking about a woman he was trying to date, or more likely, hoping to. His romantic pursuits felt to me a bit more like a pattern more than a passion.
Aches and Pains -- and More
The most intimate encounter I ever had with Don was in the ICU at Doctor’s Hospital in Richmond, only a few miles from where he lived. He had survived some medical crisis — he would suffer many — and was hopefully on the mend. I could tell it had shaken him to the core. He looked into my eyes almost with tears, and practically reached out to hold my hand, and, as if making a sacred vow, promised to continue on and make Circus Report even bigger and better than ever. I knew it was the great love of his life.
He almost never took a vacation. And rarely, to my knowledge, exercised. The only time that Circus Report subscribers missed copies was when Don was hospitalized, usually announcing in advance of having to take so many weeks off. He suffered many medical problems through the years.
Resisting Rivals
Don did have an ego. He coveted his position in the CFA, as a prominent and maybe senior member of the Joseph Andrew Rowe tent. So prominent, that when another local fan, new I think to the CFA, made waves about wanting to reboot the dormant group, Don spoke harshly of the fellow – as if a move was afoot to topple his position.
Don grew suspicious of people offering to help out with Circus Report. Two locals from Berkeley wrote him with such an offer, the implication being that there would be someone to carry on when his time had passed..
Nov. 6, 1983: “She says I ought to relax the strings a bit and not work so hard, but I’m not in favor of their helping out ... I keep getting the feeling they just want to see how things are done and go get a chance to see what money comes, in. etc.”
The next time I visited Don he brought up the matter, pulling out the letter. I encouraged him to consider that their motives might be genuine. And there before my eyes, he tore it up almost in a peevish fit, and threw it into a waste basket.
The Gift of Praise
The greatest compliment he ever gave me was to bring up the subject of my book, Behind the Big Top, and to tell me how books like mine had never been written before. More than that, how it seemed to me like he had made a conscious effort to force himself out of his comfort zone in order to make his recognition known. I regarded this as a supreme compliment, coming from Don. Touched by the adulation, yet there had been other books, by Dexter Fellows and by William Coup, that candidly covered some of the darker aspects of circus life, such as grift and animal abuse. Another time, Don offered me my own regular space in the paper for a weekly column. I wrote to him of my gratitude, telling him of my fears that I would write something that got us both in hot water. I had not contributed a single piece since my Irvin Feld story.
A Long and Long-Forgotten-Why Silence
.
There came an impasse between us, a wordless falling out if you will. There had been no arguments, nothing dramatic, just perhaps, on both sides, a growing number of irks and perceived slights forming a mass of vague, lingering resentment. Either of us could easily have lifted the phone and dialed the other’s number, and likely, the conversation would have flowed on.In his last letter to me, dated Dec. 3, 1995, Don ended by talking about a showboat model he had been working on, having discarded one and now considering a second try at another: “Only recently found some folks who have knowledge of the thing, because of their study or River Boats - who knows, it might arise from the ashes, as they say.”
We never arose from our own ashes. I have no letters from him during all of 1996, not a single one. Which even intrigues me to try recalling what might have silenced our dialogue
My subscription came up that year for renewal in October. $40 a year. I had grown, frankly, a little disengaged by the papers particular style — unless there was something he had done that set me off and hastened the cancellation. In the last issue I have, Oct. 28, 1996, Billy Barton’s column is missing. Perhaps he had been gone for some time.
And so I decided to spend my money, instead, on the Bandwagon, and in a brief note, dated 10/22/96, made this known to Don, singing off “Good luck on CR’s future ...”
Yes, I know, the sound of betrayal.
Seven years later, on April 3, 2003, Donald Salisbury Marcks passed away at the ageof 80. He left behind his widow, Martha. I believe she was the woman at the post office who had through the years been of great support to Don in his weekly send outs.
A Circus Auctioned to the Wind
Truly saddest of all, Don left his model circus to Richard Tuck’s then-in-the-planning Playland Not at the Beach on San Pablo Avenue in El Cerritos, where it would be displayed in separate cases. And when the museum closed in 2018, the circus, like every thing else, was auctioned off in sections. A terrible pity that it could not have been offered to a single entity, such as one of the circus museums.
The house at 525 Oak Street is no longer recognizable as the one I knew when I visited Don. The large side yard of grass upon which stood the old shed where his model circus was kept, is now a faded pink, one-story motel-like apartment house. In that long-gone shed, a twelve- or thirteen-year-old boy had once stood in rapt awe while the builder of the wagons opened large trunks to take out one, and then another, for the boy to see and to hold. To his eyes, they were the most magical objects he had ever seen. And from that same house on Oak Street, for thirty four years there had gone out a weekly circus paper to subscribers near and far.
Bill and Jan Biggerstaff bought Circus Report after Don died, and did a fine job of keeping it in circulation, twice a month, for the next nineteen years. Now it, too, is history.
And thus, the story of my friendship with fellow circus fan Don Marcks comes to a close. One day maybe, I will be on a bus going up San Pablo Avenue in El Cerrito, and get off to walk up to Mechanics Bank on the corner of Fairmount --- where I got off a bus one day long ago, to walk five blocks up and make a left on Oak.
P.S. today at 4:35 PM, I just went down to my mail box to find the last last issue of Circus Report. It feels so bleak and sad, like a defining death that I can't put into words. I don't want to put into words. As if, trying, some kind of a reigning light above the whole of what we had has gone out. Thank you, Bill and Jan, for keeping it going as long as you did. Goodbye, Circus Report, good bye.
********************************************************************************
Next week, looking back years later: A friendship formed in the church of sawdust and spangles.
All of Don’s letters will eventually join my archives at Illinois State University’s Milnar Library
first posted 12.31.19
Tuesday, December 24, 2019
Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: Anger in the In-Box ... The Invasion of Cirque du Soleil ... The Heartbeat of Billy Barton ...
Sixth in a series of seven
Prime contributors to the last great circus decade:
John Pugh, Kenneth Feld, and Cliff Vargas in the excellent 80's
Into the mid-1980s, Circus Report was riding as high as ever it would go. Came December and Don was facing a surprising parade of incoming ads for the upcoming Christmas issue. “It has been growing, and right now we are looking at 56 pages, so it will easily grow a bit more.”
Rival upstarts had come and gone. November 2, 1985: “So far I have outlasted all of the other attempts to put out a paper, including the magazine in England called ‘Performer.’ It closed after 4 issues. One thing in my favor I think is that I can keep things cheap since it is only me and everything is done right here – if someone has to pay help and a printer, etc. then it certainly does get to be costly.”
.
.
Big Top Bullies
Growth, of course, meant more ads, and with it, more pressure to please the advertisers. In deed, anything less than the expected feel-good coverage might drive a show owner over the cliff. How dare he! And they called him. And they rattled him. Some even practically demanded that a review or item be retracted. While he usually did not accede to their childish wants, their rattling kept him closer to playing it nice. Don't believe me?
July 7, 1986: “I had a call from the Gatti show saying they were really upset over the article that I had about their show in the recent issue - the item was titled ‘circus on the move’ I thought it was a nice article and said good things about the show. Now they want me to run a bit that the show is much better than was described, etc.”
“So, like I said there is no way to please everyone and at times I’m too thin skinned for some of the backlash on things. Try to do a good job and what do they do, they kick you anyway.”
Another caller the same week, wrote Don, “says I’m losing some credibility of the show folks because I print such glowing remarks about Toby Tyler by and then don’t print any bad things.”
Precariously Yours
Between 1973 and 1984, I turned out about a dozen pieces for Circus Report, some feature stories, some reviews-- none of which, by the way, he ever made any moves on editing. The story I am proudest of was a profile of Dory Miller, drawn from a generous interview he granted me. My favorite quote: “Nobody is disappointed in the AM.”
.
Did it hurt? Of course, it did. Deeply. Was I really that wretched a soul? Perhaps the most hazardous thing about writing is trying to tell the truth.
“What is interesting," wrote the ever-calm Don to me on December 3, “is that I have had several calls from folks saying they thought the article was right on an all. However, they didn’t want me to to use their name or to put their comments into print.”
“What is interesting," wrote the ever-calm Don to me on December 3, “is that I have had several calls from folks saying they thought the article was right on an all. However, they didn’t want me to to use their name or to put their comments into print.”
In fact, there were a few readers unafraid to go on the record, J. Scott Pyles calling it “the finest analysis of the man I’ve ever read.”
Have Typewriter - Will Fly
Animal Rights Activists: “The real horror story is from England. Animal acts are no longer permitted in metro London, where Austin Bros. circus was victimized when animal rights activists literally set fire to a horse tent and destroyed the horses, justifying their barbaric behavior with the remark that they were better off dead than with circuses!”
Cliff Vargas: On his passing away in 1988, "He not only rekindled public interest in the nations big tops, but single-handedly resurrected a fading industry and instilled it with a glamour and excitement heretofore lacking.”
Cirque du Soleil: Addressing the show's top guns for snidely disparaging the American circus, especially the Ringling show: “It’s easy to be disdainful of the North American circus when you don’t have to fight or struggle for existence, when you have government support and private funds as a nice cushion ... No one resents their presentation. What we resent is their attitude, and their rude unwarranted remarks. They are guests in our country, and Quebec, after all, is a short trip north across the border. Let’s face it. We have the Big Apple Circus and Circus Flora, both of which are theme circuses and real circus, and animals! ... I say, Cirque du Soleil, go home. We don’t need you.”
