Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1906-03-06

purpose to compare 1t to great man
ufacturing plant giving employment
to upward Of one thousand men and
women, each skilled in his or her de-
partment whether it be caring for the
chandeliers" building the tiers of
seats, selling peanuts in the "menag.
erie tent" looping the gap, or exhibit
ing the educated horses or acting ele-
plants. But the directorate OF the
great circus must overcome obstacles
that the ordinary manufacturer never
experiences. The first Of these is that
1t must feed the army Of employees
three times day in the cook tent"
and, second, 1t must change the site
Of Its plant and erect and raise its can
vas factory every day. And it does
this, mind you. to manufacture COM
modify without which the American
public Is disinclined to exist-enter-
tainment.
All this is offered as preliminary to
the statement that Sandy" was very
small wheel-indeed, single cog In
very small wheel-in the circus me-
chanism.
| After it was all over George Airing
ton, the privilege man." whose func-
ton it was to operate the side-show,
the program, the candy stands, and the
cook tent, thrust his thumbs under his
braces and remarked:
81 told you So" But he had not new
ertheless.
To be sure Arlington selected San
dy" from a multitude Of other appli-
cants just before the show left New
York, but If he perceived elements in
| the makeup of the little red haired
| Scotchman which were hidden to the
rest of us, he did not point them out,
as it were, but left everything to
time, and as it SO often does, time told
in the case of Sandy"
He had no other name, had Sandy"
He had been bootblack, and news
boy of course; he had slept beneath
the shelter of arches in his time and
had once gone for two days without
food. Because the city had, in his
opinion, treated him shabbily, he dis
liked the city, wherein he differed
widely from his companions Of the
pavement. The departure of the cir
Gus seemed to offer him means Of
escape. He asked for q Job What
! was more to the purpose-with1 San
dy, me got one. ~ g
He was the only inexperienced man
"on the stand" in the menagerie tent.
Accordingly he became at once the
butt of Billy Johnson's Witticisms,
Billy being the "boss" candy man. AS
for Sandy" >he did not take the time
to reply; he was busy. For the first
week this business of his was proceed
ing in the" big-top, consisted of watch
ing the animals. The second week he
was sent among the reserved seats"
with a basket of cracker-ja and pop
corn, .andihis sales. were SO very few
that Johnson, the next day, watched
him. The reason was apparent; San
dy" was all intent upon the perform
ance in the rings. Afterward Johnson
talked to him like father, as he told
Arlington. whereat the later observed
! from the wealth of his experience,
Keep your eye on him, but he'll de-
/ liver the goods after a bit. He's
| Scotch"
Everything about the show interest
ed SANDY" At first, as have said, it
was the animals that enlisted his
/ closest study. He became friendly
with George Conklin, the boss animal
|
plants in captivity, that neither the
natural historians nor the native ma
bouts of India know! Sandy" stored
1 this knowledge away in one Of the
inches Of his brain and took up the
"cat animals" Concerning these he
further mass of curious information
from "Scotty" who in his day had
cared for the mighty Jumbo as moth
er might care for her first-born, but
who now, in his age, was minor fac
totum among the red "dens" wherein
the "cats" growled so Justify Of Sum
day for the food that Is always denied
them on that day.
II SANDY" had motive in familiar
izing himself with the real SHOW" in
all it's myriad details, he did not make
| it public. Thompson's opinion In the
matter was accepted generally
Hes jes' GURUS" he said, he'll git
over It.
But the way he absorbed the meth
DDS of the ring performers and the
zeal that he displayed in emulating
their generally dangerous examples In
| the deserted "big-top' between shows,
when nearly every one connected with
the circus was taking the customary
early supper in the "cook tent" au-
cured i'll for any discontinuance of his
Initiative activity.
AS the days heightened into weeks,
and the miles between the show and
New York became more and more.
Sandy developed into "a little of ev-
erything.' He was fair candy butch
err" third rate ground tumbler, a
tenth-rate clown and mediocre rider
in the "hippodrome events" that closed
the big show. But one thing he was
not, unqualifedly, was not. He was
not an incline rider. And above all
else on earth riding the dizzy incline
and shooting off through space at the
bottom to drop upon a second plat
form forty feet away was the summum
bonum of '.Sandy's" weird ambition.
When THE fanfare Of trumpets from
the militarA band in the "big tent" an
nounced Who's "Death-Defying Leap