Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-03-25

does human lives in charge, can least af-
ford to be cheap and 1t isn't The stories
OF the press departments about the ex-
travagant prices IL pays for attractions
would pale before the wise eNtravazance
of the price it pays to avoid accidents
In the meanwhile in another department
OF the business office the show proper Is
being put together-manufactuTed out OF an
inchoate mas of raw material
In the beginning the putting together Is
almost as appalling as the raw material IT.
self. Rows of ledgers grow and grow until
it seems as if. instead OF becoming siUpli-
fed, the big thing" were getting ready to
swell and burst all over creation.
There are ledgers that contain lists OF
costumes: others that bear the name, age,
color, value. weight and condition of every
beast in the menager.c; others that show
the rolling stock; more that show the
names, ages and salaries of all the en-
ployes.
The "Simmering Down" Process.
Letters and cable dispatches from agents
who have secured new attractions add to
the mass daily. But slowly, steadily with
out hustle apparent worry. the piles OF
books shrink. Finally, by the middle of
January, when the show is almost "fuI.'
there are hardly any books left at all. The
easy going, cool assistant manager has a
little list wherein is every railroad car OF
the seventy owned by the show. His trains
take wagon number Car number - to
be coupled behind car number -, because
the former is short and is to take a long
wagon, which can lap over into the plat
form of the second car, because that one is
long. The first day the show goes on the
road the cars will be in that order and
they will be packed just so. The last day
OF the will be exactly the same.
He has a book in which is written the
name, age, weight, kind and value OF
every horse in the show, its exact place in
the organization, and If il is a draught an
imal, the wagon or chariot that IL is TO
haul The drivers and riders are as minute
ly provided for and tabulated as are the
horses. AT a moments notice, now, the
show could be put on the road-on paper.
The business end knows exactly where
every tent stake is. every maui to drive it
and the man to handle the maui
All the time the attractions piling
in and being subjected to two vastly diff
ferent processes. The press department IS
Selling on their spectacular side and strlv-
ing to outglitter their glitter with the amaz-
ing and clever flow of adjectives that has
become a really indispensable part of the
circus; and the executive end of the &c
partment has been boiling down" those
same attractions until they go into the
working schedule BADLY as turns of so
many minutes.
Whole Show on Orc Sheet.
By the middle of February the boiling
down is finished. The rows of books and
the piles of memorandum and plans and
tables have disappeared in the files. In
their stead the manager of each depart
ment has before him sheet of paper six
inches by ten inches. on it is the program
of the show.
All the mass of detail has been simmersd
down to that scrap of typewriter paper,
and the big thing" is ready to start out
its sixteen advance agents in their four
special cars first of all; then the 125 bill
posters with their cooks and walters in
their four big cars; then the lightweight
big top" or tent men with the seat men,
stake drivers. chandelier men and their
cooks and stewards Fifteen of these cooks
there are altogether and they have two
butchers to help them. Thirty-three train
men are ready to handle the outfit and
manage the train hands that come on to
handle the cars. The show is ready to
take the field and subsist on its own re-
sources for month without outside aid
cooking for itself, doctoring itself black
smithing itself and even making its own
electric light.