Don covered the remarkable rise of Cirque du Soleil fairly and fully.
Several years prior, Barton and Marcks had had a falling out, over exactly what, I can not recall. I think Don may have passed on one of Barton’s submissions. A few months passed . September 26, 1983: “Had a letter from Billy Barton who said he would like to come back...Promised he wouldn’t get on the soap box and his column would be gossip just like when he started.”
Don covered the remarkable rise of Cirque du Soleil fairly and fully.
The Last Great Decade: On July 10, 1982 in Tucson, Arizona,
Miguel Vazquez became the first flyer to turn a quad.
I wished Barton and stayed on it more. For, to be fair, many of his columns were fairly humdrum accounts of this and that person signing on to this or that show. Nonetheless, yet another parting of the ways occurred five years later. Billy may simply have been too busy with his circus performing dates.
February 22, 1988: “What to you think about Barton coming back? Boy do wonders never cease. He was was getting back to writing because of pressure from folks who missed his column — but that pressure must have come from others, it didn’t come from me ... One thing, it adds more names and info to the paper than I manage to get in otherwise.”
Billy came back. And he always signed off, “see you down the road, luv’s.” However long he lasted this time, I would not be around to know.
********************************************************************************
Next: Don's last letter to me, and mine to him.
first posted 12.24.19
********************************************************************************
Next: Don's last letter to me, and mine to him.
first posted 12.24.19
Thursday, December 19, 2019
Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: The First Issue Out
In his own words, from a voice message to me, 1982: “In case you forgot, now you know: Tonight's the Ringling circus on channel something or other at eight o’clock. You can check that out now. Also, I wanted to tell you, I got a copy of your book [Behind the Big Top] in the mail today.”
The phone rang. I picked up. Hello?
"Hey, got a moment?"
Yes.
"Listen to this." He was discretely amused by juicy gossip
"Big flare up at Ringling. Concello is out."
You’re kidding? I said that a lot. Best way to extract more.
"North blew a fit over in Paris."
Tell me what happened!
And we talked. And talked. Was there ever a more interesting subject than circus during the creatively and organizationally turbulent years of John Ringling North?
In some ways, thank you Ma Bell, it was more fun talking to Don by phone than face to face. Maybe the one-on-one secrecy of a Ma Bell connection made everything feel more confidential. We lived close enough to avoid long distance bills. And so we talked.
And I got to respect the way his mind worked. Remarkably, when it came to politics and current affairs, Don was placidly calm, as if he had been born naturally objective, as if nothing out there could ruffle him. Well, maybe except me, once. And how refreshing were his calm observations during those volatile years in American politics, I never knew what poetical party he might belong to. This bent of nature would serve him well when he turned the love of his life into a little weekly paper.
In covering this chapter in his life, incredibly, virtually all of his letters to me from the 1970s are missing. The fact that I have not a single one tells me they are all together somewhere in a folder, if still in my midst. So, some of the following details may be inaccurately recalled.
Sometime in 1971, the White Tops offered Don the job of editor, and he was mulling it over, frequently with me on the phone. I was surprised that he did not not jump. At the time, however, as I now hazily recall, Don had been batting around the idea of putting out a weekly paper. The White Tops offer knocked him off course for a bit, and we hashed it over at length. He wondered how he could handle editorships of two publications. Possibly the CFA got wind of his other idea, for, to Don’s acute consternation, they withdrew their offer — or worse, simply dropped communications and he found out from a third party. Whatever had happened, the about face did not go down well with Don, and that’s putting it mildly. He felt betrayed. At the same time, it stiffened his resolve to move ahead with some kind of a weekly.
The first issue of The Circus Report came out on January 10, 1972. Its humble graphics barely passable, it consisted of three 8-1/2 x 11 inch sheets of paper, stapled on the top left hand corner. Top of page one, .Vol. 1, No. 1:
On page 3, NEW LAW: “One frequently hears the question ‘how come all the shows are going out to the Cow Palace?’” The story was about a new San Francisco city law to keep hippies and hippie caravans off the streets. Circus caravans that parked outside the civic auditorium got lumped in with long hair squatters. The Cow Palace, in Daily City, did not have a hippie problem.
Reported Don, “Polack Bros. Circus was was the first show to feel the wrath of the city fathers. They were forced to commute from out of town trailer courts for each performance during their brief run here in May.”
On page 5, WE START This is the first issue of “The Circus Report” which will be published on a weekly basis. We hope that you will enjoy the paper and find each issue of value. Send $1.00 for a month’s subscription and don’t miss a single copy.
There was but one lone advertiser in that first issue:
Guess who? Clue. The advertiser lived in Oakland.
Just getting the weekly printed, stapled and addressed gave Don choice satisfaction. A weekly roll to ride. A weekly challenge. To his advantage, he would quickly manifest a trait that many other would-be publishers did not possess: He delivered on time. He never went to third class mail, mainly to avoid having to annually disclose circulation figures.
Subscribers gradually trickled in. Within weeks, Don was listing circus routes, perhaps the paper’s most valuable feature for both show owners and fans But the ads did not roll in that year nor the next. In fact, they were a long time in coming. Circus Report endured a long slow crawl to prosperity.
During the second year, on July 2, Don made a format change that would, for me, define my favorite Circus Report size. He printed off legal sized paper, and made a fold, producing a 7" wide by, 8-1/2 “ high size..
In time, Don had ample advertisers, and he would note a disparity between pro and amateur. The fans wrote all articles and reviews. The circus owners took out all the ads.. And those advertisers would come with pushy expectations, believing that their shows would not be knocked or even slighted by reporting or reviews. These owners and their loyal acolytes lived in a world insulated by fan worship. A world that even The Billboard shied away from objective reviewing. Don’s advertisers were accustomed to being loved and rarely if ever questioned. They were, kids, a spoiled lot.
On occasion, when Don dared to depart script, the phones rang and all hell broke lose. Never as loud as when an earthquake of vitriol slammed something I had written for Don, throwing us both for a loop. Blame it on White Tops Editor Walter H Hohenadel, who first published me at age 14, and let my nit picky cracks stand.
NEXT: To review or not to review? Never-ending circulation struggles ... Covering animal rights and Cirque du Soleil. Half staffing the office, and Billy Barton.
first posted 12.19.19
The phone rang. I picked up. Hello?
"Hey, got a moment?"
Yes.
"Listen to this." He was discretely amused by juicy gossip
"Big flare up at Ringling. Concello is out."
You’re kidding? I said that a lot. Best way to extract more.
"North blew a fit over in Paris."
Tell me what happened!
And we talked. And talked. Was there ever a more interesting subject than circus during the creatively and organizationally turbulent years of John Ringling North?
In some ways, thank you Ma Bell, it was more fun talking to Don by phone than face to face. Maybe the one-on-one secrecy of a Ma Bell connection made everything feel more confidential. We lived close enough to avoid long distance bills. And so we talked.
And I got to respect the way his mind worked. Remarkably, when it came to politics and current affairs, Don was placidly calm, as if he had been born naturally objective, as if nothing out there could ruffle him. Well, maybe except me, once. And how refreshing were his calm observations during those volatile years in American politics, I never knew what poetical party he might belong to. This bent of nature would serve him well when he turned the love of his life into a little weekly paper.
In covering this chapter in his life, incredibly, virtually all of his letters to me from the 1970s are missing. The fact that I have not a single one tells me they are all together somewhere in a folder, if still in my midst. So, some of the following details may be inaccurately recalled.
Sometime in 1971, the White Tops offered Don the job of editor, and he was mulling it over, frequently with me on the phone. I was surprised that he did not not jump. At the time, however, as I now hazily recall, Don had been batting around the idea of putting out a weekly paper. The White Tops offer knocked him off course for a bit, and we hashed it over at length. He wondered how he could handle editorships of two publications. Possibly the CFA got wind of his other idea, for, to Don’s acute consternation, they withdrew their offer — or worse, simply dropped communications and he found out from a third party. Whatever had happened, the about face did not go down well with Don, and that’s putting it mildly. He felt betrayed. At the same time, it stiffened his resolve to move ahead with some kind of a weekly.
The first issue of The Circus Report came out on January 10, 1972. Its humble graphics barely passable, it consisted of three 8-1/2 x 11 inch sheets of paper, stapled on the top left hand corner. Top of page one, .Vol. 1, No. 1:
Reported Don, “Polack Bros. Circus was was the first show to feel the wrath of the city fathers. They were forced to commute from out of town trailer courts for each performance during their brief run here in May.”
On page 5, WE START This is the first issue of “The Circus Report” which will be published on a weekly basis. We hope that you will enjoy the paper and find each issue of value. Send $1.00 for a month’s subscription and don’t miss a single copy.
There was but one lone advertiser in that first issue:
WANTED
Tape music from the Ringling Barnum Circus while under canvas.
Send details to
Guess who? Clue. The advertiser lived in Oakland.
Just getting the weekly printed, stapled and addressed gave Don choice satisfaction. A weekly roll to ride. A weekly challenge. To his advantage, he would quickly manifest a trait that many other would-be publishers did not possess: He delivered on time. He never went to third class mail, mainly to avoid having to annually disclose circulation figures.
