Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1904-08-31
THEY KNOW HOW FALL.
Why Acrobats Have Been Successful
in "Looping the Cap on
Bicycle.


looping the gap on simple shuttle
loop" and here was young Italian
performing the same feat with the add
ed danger of the gap" says descrip-
ton of "How Circus Performers Learn
Their Thrilling Feats," by Harvey J.
O'Higgins, in Success. He coasted
down an incline that hoped back at
its foot and carried him, upside down,
across gap in the top of the hoop to
the other side of the circle and so down
to the level again. In fact, flying
through the air, head down. he turned
complete somersault with his wheel
and came down on it.
You can't say that isn't dangerous"
one OF our party challenged.
"Dangerous!" the circus man replied
its deadly-to person who can't
do 1t. I'm only surprised that more
ambitious amateurs weren't killed in
that Coney loop. AS for our man here
well, just to prove what I say, I'll
tell you something that isn't known
outside. We have to carry three men
able to do that appalling feat but the
three are all members of one troupe Of
acrobats, and they all do it equally we'll
and yet," he added with a smile,
none of them is a brave man. With
each, skill eliminates most of the risk"
He introduced us to them They
were French acrobats of the name of
Ancilotti, either sons or apprentices of
a famous circus performer of Europe.
When any, of them ~'1ooped the gap"
he rode in full control of his wheel,
with an unbewildered consciousness of
where he was at every moment of the
way, and with an alert preparedness
for any accident that might throw him.
They had had many falls while they
were learning the act. They had never
been hurt. They knew how to fall.
They had, in fact, spent a lifetime
learning how to fall-and how to ride
without falling. From the earliest
years of their infancy they had been
working at that art. With their par
ents in France, and with circusses in
every country of Europe, they had been
riding the single wheel, mounting the
spiral, descending the ladder, crossing
the high wire, balancing on each 9TH
ers' shoulders, and doing all the other
circus feats that the bicycle introduced
into the circus. They had added "loop-
ing the gap" to their repertory. They
will have new trick for next season.
The circus man spread his hands.
"You see, we have no use for a man
who endangers his life. What we want
is man who can do acts that appear
appallingly dangerous, but can do them
without any risk to himself. That is
what all these men can do, and are
paid for doing-that and nothing
more"
William Wallet, an English bare
back rider, undertook to explain. He is
IS years old and has been riding in the
circus since the age of four-when he
made his first appearance strapped to
the back of a pony.
'It-is all done with the shoulders"
he said. 1.-THE shoulders are the center
Of gravity, in the air. It is with the
muscles Of the chest that the lift and
turn are both made. For example, in
back somersault you do not throw
yourself over with q kick from the
ground. You merely leap into the air,
and then, with the muscles of your
stomach and chest, whip your legs up
over you, rcvolve around your shoul-
ders and come down on your feet. That
is the reason why all circus performers
are widest under the arms and smallest
around the waist. They sre built like
greyhounds."