Jack’s Winning Words 4/7/21

“There’s a sucker born every minute.”  (P.T.Barnum - died: 4/7/1891)  Barnum, known as the Greatest American Showman was also a great huckster (giving people what he thought they wanted – the world’s smallest man (Gen Tom Thumb) and the Fiji Mermaid and the Barnum Bailey Circus.  It’s said that he had an affair with “the Swedish Nightengale” Jenny Lind, while sponsoring a series of American performances by her.  During my “growing up” years when the “circus” would come to town, a staple was the Barnum display of unusual people.  ;-)  Jack

FROM J&S:  Have you seen the Greatest Showman movie? We watched for the first time a few weeks ago.===JACK:  The bio-movies tend to stretch the truth a bit.  I have not seen the movie.

FROM LBP:  Do you ever find that people around you become part of the scenery? Neighbors in the yard are as common to see as the birds at the feeder. Or people at the grocery are as expected as the the boxes on the shelves. Sometimes I look at the person in the car beside mine at the stoplight and try to actually see them as an individual. It’s an exercise.===JACK:  Do you mean...Do I see them as people before or after I HONK at them to get going?

FROM HOMELESS IN FLORIDA:  What kind of "unusual" people did you see at the Barnum displays?===JACK:  I'll have to think about that.  Maybe, The World's Heaviest Woman...or the man with skin like a snake.

FROM BB IN CHGO:  There is a great museum of Barnum in Sarasota Florida.  My favorite part of the exhibit is the scale train set that shows in miniature, how many food cars and supply cars for the animals and such were required to move the circus from place to place around the country at the turn of the…last century. ===JACK:  I appreciate the opportunity to have seen it in "life-size" and in operation.

FROM COPPER COUNTRY PASTOR:  My great grandpa, with the long beard of 17 ft. 6 in. was one of his "freaks" for a couple of years.  He quit because folks thought it fake and tried to yank it off.  The beard is now in the Smithsonian  ===JACK:  Now, I actually know a "freak". or someone related to one.

FROM BLAZING OAKS:  The movie THE GREATEST SHOWMAN indicated that affair...He certainly created a magical world for people in that day. I can remember watching animals unloaded at the train station; elephants! Tigers! etc, It was pretty exciting! I loved the circus! Especially the trapeze high wire performers!===JACK:  Nothing  can replace my childhood memories.