Subscribers gradually trickled in. Within weeks, Don was listing circus routes, perhaps the paper’s most valuable feature for both show owners and fans But the ads did not roll in that year nor the next. In fact, they were a long time in coming. Circus Report endured a long slow crawl to prosperity.
During the second year, on July 2, Don made a format change that would, for me, define my favorite Circus Report size. He printed off legal sized paper, and made a fold, producing a 7" wide by, 8-1/2 “ high size..
In time, Don had ample advertisers, and he would note a disparity between pro and amateur. The fans wrote all articles and reviews. The circus owners took out all the ads.. And those advertisers would come with pushy expectations, believing that their shows would not be knocked or even slighted by reporting or reviews. These owners and their loyal acolytes lived in a world insulated by fan worship. A world that even The Billboard shied away from objective reviewing. Don’s advertisers were accustomed to being loved and rarely if ever questioned. They were, kids, a spoiled lot.
On occasion, when Don dared to depart script, the phones rang and all hell broke lose. Never as loud as when an earthquake of vitriol slammed something I had written for Don, throwing us both for a loop. Blame it on White Tops Editor Walter H Hohenadel, who first published me at age 14, and let my nit picky cracks stand.
NEXT: To review or not to review? Never-ending circulation struggles ... Covering animal rights and Cirque du Soleil. Half staffing the office, and Billy Barton.
first posted 12.19.19
Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: Into the 1980s, Thriving and Diving Through the Last Great Circus Decade
Fifth in a series on my friend Don Marcks and his The Circus Report
October 25, 1984: “I wish I could offer you a job with CR should you return to the Bay Area. Am not sure I could pay what you might need and deserve."
In the paper’s peak years, Don now and then employed a part timer, usually a student “just out of school,” but he found them to be undependable. His dependable mom was always there to help out with folding, stapling and stamping fresh sheets off the press for assembly and a trip to the local post office. One of the postal clerks showed Don support and compassion, and he would eventually marry her.
His greatest challenge were the never ending struggles to sustain circulation. He sent out free copies to new members of the various circus clubs, hit the lots with samples. His circulation high, this number sticks in my brain, may have been around 2,400. I doubt that any of the circus magazines ever matched that.
October, 5 1984: “Oh, I forgot to tell you. I’ve lost almost 300 subscribers, so I guess I have to figure out something to improve and make CR a bit more appealing. That’s a pretty big loss over the last few month. Wouldn't think it was due to my having been laid up, but never can tell."
As a news source, how good a job did Circus Report do? On the plus side, the routes were outstanding, the reporting equally so when he picked up from AP stories about mishaps under the big top (such as the Toby Tyler seating collapse), and the animal rights movement. He did not shield readers from any of these controversies or misfortunes. From corrupt phone room operations in the 1970s. He did not hide from the world. I admired that about him.
On the debit side, what Don’s weekly most sorely lacked were attendance figures under our big tops. Of course, this was not primarily Don’s fault, for the American circus has never had its own Nielsen's — and I am dead sure never wanted them. Not then. And certainly not now. The old Billboard, edited by Tom Parkinson, did a far better job of a least estimating crowd size on the lots. Nothing was more compelling to my young eyes than the headlines on the first page of its Circuses section. Example, those in the August 6, 1955 number:
Chicago Attendance Poor For Ringling; Plan to Cut Prices ... Beatty Score Well at Vancouver Stand ... Truck Delays Hit King; Crowds Fair ... Polack's Strong Spots Make Up for Decreases ... Kelly-Miller Going Strong on Extensive Wisconsin Tour ..
July 31, 1954: Cincinnati Gives R-B Strong Two-Day Biz. As reported, "Show registered one-third filled houses for the two matinees but racked up capacity business for both night shows."
Sorry to say, rosy Circus Report reviews could be numbingly predictable. And predictability does not make for must-read news. Don fell in line with other fan publications, afraid to alienate his core subscriber base. He once complained to me about all of the glowing write-ups he was getting of Circus Vargas. He did not want to print them all, but he probably did. Another time, he told me of having received a review of Vargas. “It wasn’t very good, so I didn’t print it.”
Feb. 27, 1966: “I know that you feel things should be iron clad in review with positive like or dislike. I’m inclined to present the facts and let the reader decide what he thinks. Guess that I might not make a reviewer for I just like the shows too much.”
He wanted “better reports on shows and such.” He addressed a subject that would regularly dog him, that he could never fully resolve, writing to me that it was “also too bad, like the one review when the fellow says the bad was bad that so much uproar results. It would seem that if it were true you ought to be able to say so.”
He did share with me his unease over rah-rah notices, and stories that went on and on, but he was beholden to a loyal base of contributors, who supplied the necessary content. He was skittish about asking writers to cut back on excess.
Another force that kept him playing it safe were the circus owners themselves, who took out the ads and were not accustomed to what we might call objective reporting.
Next: The Invisible Red Pen of Circus Oowners ... The Heartbeat of Billy Barton ... The Invasion of Cirque du Soleil ....
first posted 12.19.19
In the paper’s peak years, Don now and then employed a part timer, usually a student “just out of school,” but he found them to be undependable. His dependable mom was always there to help out with folding, stapling and stamping fresh sheets off the press for assembly and a trip to the local post office. One of the postal clerks showed Don support and compassion, and he would eventually marry her.
His greatest challenge were the never ending struggles to sustain circulation. He sent out free copies to new members of the various circus clubs, hit the lots with samples. His circulation high, this number sticks in my brain, may have been around 2,400. I doubt that any of the circus magazines ever matched that.
Fickle Subscribers
October, 5 1984: “Oh, I forgot to tell you. I’ve lost almost 300 subscribers, so I guess I have to figure out something to improve and make CR a bit more appealing. That’s a pretty big loss over the last few month. Wouldn't think it was due to my having been laid up, but never can tell."
As a news source, how good a job did Circus Report do? On the plus side, the routes were outstanding, the reporting equally so when he picked up from AP stories about mishaps under the big top (such as the Toby Tyler seating collapse), and the animal rights movement. He did not shield readers from any of these controversies or misfortunes. From corrupt phone room operations in the 1970s. He did not hide from the world. I admired that about him.
But How Many People Were in the Tent?
On the debit side, what Don’s weekly most sorely lacked were attendance figures under our big tops. Of course, this was not primarily Don’s fault, for the American circus has never had its own Nielsen's — and I am dead sure never wanted them. Not then. And certainly not now. The old Billboard, edited by Tom Parkinson, did a far better job of a least estimating crowd size on the lots. Nothing was more compelling to my young eyes than the headlines on the first page of its Circuses section. Example, those in the August 6, 1955 number:
Chicago Attendance Poor For Ringling; Plan to Cut Prices ... Beatty Score Well at Vancouver Stand ... Truck Delays Hit King; Crowds Fair ... Polack's Strong Spots Make Up for Decreases ... Kelly-Miller Going Strong on Extensive Wisconsin Tour ..
July 31, 1954: Cincinnati Gives R-B Strong Two-Day Biz. As reported, "Show registered one-third filled houses for the two matinees but racked up capacity business for both night shows."
To Review or Not to Review?
Sorry to say, rosy Circus Report reviews could be numbingly predictable. And predictability does not make for must-read news. Don fell in line with other fan publications, afraid to alienate his core subscriber base. He once complained to me about all of the glowing write-ups he was getting of Circus Vargas. He did not want to print them all, but he probably did. Another time, he told me of having received a review of Vargas. “It wasn’t very good, so I didn’t print it.”
Feb. 27, 1966: “I know that you feel things should be iron clad in review with positive like or dislike. I’m inclined to present the facts and let the reader decide what he thinks. Guess that I might not make a reviewer for I just like the shows too much.”
He wanted “better reports on shows and such.” He addressed a subject that would regularly dog him, that he could never fully resolve, writing to me that it was “also too bad, like the one review when the fellow says the bad was bad that so much uproar results. It would seem that if it were true you ought to be able to say so.”
He did share with me his unease over rah-rah notices, and stories that went on and on, but he was beholden to a loyal base of contributors, who supplied the necessary content. He was skittish about asking writers to cut back on excess.
Another force that kept him playing it safe were the circus owners themselves, who took out the ads and were not accustomed to what we might call objective reporting.
Next: The Invisible Red Pen of Circus Oowners ... The Heartbeat of Billy Barton ... The Invasion of Cirque du Soleil ....
first posted 12.19.19
Monday, December 02, 2019
Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: Journalist to Variety Show M.C.
Hey there!
Hi, there!
Time to sing
time to raise the roof!
Show time
Go time
This is no time to be aloof!
California Varieties
That’s our show, and we’re on
So, welcome and cheers ...
Here’s Don!
The above was composed in one take by yours truly, on the backside of an Econo-Car Rental System Inspection slip – my day job at the time. It might have been the opener for the amateur revue that Don produced and booked into various community venues throughout Northern California. He had local singers and dancers, maybe a comedian, a good little local home grown dog act. And did a little plate-spinning.
“I was thinking about your recent show at the college and wondering why you don’t write something for me to use in the shows we do? 2/27/66
Well Don, how about that?
No, not about that, David. Without hardly a comment, he stayed aloof to the shameless rouse I had offered his stage entrance.
