The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-01-09
OLD CIRCUS MANS YARN.
There Was Something Doing When the
Giant Posed as Santa Claus. $50,

GidHI FOSSO as OdnCd NIduSs fLtt4t
perhaps yodo remember me telling
YOU" said the old circus man, "about
the political folks getting the
old man to let the greatest of all
giants carry a torch in their political
procession? But they were not the
only local people by all means that
called for the giant.
I'VE had this season request from.
one of the biggest churches in town to
let the giant play Santa Claus and give
out the presents from a Christmas tree
to be set up in the church. Good idea !?
Why, thought to myself that the cir
Gus business. didn't include all the
shrewd people in the world. But the
giant was willing and the old man
couldn't refuse, and so we told EN-
they could have him.
well, they sent up and measured
him for his Santa Claus suit-the coat
of an ordinary Santa Claus suit
wouldn't have been much too big for
a hat for the giant-and had it made
up for him in good shape, and a won
derful figure he made in it.
4nSy SCI. lIlS ASlIlSlIudS Tree up III
the church, this year, not in the Sun
day school room4the giant couldn't
have begun too'stand up straight in
that-but in the body of the church.
The tree they set up was much the
biggest one they ever. had.
THE children were to sit in the gall
leries. The giant, walking along one of
| the side aisles, would have clear and
! IL
in front of and just off the front of the
gallery, all of which the church folks
thought out well in their plan.
What troubled US most was how to
| get the giant into the church in a dig
nified manner; it wouldn't do to have
Santa Claus creeping into church on
! his hands and knees as this Santa
! Claus would have to do if he had come
in at one Of the doors; that would
| have spoiled the whole business. But
we got him in through a side window
the church had along the side tall
| windows that reached up from the
| ground floor to the space above the
galleries, windows that would have
been tall enough for the giant to step
| through erect, if the gallery hadn't
! been in the way. We got him in
| through the lower part of one of these
windows, back at the corner of the
/
had been hung there, and when the tree
and the people were ready the giant
| stepped out from behind it.
IF it hadn't been for his kindly face
| he would have frightened many of
them, OLD and young. / had seen the
| giant myself in pretty much every con-
| ceivable sort of costume, in which his
height had been, heightened by the
wearing of tail qbearskin hats and that
1 sort of thing. bIt he had uovor 1oalxod
| SO big to me as che did now as jolly
Santa Claus; but his face made him
all right, though there were some chill
dren who trefnbfed still, as he APP
preached them 4ls
Whoever it was who was giving out
the gifts would call out the names of
the children and then the giant would
take the things with those names on
off the tree, reaching without any diff
ficulty or anyI stretching whatever
things that a man of ordinary stature
couldn't have reached standing on a
chair. or on a step ladder for that mat
| ter. o.
and then the giant would take these
things around and distribute them to
| the children ifs the galleries, walking
| along the aisle and calling the chill
drens names. HIS head and shoulders
and the upper part of his body, in fact,
were well above the top of the gallery
rail; he could have reached pretty
we'll over toward the back seat in the
! gallery.
But the children were all in the
| front rows, and the giant reached them
all without any trouble. And so it
went.
when the things had all been dis
| tributed, so Enthusiastically kind and
gentle was the great giants bearing
| that everybody. had come to feel like