Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1883-05-03
ACROBATS AND GYMNASTS.


out net is SO manifestly reprehensible
that it needs neither comment nor con-
domination here; but it is a curious fact
that many more accidents are recorded
of ground-tumbling than of aerial gym
nastics A member of the Hanlon-VOlta
troupe, who has been doing sensational
business all his life, told me that he
never met with a mishap but once, and
that was in descending from bar only
his own height from the stage, when he
sprained his knee rather severely. And
it is significant circumstance, which
cannot be too strongly noted, that the
comparatively few accidents which have
happened to gymnasts have nearly all
occurred through defects in the life
saving apparatus the net. When this
belongs to the performer, it is generally
spread under his own supervision, and
the strength of its texture and fasten-
ings carefully tested, and renewed if re-
CURED; but where the net is a stock
property of place of entertainment, or,
worse still, is provided by an ENTIRE
preneur who, not a performer himself,
farms the gymnast, and undertakes to
find all the appliances, damaged ma
terial and insecure attachments are apt
to be overlooked.
The descent into the net itself is said
to be not altogether devoid of danger.
and an impression is current among
these people that to fall upon the side
of the head will inevitably break the
neck. lam not aware, however, that any
case has been known to bear out this
theory. Many gymnasts now dispense
with the rugs or carpets with which the
net is commonly padded, on account of
their interfering with the view of those
seated underneath, and come down upon
the naked meshes without injury. A
certain Little Bob''-a fine young
man now-whO has been celebrated for
pre-eminently high dives ever since he
was a very small boy, sometimes max
ing headlong perpendicular descent of
eighty feet or so, where the building is
lofty enough to permit of it, says that
he would have no objection to plunge
from a height twice as great into net
of proper tension, and that he has never
suffered any Inconvenience from the
transit through the air or arrest of mo-
ton. He comes down in slightly OBJ
lique direction, with the hands extended
for effect, after the fashion of a diver:
when he sees the net "getting near
the arms are withdrawn to the sides and
the head is tucked in on the chest, so
that he falls upon the shOulder-blades
and rolls over. In connection with this
part of the subject, the elegant and
wonderful "dives" of Zazael at the
London Aquarium will doubtless be re-
membered by many readers.
Your special commissioner being
taken up to an exceedingly high and
dusty place to see some very ingenious
mechanism recently invented by GYM
mast. was induced by the enthusiastic
arguments, protestations, and twice
repeated example of that individ-
ual, to take the direct route to
the lower regions--in plain words, to
drop from swinging bar into the cush-
toned net some fifty feet below. Fin
gers seemed to assume an iron grip. and
the bar to become magnetic, even after
the trapeze had been brought to stand
still, and the legs drawn up at right
angles with the body in a sitting pos
ture. as directed Nov then. 90"
was shouted more than once. before I