In tone an temper, Donald Marcks, born in Pittsfield, Mass, was closer to a bookkeeper — or pastor — than ringmaster. Think somber. Is there a soul dead who ever left behind as few photos of themselves as did Don? I know of only one. But then, while digging up info for this post, I found a second photo, right down there! Looking back, I wonder if he lived on a low-laugh diet.
The old Key System terminal in San Francisco.
By day when I met him, he worked as managing editor of the one-man office of The Guide, a daily shipping newspaper based in San Francisco, its history dating back a hundred years. To get to The Guide from the Key System bus and train terminal in the city, Don took long strides at the breakneck speed of a race track trotter. I should know, for I once met him at the terminal, and trailed him, panting all the way to his workplace. He answered phones, took down news items and wrote them up, and set them in type on a Linotype machine. Then to a small press, and into the mail and to distribution points around the city. . 
Don Marcks now and then dabbled in writing himself. I can only guess that he never took any ideas very far because he was too bottled up inside. Too afraid to disclose. He did disclose quite a lot to me in his numerous letters, impeccably typed out, some going on for three pages, many without a single typo! .I have a note from him in which he announced how his marriage (the first one) did not work out and was thus annulled. He seemed accepting of fate, without any show of emotion one way or the other.
On the social side, Don’s California Varieties, a showcase for eager young amateurs, gave him a break from circus obsessions. He did a little plate spinning and was the show’s straight-faced MC. He also would change coats several times through the program, a rare show of flair for Don.
Sometimes I rode with him to one of the dates. Many were at rest homes, some on military bases or at small county fair fairs. Nice good people. One of his best friends was the woman who trained the dogs. She also lived in El Cerrito, and spoke freely and openly. A city adult. After the shows, my favorite part, the company would adjourn to a nearby restaurant. Since I had grown up in a church where the performing arts where encouraged, I could appreciate spending time with these kind of people
Don wanted his variety show to become bigger and more professional. While I was on the road, in 1969, ahead of James Bros. Circus as press agent, in a letter to me, he excitedly raised the subject of my helping him promote California Varieties as a fund-raising venture for local groups. “I think [there ] could be a field here for us which would give everyone some money ... (but no phone crews).”
I made a big effort out of it, talking to many local churches, following up, calling back, reminding. Gradually, I had to let go of our not-very-strategic game plan.
Don should have hired a phone man.
*****************************************************************************
Next: Rise of The Circus Report
first posted 12.2.19
Monday, November 18, 2019
SUNDAY MORNING OUT OF THE PAST: Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: How We Met
As the Circus Report neared its final issue in 2019, I began a series about the Don I knew for many years. They will appear one after the other, in the order in which they were first posted.
No single image anytime in my life that I can recall, captivated me so instantly and fully as did what I saw in the window of the Western Auto store down Fourth Street in Santa Rosa. I might have been ten-years-old at the moment of conversion into the world of sawdust and spangles.
There, behind the glass, my spirit was captured by the spectacle of model circus wagons standing atop flatcars. The shapes. The bright gaudy colors. The look of a wondrous world coming into town! I’d never seen anything like this in my life.
I went back to Western Auto, everyday, to stand and stare at the magic. To study the wagons. To marvel at the festive decorations . And then, Marcks Circus was gone.
Not long after, I learned what balsa wood was at the Toy and Model Shop of Fifth Street. I learned how to use exacto blades and tester’s glue. I taught myself how to cut pieces of wood and fit them together to form my own crude circus wagons. Both Playland-at-the-Beach, across the street from where I was raised in San Francisco, and the Marcks Circus would compete for role-model attention and space when a 4x8 slice of plywood was installed by the family in our garage. My own private workshop!
In a year or so, I was riding a bus from San Francisco, across the bay, to a town called El Cerrito. Once it reached San Pablo Avenue, I had been told to look for Mechanics bank. Ask the bus driver! He let me off on the corner, and I walked up to Oak Street, turned right, and looked for 525.
Don Marcks, maybe 15-20 years my senior, was a rather solemn soul, yet ready to share samples from his collection, if at a slight remove. He walked me out to a large shed across the backyard grass, invited me in, and proceeded to open drawers, and remove sample wagons. I got to hold a few in my hands. I could have gone through the whole lot, but he made this first visit more of a sampler. Maybe he wanted not to soil the mystique.
We became friends, thanks to his friendly letters and sharing spirit.. In some, his unfiltered opinions about circus shows leaked through, which assures us that circus fans did hold sharp views, however privately held.
October 19, 1955: “Yes I saw the Ringling show this year several times for I was in Seattle, Richmond, San Francisco and Los Angeles on the show .... As for the specs, they could drop them without anybody noticing it. [I did not agree!] ... I felt they had some very good acts and thought the show was good except that it was too slow and too long. Without a doubt it could have been speeded up and cut at least an hour off the time. Boy to sit and watch a circus for three hours for the public is a long time and I don’t care what anyone says, those seats of theirs are the most uncomfortable things I’ve ever sat on” ***
I think it was closer to 2-1/2 hours, but without an intermission, the complaint was valid. For myself, I could have watched it many more times. It gave off a certain subtle enchantment.
As for the frugal seats of one Arthur M. Concello, for sure they were not designed to pamper. Even I, at age 14, felt a bit cramped. Which makes me wonder, for the first time, if some patrons remembered the confined seating and were thus less inclined to return in following seasons? I actually have fond memories of the Clyde Beatty Cole Bros. chairs. Grand!
“Will probably see you when my show is displayed in Antioch next month”
On another of his display dates, I went with him to help set the whole thing up.
Don often offered me excess or superseded parts of his own model. Jan 28, 1956: “Just got to thinking and I do have a few ½ inch scale ring horses that you could have if you wanted. They are in various positions and are brown. ... There will be a small indoor circus at the high school in Petaluma. I plan to attend and if you should perhaps be there I’d bring along the horses along the horses for your then — Let me know for sure about this?"
My scale was closer to 1/4", and so I found his figures rather heavy, and somehow they didn’t fit my layout. He did give me some (very heavy) wheels that did fit my wagons. He was then switching over to plastic.
Oct. 13, 1958: “Show [Ringling] definitely lacks something ... Perhaps it is the poor band .... and the fact they don’t announce much stuff... However, one must admit that they still have more and bigger than any show on the road.” ***
We grumbled for many years over the demise of Ringling-Barnum under canvas, and were thus, I believe, prone to be more critical of the indoor shows that followed.
No single image anytime in my life that I can recall, captivated me so instantly and fully as did what I saw in the window of the Western Auto store down Fourth Street in Santa Rosa. I might have been ten-years-old at the moment of conversion into the world of sawdust and spangles.
There, behind the glass, my spirit was captured by the spectacle of model circus wagons standing atop flatcars. The shapes. The bright gaudy colors. The look of a wondrous world coming into town! I’d never seen anything like this in my life.
I went back to Western Auto, everyday, to stand and stare at the magic. To study the wagons. To marvel at the festive decorations . And then, Marcks Circus was gone.
Not long after, I learned what balsa wood was at the Toy and Model Shop of Fifth Street. I learned how to use exacto blades and tester’s glue. I taught myself how to cut pieces of wood and fit them together to form my own crude circus wagons. Both Playland-at-the-Beach, across the street from where I was raised in San Francisco, and the Marcks Circus would compete for role-model attention and space when a 4x8 slice of plywood was installed by the family in our garage. My own private workshop!
In a year or so, I was riding a bus from San Francisco, across the bay, to a town called El Cerrito. Once it reached San Pablo Avenue, I had been told to look for Mechanics bank. Ask the bus driver! He let me off on the corner, and I walked up to Oak Street, turned right, and looked for 525.
Don Marcks, maybe 15-20 years my senior, was a rather solemn soul, yet ready to share samples from his collection, if at a slight remove. He walked me out to a large shed across the backyard grass, invited me in, and proceeded to open drawers, and remove sample wagons. I got to hold a few in my hands. I could have gone through the whole lot, but he made this first visit more of a sampler. Maybe he wanted not to soil the mystique.
We became friends, thanks to his friendly letters and sharing spirit.. In some, his unfiltered opinions about circus shows leaked through, which assures us that circus fans did hold sharp views, however privately held.
October 19, 1955: “Yes I saw the Ringling show this year several times for I was in Seattle, Richmond, San Francisco and Los Angeles on the show .... As for the specs, they could drop them without anybody noticing it. [I did not agree!] ... I felt they had some very good acts and thought the show was good except that it was too slow and too long. Without a doubt it could have been speeded up and cut at least an hour off the time. Boy to sit and watch a circus for three hours for the public is a long time and I don’t care what anyone says, those seats of theirs are the most uncomfortable things I’ve ever sat on” ***
I think it was closer to 2-1/2 hours, but without an intermission, the complaint was valid. For myself, I could have watched it many more times. It gave off a certain subtle enchantment.
As for the frugal seats of one Arthur M. Concello, for sure they were not designed to pamper. Even I, at age 14, felt a bit cramped. Which makes me wonder, for the first time, if some patrons remembered the confined seating and were thus less inclined to return in following seasons? I actually have fond memories of the Clyde Beatty Cole Bros. chairs. Grand!
“Will probably see you when my show is displayed in Antioch next month”
On another of his display dates, I went with him to help set the whole thing up.
