No More Circus to Run Away to

[jeffsmith]

Ringling Brothers just Announced the End of their Circus

Ringling Bros. Final Performances - Ringling Bros. Circus




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[i1afli]

Ringling Brothers just Announced the End of their Circus

Ringling Bros. Final Performances - Ringling Bros. Circus




Please Note
if you make this thread "Political"
this thread could disappear

Not surprised...it had become a mere shadow of its former self.
Hate to see the end of an iconic tradition however.

 

[rwsmith]

I've been expecting that....

It was a long course, but it had run its entirety.
Years ago when I saw them it was still a great show, with enough interest to draw the family crowd. Just last night I saw where they hired their first female ringmaster. I wonder if that was old news?

 

[johngalt]

I remember mom and dad taking us. They put on a good show.

 

[bigwheelzip]

To bad. When I took my kids to their shows in the 1970's, the animal performance by Gunther Gebel-Williams, especially his Royal Bengal tigers was breathtakingly spectacular.

 

[Boudiepitbull]

Looks like the Big Apple Circus is throwing in the towel too. Bad time to be a clown...

My favorite Ringling Brothers circus memory happened one night in the 1970s riding my bicycle at 2:00AM down Second Ave in NYC. I look up and I see a bunch of camels walking into the mouth of the Midtown Tunnel. Yes...some drugs may have been involved on my part...but there really was a long string of animals stopping traffic and walking in a slow moving procession across midtown Manhattan in the middle of the night. At the very end of the line, after the elephants passed came three Dept. of Sanitation street sweepers following behind in a tight staggered formation.

Apparently that was how they moved all the big animals from Madison Square Garden, they walked them across Manhattan in the middle of the night...

 

[Racer X]

They did that in Seattle back in the day. The King Street train station was at the south end of downtown, and the arena was at the north end. They turned it into a parade every year. It was a straight shot essentially on a single street.

 

[shouldazagged]

I wonder if Cirque du Soleil set the spectacle bar too high, for lower operating costs.

The expense of moving a big circus like the Ringling Brothers shows of old must be enormous today. Even the reduced scale must have been a strain.

 

[Donn]

Another page from my childhood ripped out.

 

[soFlaNative]

Any Florida folk familiar with the winter circus town near Sarasota?
Hope the museums and gardens remain long enough for me to visit one more time.
Just an awesome experience.
The Ringling

 

[Tom S.]

I took my daughter when she was maybe 10. We got there early and someone from the circus came into the stands as asked if she wanted to be in the show parade at the beginning. They took her down to meet some of the performers and she rode in a horse drawn carriage in the parade. Somewhere I got pictures of her and she was on cloud nine for a week.

Too bad other 10 year olds will never get to experience this thrill.

 

[Doug627]

I remember one night there was a long slow moving line of clowns walking past our house . . . wait, that was a nightmare from my childhood.

 

[daniel lawecki]

With the animal rights groups going after them all the time. It's a wonder they made it this long. Animal rights groups along with PETA we will lose hunting and fishing rights. Sooner or late we will all be eating Tofu and **** like that meat will be banned.

 

[chaparrito]

I never cared much for the circus. As a kid, I was always hoping the elephants would stomp on the trainers with their pointed prods.

 

[forindooruseonly]

That's very sad.

Included in the press release: "The decision to end the circus tours was made as a result of high costs coupled with a decline in ticket sales, making the circus an unsustainable business for the company. Following the transition of the elephants off the circus, the company saw a decline in ticket sales greater than could have been anticipated."

Elephants were the backbone of the circus.

Lots of circuses used to winter in Hugo, Oklahoma. A few years ago, we showed up wanting to tour the facilities thinking it must be a common thing and easy tourist money for the circuses. Boy, we were wrong. We were met with suspicion and hostility by the workers around the place, and eventually met with one of the managers. She explained the problems they had had with activists trying to sneak around and cause issues, ranging from surveillance of everything to sabotage of equipment and theft. Apparently, lots of activists gain access by doing exactly what we did, show up and act like stupid tourists.

Once she realized we were circus fans, she happily took us on a great tour of the place. They don't give tours normally, so we saw it how it was and got to watch an elephant training session and talk to a bunch of the workers and performers.

Through it all, I kept thinking about how hospitable and nice these people were when you got past the initial suspicion, and the pressures that must be put upon them to become so defensive in the first place.

And for the record, I've rarely seen animals treated as well as those I saw there. The elephant barn was warm, modern, well lit, with plenty of room. There was plenty of pasture on the interior of the place. The training was done through generational techniques, so basically the older elephants taught the newer ones through mimicry and a reward system. It's super cute to watch a baby elephant try to emulate some of the poses and tricks the old ones do... I think the fact that they were treated so well made me even more frustrated about the situation, and sadly, since this was 2004 or 2005, I think I realized then the writing was on the wall for circuses. I'm glad I got to see them and I'm heartbroken the next generations won't.

 

[427mach1]

What kind of job opportunities will be available to the soon-to-be unemployed circus workers? What other skills do trapeze artists have? And what about the bearded lady?

 

[loknload]

Sad,,very sad ! Another great American institution gone!

 

[soFlaNative]

Following forindoor's track, did the circus continue to use the elephants and transport and heavy equipment for set up? The logistics for truck and crane use would add to already considerable overhead.


As for 427mach1's question, I wanna be at the job fair when 27 guys get out of the VW bug.

 

[billwill]

Circus died cause to many kids today cannot see past their iPhones or tablets. Sad times

 

[sheepdawg]

Basically another tradition done away by today's politically correct atmosphere. A previous poster is correct, hunting and fishing are next on the target.