A couple of my early wagons, on display at the Toy and Model Shop, in Santa Rosa
Don often offered me excess or superseded parts of his own model. Jan 28, 1956: “Just got to thinking and I do have a few ½ inch scale ring horses that you could have if you wanted. They are in various positions and are brown. ... There will be a small indoor circus at the high school in Petaluma. I plan to attend and if you should perhaps be there I’d bring along the horses along the horses for your then — Let me know for sure about this?"
My scale was closer to 1/4", and so I found his figures rather heavy, and somehow they didn’t fit my layout. He did give me some (very heavy) wheels that did fit my wagons. He was then switching over to plastic.
Oct. 13, 1958: “Show [Ringling] definitely lacks something ... Perhaps it is the poor band .... and the fact they don’t announce much stuff... However, one must admit that they still have more and bigger than any show on the road.” ***
We grumbled for many years over the demise of Ringling-Barnum under canvas, and were thus, I believe, prone to be more critical of the indoor shows that followed.
Wagons I made in my mid to late teens. What a difference Don's donated wheels made.
.
His letters were typed out, single spaced, and most of them needed another two or more pages . And in some, I can’t spot a single typo! I have dozens of them, and they all will eventually reside in my archives at Illinois State University. Don Marcks will never be forgotten there.
*"" 8.11.24: So we can see, circus fans can actually have sharp opinionated reactions to a circus, even though rarely if ever do they vent them publicly or in print. Those are DON'S words, not mine. I know the show was long, but I could have sat there forever, it was so enchanting. My one and only time under the Ringling big top. The seats? Yes, I was left feeling a bit uncomfortable, they were frugal. But then again, this was Big Bertha, so every thing about it seemed super good. Right?
Next: Going to the Circus with Don
first posted 11.8.19 1 of 7
Sunday, August 18, 2019
Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: Chasing Big Tops Together
“I always have mixed feelings about the Ringling show and am sometimes not too interested in seeing it. Mainly I guess because it seems there isn’t anyone there I know and I much prefer to visit than just sit in the seats and watch the full show,”
-- in his letter to me from October 22, 1989
He often offered to drive or to meet me at circuses playing in the area, though never once did I actually watch a circus performance with Don. Usually — and this was fun, I will admit — we would nonchalantly wander into the backyard, as if being “with” the show, merge with the actual staff and continue right on in through the back door. Victory! Free seats! Oh, the thrill of the illicit walk in!
We all did it. Another circus friend and fellow Santa Rosan, Hugo Marquardt, was with me at the fairgrounds, where Carson & Barnes was playing. We were sauntering along the edge of the tent, heading towards the back yard. Hugo raised his hands in applause mode, and giddily sighed -- lampooning a CFA mantra about paying your way in -- “We clap as we go!”
Perhaps Don had taught me well. In my youth, I relished being able to slip through anonymously. I practically walked into the Oakland arena when the Russians were playing there. Talk about class crash. Well, my bank account held a near zero balance. That was my excuse then. What was yours?
My most disillusioning experience with Don was the time he offered me a ride to Carson & Barnes, which was playing in an East Bay location that would have required my taking two or three bus rides to get there. Relief! As it turned out, he went the day before — he often planned to spend several days around a circus lot — but evidently was not nearly as well received as he might have expected. So he called up to tell me that he would not be going. That felt cold.
Or maybe he had encountered insulting indifference to a Circus Report pitch. He was forever struggling to sell new subscriptions, in order to replace a continuous stream of non-renewals.
When we did go together, he escaped our company the moment we entered, and vanished – somewhere into that special space where show people lived and worked. I would sit out and watch the show, and meet up with him afterwards. He lived for the validation of circus peple.
May 18, 1983: "Was in Wally Naughtin's trailer when there was a knock on the door and in walked Vargas. He acted like he was happy to see me. Another time he was going through the backyard and came over to tell me that he had been selling tickets and said, do you know the people who buy those tickets are crazy."
I recall his once actually finding me in the mezzanine seats — we both happened to be at Ringling in the old Oakland Auditorium. Plenty of spare chairs that day. He sat down next to me and grumbled a little, something about the show. He must have been not very welcome that day.
-- in his letter to me from October 22, 1989
He often offered to drive or to meet me at circuses playing in the area, though never once did I actually watch a circus performance with Don. Usually — and this was fun, I will admit — we would nonchalantly wander into the backyard, as if being “with” the show, merge with the actual staff and continue right on in through the back door. Victory! Free seats! Oh, the thrill of the illicit walk in!
Sidewall Champs
The Carson and Barnes show I saw in 1966-67 holds a special place in my memory bank of great circus performances. The vibrant program bubbled and bounced as if on air, the rings rich in talent, the band a rollicking treat to the ears.
Perhaps Don had taught me well. In my youth, I relished being able to slip through anonymously. I practically walked into the Oakland arena when the Russians were playing there. Talk about class crash. Well, my bank account held a near zero balance. That was my excuse then. What was yours?
My most disillusioning experience with Don was the time he offered me a ride to Carson & Barnes, which was playing in an East Bay location that would have required my taking two or three bus rides to get there. Relief! As it turned out, he went the day before — he often planned to spend several days around a circus lot — but evidently was not nearly as well received as he might have expected. So he called up to tell me that he would not be going. That felt cold.
Or maybe he had encountered insulting indifference to a Circus Report pitch. He was forever struggling to sell new subscriptions, in order to replace a continuous stream of non-renewals.
One to Hob Nob, One to Nit Pick
When we did go together, he escaped our company the moment we entered, and vanished – somewhere into that special space where show people lived and worked. I would sit out and watch the show, and meet up with him afterwards. He lived for the validation of circus peple.
May 18, 1983: "Was in Wally Naughtin's trailer when there was a knock on the door and in walked Vargas. He acted like he was happy to see me. Another time he was going through the backyard and came over to tell me that he had been selling tickets and said, do you know the people who buy those tickets are crazy."
There I am at Graham Bros. Circus, 1966. Maybe Don was somewhere in the backyard.
I recall his once actually finding me in the mezzanine seats — we both happened to be at Ringling in the old Oakland Auditorium. Plenty of spare chairs that day. He sat down next to me and grumbled a little, something about the show. He must have been not very welcome that day.
Getting the Bauman Bounce
The Felds were none to thrilled by invading circus fans. In a particularly revealing letter, dated August 24, 1984, Don wrote of how unwelcome he was suddenly made to feel when, while walking up a ramp at the Cow Palace between the backyard and the arena, he was confronted by a former center ring star, now the performance director:
“Guess what. Charlie Bauman told me to get out and I didn’t belong there.”
“I’ve often heard from others that Bauman is a very difficult man to get along with and he has been rough on others who come to visit. Even to the point of going up in the seats and telling them they have to leave and can’t have a free seat at the circus.”
“He never does look anything other than grouchy. He must have a miserable life”.
Or maybe the Felds had been hounding Mr. Bauman to do the job?
Sometimes, when having gone to a circus on my own, from my seat in the audience I would spot him down by the performers entrance, standing there with his arms folded, lost, I supposed, in a dream of being One of Them — maybe the big boss himself. Of being with it and for it.
****************************************************************************
Next: Don at his day job, and on the road with his California Varieties show.
first posted 11.18.19
second in a series
Sunday, October 26, 2014
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks: When Circuses Landed Major Sponsors -- When Kelly Miller Pachyderms on Parade Pitched Chevrolet
While I tend not to regret having taken circuses to task (or did I blast them?) for the crass insertion of advertisements during the performance, I can be nice when it comes to ads on the edge that do not stop the flow of action. Yes, I am a Pep and PACE-aholic.
Such as, so charming an image from out of the past, this from Don’s letter to me dated October 25, 1958 – anybody out there alive that far back?
“Would be sort of nice to have that idea as the Kelly Miller show had, a large elephant and a small elephant with No Job To Big for the Chevrolet and No Job Too Small for the Chevrolet.”
He waxed reflective: “Actually, you might say this is too commercial but yet all circuses throughout history have done that sort of thing so it wouldn’t be out of line.”
The practice also showed up in circus parades, Don reminded me. “... but guess they like the money that is in it despite the fact that we don’t care too much for it.
Right on that point, too. However, that stuff never much riled me. Such ad art, in motion, never stopped the show. I think they had painters on the payroll who, daily, created simple ads on large sheets of paper for advertisers, which they hung around the tent.
In recent times, I’ve blasted Cirque du Soleil for its high-tech neon ads encircling the tent on the sidewalls. Ringling, back in the fifties, took a lot of heat for signing onto a multitude of walk around clown gags pushing various popular products, toothpaste to Tums (for the tummy). The spectacle became such an orgy of commercialism, the show finally put a stop to it.
Then again, however, I enjoyed the veiled commercials if they were funny, although I can’t recall specifics. I’d like to see today’s jesters spoofing some of the more obvious targets. Oh, just for starters, the ad for a certain pill to give couples in need a thrill. Can you see them going to town with this?
My newly late friend Liz once commented that sometimes, the best thing about television were the commercials. Either those, or her favorite program, Masterpiece Theatre.
Towards the end of Don’s two page letter, this:
“If ever you wish to come over it would be nice to have you once again. Hope to hear from you again and to see you too.”
That’s how it went. He was a most generous correspondent.
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks: Concello Gets “Kicked Out” of the Ringling Show... All About that Strange Ill-fated European Tour
Photos from the program magazine
The recollections of it, depending upon whom to believe, are so wildly variable as to leave one in a complete muddle. Was it that bad? Or, no, you say it was quite good, really? When John Ringling North took Ringling-Barnum to Europe in 1963, banking on continental acclaim, great business, and a regular annual our of major Old World capitals, he left virtually all of the planning and delivery to Arthur Concello. The two had, what would become, a legendary history, something like Barnum & Bailey.
We know the show may have opened in shambles — director Richard Barstow curiously not called over to begin his work until the show was well into rehearsals, under the default direction of Concello’s girl friend, Maggie Smith. The reviews were good, business fairly good and building.
From Don’s letter to me dated November 13, 1963, when I was in Scotland at the time:
You’ll be interested to learn some information I picked up while visiting James Bros. Everyone was talking about the fact that North has kicked Concello out of the Ringling organization. He is reportedly suing Concello for something like $2 million. As I understand things Concello will manage the New York World’s Fair circus and then his connection with the Ringling show ceases completely. What has happened or why the sudden outburst I don’t know. In fact I’m most anxious to learn about this myself, so will surely keep you posted.”
A page from the program magazine. I do not see a dearth of talent.
.
About the “sudden outburst,” years later, while interviewing Mr. Concello, indoor pool side, in his Sarasota home (he was kind to me, always) when the subject of the European tour came up, at one point in the disintegrating relationship between AMC and JRN abroad, Mr. Concello motioned me to follow him around the pool to a closet. In it, he reached up to retrieve his diary for the year 1963. He thumbed through it to a page, and held it up for me to read;.
“North raising hell”.
He stood there looking a little amused by my serious reaction. But, in fact, I got a distinct feeling that he had felt very very uncomfortable being around North at the time. He did not know, although he may have suspected, that, upon returning to the states to work on the World's Fair unit, he was about to be fired.
The two men were equally strong willed, from my observations. Concello’s handling of Ringling in Europe seemed engineered to favor choreographer Margaret Smith (the two later married) over the director of record, Dick Barstow. And here is the strangest part of the story: Barstow kept waiting to be called over to begin his work, and kept being put off. Finally, he was notified to come, and when he arrived, the show had already opened. Flabbergasted at the chaotic state of the program that he claimed to have found, Barstow bolted up to JRN and demanded that his name be taken off the program, that he was going back to the states. North talked Barstow out of it.
Henry Ringling North, in an interview he gave me at the Yale Club in NY, some years later, called the Paris opening “an absolute disgrace.” Meaning, I think, the program was a mess, as sometimes they can be the first few performances out. Based on the program lineup, no way can anybody claim that the roster of performers was not generally top drawer. But, of course, it’s all in how the whole thing is put together.
They played a few cities. Photos show most of the seats filled. Ken Dodd, who has seen a video of the show, thought it looked very good.
John Ringling North let go of his dream, in my opinion, not wishing to harm his high reputation over there, as he had already done in the states when he struck the big top. He wished more, I believe, to sustain the peace and respect he had found in the Old World.
9.14.14
Sunday, August 31, 2014
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks: Waiting for a poster to appear on the side of a building. Reaching for rumors. Wondering if the show might already be somewhere in the area ... Might already be, horror of horrors, gone! ...
A sunny pleasure it is, these summer days, sitting out on my balcony on Saturday afternoon, wandering through the many letters I have from Don Marcks. Looking for something meaty (rare), or just a few words or images that fire a feeling, a memory, a thought.
From June 13, 1965:
“Had hoped that on your trip to Santa Rosa, you’d run across some information on Carson & Barnes - Haven’t heard or learned a thing myself. Wish that I knew where they are and just hope that I haven’t missed them completely. Boy that would sort of be tragic to say the least.”
Ah, yes, Don, it would! The mystery of where they where that moment in June. Before the internet, and all these modern gadgets, you waited for big gaudy lithographs to blossom on the sides of buildings, and was that a thrill.
No posters in Santa Rosa was a sure sign that C & B hadn’t been there, yet, if, indeed, they planned to play the town at all. For, when this show did come to town, well in advance it threw up lithographs wherever it could.
Newspaper ads, if there were any as I recall, did not tend to appear until right near show day.
Once, I came upon a dazzling, indeed, rather brazen sea of Carson and Barnes lithographs covering, it seemed, the entire temporary (construction) wood wall that surrounded the Courthouse in the middle of town. It felt like an invasion of sorts. Carson and Barnes posters screamed CIRCUS! Screamed,WE ARE COMING!
The mystery for Don and me. Yes, were they at that moment somewhere close? They tended to pitch their tents in smaller towns, so they could sneak through without our ever knowing.
Routes in the Billboard would often arrive too late.
My most vivid memory of coming upon a circus litho was one, medium size, posted on a wall around Fourth Street, of a man who appeared, miraculously, to be standing on one finger! I couldn’t believe what I was watching. Did this really happen? The words Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey were prominently displayed across the sheet. But the image of the man was stunning.
It would forever epitomize for me the startling and superior magic of circus.
The year was 1953. Ringling had staked out prime visual notice of its coming to San Francisco, some fifty miles south of Santa Rosa.
I was too young to take a bus ride down and see the circus.
I can’t remember if Carson and Barnes played any Bay Area dates in 1965 close to either Don or me.
Ah, the mystery of wondering, waiting, hoping, dreaming ...
And of fearing, in Don’s words, “something tragic.”
I can tell you this, had I gone all the way to Richmond, in 1955, only to find that the great Ringling Bros. Circus under the big top had skipped the date, now, that would have been tragic.
From June 13, 1965:
“Had hoped that on your trip to Santa Rosa, you’d run across some information on Carson & Barnes - Haven’t heard or learned a thing myself. Wish that I knew where they are and just hope that I haven’t missed them completely. Boy that would sort of be tragic to say the least.”
Ah, yes, Don, it would! The mystery of where they where that moment in June. Before the internet, and all these modern gadgets, you waited for big gaudy lithographs to blossom on the sides of buildings, and was that a thrill.
No posters in Santa Rosa was a sure sign that C & B hadn’t been there, yet, if, indeed, they planned to play the town at all. For, when this show did come to town, well in advance it threw up lithographs wherever it could.
Newspaper ads, if there were any as I recall, did not tend to appear until right near show day.
Once, I came upon a dazzling, indeed, rather brazen sea of Carson and Barnes lithographs covering, it seemed, the entire temporary (construction) wood wall that surrounded the Courthouse in the middle of town. It felt like an invasion of sorts. Carson and Barnes posters screamed CIRCUS! Screamed,WE ARE COMING!
Carson and Barnes Circus midway, around this period
The mystery for Don and me. Yes, were they at that moment somewhere close? They tended to pitch their tents in smaller towns, so they could sneak through without our ever knowing.
Routes in the Billboard would often arrive too late.
My most vivid memory of coming upon a circus litho was one, medium size, posted on a wall around Fourth Street, of a man who appeared, miraculously, to be standing on one finger! I couldn’t believe what I was watching. Did this really happen? The words Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey were prominently displayed across the sheet. But the image of the man was stunning.
It would forever epitomize for me the startling and superior magic of circus.
The year was 1953. Ringling had staked out prime visual notice of its coming to San Francisco, some fifty miles south of Santa Rosa.
I was too young to take a bus ride down and see the circus.
I can’t remember if Carson and Barnes played any Bay Area dates in 1965 close to either Don or me.
Ah, the mystery of wondering, waiting, hoping, dreaming ...
And of fearing, in Don’s words, “something tragic.”
I can tell you this, had I gone all the way to Richmond, in 1955, only to find that the great Ringling Bros. Circus under the big top had skipped the date, now, that would have been tragic.
Sunday, August 24, 2014
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks, Thirty Years Ago, Today: Trying to Crash Ringling, Don Gets the Boot from Famous Performer
Ringling was in town, and Don was happily engaged, or so for a while, going out to visit the show, until he practicably got run off the lot.
From his letter to me dated August 24, 1984
“I went down to the Ringling show on opening night which was Tuesday. They had a good crowd as usual. I spent most of the time in the backyard to be available to anyone who was interested in CR [Circus Report]. I did pass out a fair number of samples, etc. Also peaked at a part of the show.”
He wasn’t to impressed, but he rarely was. I would know this, although he would never publish such feedings in his paper, but he often felt a let down, perhaps comparing the present to a past he much preferred. I got a kick out of Don, sometimes seeing him approach me in the higher side seats at the Oakland Auditorium (that I had bought, if not getting through the back door myself), to take a seat himself for a while and carp about the performance.
“The big spec just didn’t seem to make any sense to me. It was dancing girls and guys more than anything else.”
Nonetheless, he returned the following night, only to be met by a rebuff in the backyard by one of the most preeminent wild animal trainers of the era.
“Talked to the backdoor guy for a time then walked down the ramp to the backyard, hoping I’d have some success with getting money, new subscriptions,.”
Bad Boy Don is bounced!
“Guess what. Charley Bauman told me to get out I didn’t belong there. So I went back up the ramp.”
Circus Report's rebuffed publisher chatted for a little with the backdoor guy, got tired, got chilly, and went home. I doubt he ever saw the show itself.
“I’ve often heard from others that Bauman is a very difficult man to get along with and he has been rough on others who come to visit. Even to the point of going up in the seats and telling them they have to leave and can’t have a free seat at the circus."
Well, here I’m on the show's side. It may be bad form to remove unwanted “lot lice” from the seats, unless, of course, they are asked to show their ticket stubs. We don't know all the details. But it is very bad form to steal into the arena or tent, especially when the gate crashers are not starving kids off the farm, but adults, likely well employed and the very fans who belive in suppoting circuses.
Yes, I once then, too, loved the challenge of walking right through for free. Ir was almost a badge of honor among fans. And what a perverse thrill. Once in, you were in!
“However, this is the first time he has ever done anything like that to me.”
I think the Felds were getting tired of indulging fans one of their most selfish fantasies, built on a wish to feel "with it and for it," for if that was, indeed, their status, why should they have to pay?
Don loved to stand at the performers door, for that made him one of them. I knew the feeling, but I wanted to be seated with a good view of the show. I guess I was funny that way.
“I’ve been thinking I might go down to the train this weekend and take a photo of each car for the files
“Not much doing otherwise. I have been thinking that it would be nice to have like an Open House each Friday evening for fans and model builders. They could come and just talk,work on models, exchange ideas, even see a movie. No politics, no minutes or anything like that.”
One of many of Don’s inklings that never flew
“That Little Theatre group in Point Richmond opens their show George M this evening.”
I doubt, if he went to see George M, that he got in free.
Thirty years ago today. And may all your days be free circus days!
From his letter to me dated August 24, 1984
“I went down to the Ringling show on opening night which was Tuesday. They had a good crowd as usual. I spent most of the time in the backyard to be available to anyone who was interested in CR [Circus Report]. I did pass out a fair number of samples, etc. Also peaked at a part of the show.”
He wasn’t to impressed, but he rarely was. I would know this, although he would never publish such feedings in his paper, but he often felt a let down, perhaps comparing the present to a past he much preferred. I got a kick out of Don, sometimes seeing him approach me in the higher side seats at the Oakland Auditorium (that I had bought, if not getting through the back door myself), to take a seat himself for a while and carp about the performance.
“The big spec just didn’t seem to make any sense to me. It was dancing girls and guys more than anything else.”
Nonetheless, he returned the following night, only to be met by a rebuff in the backyard by one of the most preeminent wild animal trainers of the era.
“Talked to the backdoor guy for a time then walked down the ramp to the backyard, hoping I’d have some success with getting money, new subscriptions,.”
Bad Boy Don is bounced!
“Guess what. Charley Bauman told me to get out I didn’t belong there. So I went back up the ramp.”
Circus Report's rebuffed publisher chatted for a little with the backdoor guy, got tired, got chilly, and went home. I doubt he ever saw the show itself.
“I’ve often heard from others that Bauman is a very difficult man to get along with and he has been rough on others who come to visit. Even to the point of going up in the seats and telling them they have to leave and can’t have a free seat at the circus."
Well, here I’m on the show's side. It may be bad form to remove unwanted “lot lice” from the seats, unless, of course, they are asked to show their ticket stubs. We don't know all the details. But it is very bad form to steal into the arena or tent, especially when the gate crashers are not starving kids off the farm, but adults, likely well employed and the very fans who belive in suppoting circuses.
Yes, I once then, too, loved the challenge of walking right through for free. Ir was almost a badge of honor among fans. And what a perverse thrill. Once in, you were in!
“However, this is the first time he has ever done anything like that to me.”
I think the Felds were getting tired of indulging fans one of their most selfish fantasies, built on a wish to feel "with it and for it," for if that was, indeed, their status, why should they have to pay?
Don loved to stand at the performers door, for that made him one of them. I knew the feeling, but I wanted to be seated with a good view of the show. I guess I was funny that way.
“I’ve been thinking I might go down to the train this weekend and take a photo of each car for the files
“Not much doing otherwise. I have been thinking that it would be nice to have like an Open House each Friday evening for fans and model builders. They could come and just talk,work on models, exchange ideas, even see a movie. No politics, no minutes or anything like that.”
One of many of Don’s inklings that never flew
“That Little Theatre group in Point Richmond opens their show George M this evening.”
I doubt, if he went to see George M, that he got in free.
Thirty years ago today. And may all your days be free circus days!
Sunday, August 17, 2014
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks: The Glory that Was Vargas
Fans came to mingle on the midway, hoping to catch a glimpse of "Mr. V," hoping, better yet, to cut up jackpots with the fiery circus owner. This man of humble origins stared out a phoneman, and ended up a showman.
The crowds were healthy, sometimes the tent was packed, a rarity for me one night, returning from the Bay Area, after jumping off my bus, hurring over to the lot, only to be told, "it's a sell out." The show had just begun. I felt a let down, of course, but also a great joy for the show -- and for the American circus scene.
Here. from Don's letter to me, dated February 8, 1985
"Not much else happening. I heard that this year Vargas has his best show yet."
Easily.
"Also, that he is excited about the fact the CFA will use his show as their convention circus this year."
It was, in my book, the best of all Vargas years, a peformance that topped all the others. He had a five piece band in the tent, riding the charts of pulsing jazz and Latin, interweaving songs from Broadway and the Great American Songbook, with a few old fashiony circus tunes tossed in. He had a well dressed show, a good balance of acts, a formidable elephant herd.
I probably saw the show three times. I used to do that, when I liked a show, I would go back. Did it with Ringling, not recently, though sometimes during Feld years as well as during the John Ringling North era.
Three rings still resonate in my mind.
Within only a few years, Circus Vargas would begin a gradual slide in performance values, as Mr. V. chased after other markets, and then started appearing in arenas, in direct contradiction to the press campaign upon which he had built his name: "A return to the circus under the big top, as it once was in America!"
He cast a spell over the entire circus community. In my lifetime, I can't think of an owner who was so admired, respected, and appreciated as much as Cliff Vargas.
Sunday, August 10, 2014
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks: The Birth of Don ...The Return of Billy Barton
Combing through the letters, nothing spectacular, but it's Sunday morning, and had you anything better planned? You're here, so I guess not.
Don once contemplated writing his life story. Of course, he never got very far, other than two opening paragraphs, from what I know
From his letter to me of August 13, 1994, he begins:
“Came up with a title to my book - how does this sound? ‘All Things I Wanted to do but never did.”
On a separate sheet, came this:
ALL THE THINGS I WANTED TO DO BUT NEVER DID
by Don Marcks
It had been one of those harsh winter nights in New England. It was cold, the sky was overcast and snow fell continuously. This winter storm continued through the next day until at 11:55 a.m. on March 12, the clouds parted and the sun shone. It was as if some power greater than that on earth had paused to say, "Welcome to the world."
Thus on March 12, Donald Marcks, was born to Alice and Isaac Marcks, at Pittsfield, Mass. Unlike nowadays, where births almost always take place in the hospital, this one took place at a small house on Lexington Street, which was to be his home for the next few years.
End of momentous quote.
Hmm. So, I guess, upon delivery, Don was spared a muddy lot.
Pittsfield resonants with me, don’t know exactly why. It’s a neat sounding name, a little offbeat, exclusive, entrenched in tradition.
Now, to the rebirth in Circus Report of Billy Baron (yes, I know, you were waiting for this), who, I always thought, gave Don’s folksy, very fan-ish weekly a little sex appeal, or jazz, something that it needed to give it a pulse. Even though, on balance, most of Barton’s columns were compactly composed, straight ahead conveyors of facts – names, dates, acts coming going, imported, cities played, marriages and divorces, with a few harmless zingers tossed in now and then. But, yes, once in a while he did express himself on serious issues, and I found that refreshing.
Getting off my own soapbox, let’s hand the pen over to Don, from his letter to me dated October 12, 1984:
“Guess I probably told you that Barton had said he would like to write again and that he won’t get on the soapbox again. So, since then I have heard from him and he wants to do a column about every other week - which isn’t too bad. Have to see how it goes, no doubt once folks start telling him how good he is, he will want to get back to the weekly schedule and the soapbox - we’ll see.”
The trouble was, for Don, almost any opinion spelled trouble. He was too easily rattled by anxious or intimidating phone calls from circus owners.
I do know there was friction between Don and Billy on one or two tense occasions. I think Billy had written some things that put Don out, and he took it upon himself to edit the unwelcome prose. Billy flew into a rage, on or off his cloud sing. Don forced himself to communicate to Billy certain things that bothered him. This was not easy. I think there was a falling out for a time.
I would have been pleased with Billy Barton returning. I mean, who did not, every week, look forward to what Billy had to say, even if he rarely said it?
You need a pulse in any venture.
Don once contemplated writing his life story. Of course, he never got very far, other than two opening paragraphs, from what I know
From his letter to me of August 13, 1994, he begins:
“Came up with a title to my book - how does this sound? ‘All Things I Wanted to do but never did.”
On a separate sheet, came this:
ALL THE THINGS I WANTED TO DO BUT NEVER DID
by Don Marcks
It had been one of those harsh winter nights in New England. It was cold, the sky was overcast and snow fell continuously. This winter storm continued through the next day until at 11:55 a.m. on March 12, the clouds parted and the sun shone. It was as if some power greater than that on earth had paused to say, "Welcome to the world."
Thus on March 12, Donald Marcks, was born to Alice and Isaac Marcks, at Pittsfield, Mass. Unlike nowadays, where births almost always take place in the hospital, this one took place at a small house on Lexington Street, which was to be his home for the next few years.
End of momentous quote.
Hmm. So, I guess, upon delivery, Don was spared a muddy lot.
Pittsfield resonants with me, don’t know exactly why. It’s a neat sounding name, a little offbeat, exclusive, entrenched in tradition.
Now, to the rebirth in Circus Report of Billy Baron (yes, I know, you were waiting for this), who, I always thought, gave Don’s folksy, very fan-ish weekly a little sex appeal, or jazz, something that it needed to give it a pulse. Even though, on balance, most of Barton’s columns were compactly composed, straight ahead conveyors of facts – names, dates, acts coming going, imported, cities played, marriages and divorces, with a few harmless zingers tossed in now and then. But, yes, once in a while he did express himself on serious issues, and I found that refreshing.
Getting off my own soapbox, let’s hand the pen over to Don, from his letter to me dated October 12, 1984:
“Guess I probably told you that Barton had said he would like to write again and that he won’t get on the soapbox again. So, since then I have heard from him and he wants to do a column about every other week - which isn’t too bad. Have to see how it goes, no doubt once folks start telling him how good he is, he will want to get back to the weekly schedule and the soapbox - we’ll see.”
The trouble was, for Don, almost any opinion spelled trouble. He was too easily rattled by anxious or intimidating phone calls from circus owners.
I do know there was friction between Don and Billy on one or two tense occasions. I think Billy had written some things that put Don out, and he took it upon himself to edit the unwelcome prose. Billy flew into a rage, on or off his cloud sing. Don forced himself to communicate to Billy certain things that bothered him. This was not easy. I think there was a falling out for a time.
I would have been pleased with Billy Barton returning. I mean, who did not, every week, look forward to what Billy had to say, even if he rarely said it?
You need a pulse in any venture.
Sunday, August 03, 2014
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks: When Big Tops Put People in the Seats
There may have been a day. Certainly, long ago when I took in circus shows, I recall seeing many people in the seats, usually at least more than half of the seats filled.
Here, from his letter to me dated September 19, 1965. We’re under canvas.
“I spent this weekend with Carson and Barnes Circus and enjoyed it. Was in Santa Cruz and Soledad, where it was rather warm in the daytime but cool at night. Show did pretty fair business, but they still seemed to be unhappy, thinking that they should pull more, but gollys they can’t have an overflow crowd all the time.”
Looking way back, not sure if I ever saw an overflow crowd at C&B, but I do know I saw lots of people under the tent, not just a few hundred across a sea of empty chairs and planks, as I do in modern times.
“Seems to me that they have to set up the show to break even on a half house or so and go from there.”
A half house. If only, when I go to Vargas or Carson & Barnes today, even to Ringling at the Oakland Coliseum arena, I could see a half house, how exciting that would be. I know it happens, I guess just not when I am around. Maybe I bring bad vibes to the midway. The only shows where I have always seen a three-quarter to near full tent are Big Apple and, of course, Cirque du Soleil.
3,900. Does the number ring a bell? Think hard. A recent seat count for a very tragic event. Three thousand nine hundred. Need a clue? The number present at a performance which went very wrong.
Still not there? Think a major circus up in a New England town, earlier this year.
Yes, Ringling, at Providence, when the aerialists fell to the floor after their rigging malfunctioned.
3,900, it was said too many times by too many different sources (maybe not by Circus Report or White Tops) not to believe. And believe it I do, for it resonates with my own recent experience of seeing Ringling-Barnum out here in the 15,00 seat plus Oakland Coliseum arena. I'd guess from three to five thousand spectators max.
And what is the point of all this? Well, what is the point. The letter reminded me of how the times have changed, I think.
“But gollys they can’t have an overflow crowd all the time."
Right, Don. If only, they could overflow the tent just some of the time.
That’s what seems to be happening across the pond for Peter Jolly’s Circus. Today. Not yesterday. He’s been packing them in at some stands, possibly, opines Brit blogger Douglas McPherson, because of anti-circus animal legislation in the winds, this inspiring the public to take in a real circus while there still is a real circus to take in. By golly, were he still around, would Don and I have fun talking about that!
Johnny Pugh's Cole Bros. Circus packing them in at a recent date (as reported in Circus Report) was,by golly, Don, something to crow about.
Promise not to question that, the feeling is too good.
Here, from his letter to me dated September 19, 1965. We’re under canvas.
“I spent this weekend with Carson and Barnes Circus and enjoyed it. Was in Santa Cruz and Soledad, where it was rather warm in the daytime but cool at night. Show did pretty fair business, but they still seemed to be unhappy, thinking that they should pull more, but gollys they can’t have an overflow crowd all the time.”
Looking way back, not sure if I ever saw an overflow crowd at C&B, but I do know I saw lots of people under the tent, not just a few hundred across a sea of empty chairs and planks, as I do in modern times.
Nice little full house (500) at the Zoppe Family Circus.
“Seems to me that they have to set up the show to break even on a half house or so and go from there.”
A half house. If only, when I go to Vargas or Carson & Barnes today, even to Ringling at the Oakland Coliseum arena, I could see a half house, how exciting that would be. I know it happens, I guess just not when I am around. Maybe I bring bad vibes to the midway. The only shows where I have always seen a three-quarter to near full tent are Big Apple and, of course, Cirque du Soleil.
3,900. Does the number ring a bell? Think hard. A recent seat count for a very tragic event. Three thousand nine hundred. Need a clue? The number present at a performance which went very wrong.
Still not there? Think a major circus up in a New England town, earlier this year.
Yes, Ringling, at Providence, when the aerialists fell to the floor after their rigging malfunctioned.
3,900, it was said too many times by too many different sources (maybe not by Circus Report or White Tops) not to believe. And believe it I do, for it resonates with my own recent experience of seeing Ringling-Barnum out here in the 15,00 seat plus Oakland Coliseum arena. I'd guess from three to five thousand spectators max.
And what is the point of all this? Well, what is the point. The letter reminded me of how the times have changed, I think.
“But gollys they can’t have an overflow crowd all the time."
Right, Don. If only, they could overflow the tent just some of the time.
That’s what seems to be happening across the pond for Peter Jolly’s Circus. Today. Not yesterday. He’s been packing them in at some stands, possibly, opines Brit blogger Douglas McPherson, because of anti-circus animal legislation in the winds, this inspiring the public to take in a real circus while there still is a real circus to take in. By golly, were he still around, would Don and I have fun talking about that!
Johnny Pugh's Cole Bros. Circus packing them in at a recent date (as reported in Circus Report) was,by golly, Don, something to crow about.
Promise not to question that, the feeling is too good.
Sunday, December 01, 2013
Sunday Morning with Don Marcks: Christmas Cards
Remember Christmas cards?
Here is Don, writing to me December 12, 1958, sharing his plans for a card.
"Have been thinking of having some Christmas cards made sometime. I would like to have maybe a Sunburst wagon wheel laying against a fence in the snow, or else have a barn in the background and then have all sorts of old wagons just outside with the snow quite deep and covering most everything. Would be a lot of work and all but would be interesting. By gollys, just thought since I have the barn and wagons I guess that I could take a picture of my own stuff and use cotton to create the snow????"
I love his imagined images.
Oh, such simpler times they were, and I suppose each generation ends up saying essentially the same thing. I'd almost be happy to give up my PC and the lush research-communication benefits to get back some of the things we've lost, like a telegram guy knocking on your door, one telephone in only one room in the house. The afternoon paper landing out there on the grass, its headlines bearing an urgency. Three TV channels, so much easier. Playing with kids outside on summer evenings. I guess now, they face book in the dark. How pitifully remote.
One of the best things back then was waiting each day in December for the postman to arrive with another stack of cards for our mail box. Sometimes, he'd make two deliveries! The word "Christmas" was not yet fraught with political hysteria.
How I miss getting lots of cards in the mail, most of them back then addressed to our family. The envelopes. The colors inside. Snowy scenes of sleighs and brick houses, their windows aglow with sparking lights around tinseled trees. The warm greetings. The valued handwriting of friends and family.
I still like to send them, but only to those from whom, the previous season, I'd received one as well. Otherwise, I feel part of an irrelevant tradition nearly as quaint as vaudeville. I keep a list; it has been narrowing down over the years.
When I get an e-card from somebody, I am just as apt to delete it. So cold. So anonymous. So mass produced; how easy to add my name to your list.
A handwritten card connects one soul to another. Shows the effort taken to reach out.
I don't know how Don's card turned out that year. Here is a card of myself, which I sent out several years before. Taken of me at the Redwood Empire Roller Palace in Santa Rosa. What perfect penmanship, I am so proud looking back! I think I peaked in my 12th year, and then I go so lost, tangled up in scribbling out words, sentences, revisions upon revisions, that I lost my hand.
Many years later, as we faced the last year of the old millennium, I sent out a photo of my amusement park in the works, to the most people who would ever receive a card from me, about 60. The name of my park is what inspired me to send it.
A Century of Thrills ... May '99 Be Your Best Yet
The card came with the above greeting. The sepia photo shows my model midway so young then, with only the Big Dipper roller coaster, Thimble Theatre fun house (based on the one rotting away in a back shed at Baraboo), and The Whip. In seasons to come, I would add the Tilt-A-Whirl, Ferris Wheel, Swings and, now in the works, Laugh in the Dark.
12.1.13/revised-expanded 2014
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