Liz Zelencich

Program Co-ordinator
NEWSPAPERS IN EDUCATION
Email your thoughts to nie@thestandard.fairfax.com.au
NEWSPAPERS IN EDUCATION
12 TUESDAY, July 29, 2014 The Standard www.standard.net.au
The decline of the traditional
circus was obvious during the
Great Depression in the 1930s.
However, nowadays, we have
seen the reinvention of the circus
with the birth of Cirque de Soleil
and our very own Circus OZ.
Circus Oz was founded in
December 1978 in Melbourne,
with its rst performance season
in March 1979. Circus Oz was the
union of two already well-known
groups - Soapbox Circus, a road
show set up by the Australian
Performing Group in 1976, and
the New Ensemble Circus, a
continuation of the New Circus,
established in Adelaide in 1974.
The founders wanted to create
a modern circus without animals,
but instead with elements of
rock'n'roll, popular theatre and
rollicking fun. One of the very
rst new style circuses without
animals, Circus Oz continues to
make a show with only a dozen
multi-skilled performers who all
perform the entire show, doing 'a
bit of everything', from acrobatics
and clowning to music and aerial
work. The skills are high-level
circus, but the show is usually
amusing and built on characters
such as Spannaand Fantasia
Fitness.
Circus OZ
The Early Circus
No one knows just when or where the rst circus act
was performed. People have probably thrilled to displays
of physical skill and animal training for many thousands
of years. Some circus acts are so old that even the
ancient Romans, who coined the word circus, did not
know where they originated. We know that acrobatic
shows were popular royal entertainment in China as far
back as 3,000 years ago.
To the romans, a circus was an open-air arena. The
largest and oldest was the Circus Maximus (biggest
circus). Chariot races were held there, as were displays
of horsemanship, wrestling and acrobatics. Wild beasts
and even human captives were also exhibited in the
Roman circus, often cruelly.
With the fall of Rome, this type of circus became a
thing of the past. The best part of the ancient circus
instinct survived, however. For hundreds of years it was
kept alive in the Western world by wandering troupes of
performers and clowns, by exhibitions at horse fairs, and
by travelling animal trainers.
Not until the late 1700s did the modern
circus begin to take form. It is believed
to have originated in the exhibitions of
horsemanship that became popular in
England. A former cavalryman, Philip Astley,
was presenting such acts in London in 1768.
Astley put his horses through their paces in
a large circle, or ring. Ever since his time the
ring has been the central performance area
of the circus.
Astley enhanced his London show with
music, acrobats, tumblers, ropewalkers, and
a clown. In 1783 he built the rst real circus
in France. Soon circuses based on the Astley
pattern were performing across the continent
of Europe and in the United States, Canada,
and Mexico.
John William Ricketts, a Londoner, brought
the circus to the United States when he
opened a show in Philadelphia, in 1793. He
may also have introduced this entertainment
to Canada, for a man named Ricketts had a
circus there in 1798.
These were both one-ring, resident
(non-travelling) circuses. In Philadelphia,
which was then the capital of the United
States, President George Washington was
among the famous people who enjoyed the
circus.
By the 1800s, traveling French and
Spanish troupes were reviving the circus
scene from Mexico to Canada. In the 19th
century American circus men began to add
new touches to this European-born type of
entertainment. Among their contributions
were the canvas-topped touring circus
with its main tent, or big top; a musical
instrument called the calliope; and the
three-ring circus.
Even in the early 1800s many American
circus men were wanderers. They went from
town to town in wagons drawn by horses and
donkeys, exhibiting their acts and animals
wherever they could draw crowds.
The most popular of their animals, at rst,
was the performing horse. The elephant,
however, soon took the spotlight. Soon
every circus, to be successful, had to have
at least one elephant. The public began to
rate a show by the number of its elephants,
rather than by the number of its acts or its
performers.
Birth of the Modern Circus
Tents, Menageries, and Sideshows With the introduction of the canvas performance
tent, the travelling circus entered a new era. The
rst such tent was probably the one raised in 1826
by Aaron Turner. His tent was only 15 metres or
less in diameter, but it was large enough to shelter
his show and his audience from sun and rain.
Other travelling circuses welcomed this innovation,
and began to carry tents which could be raised on
any vacant lot or eld.
As circuses grew larger by adding acts and
animals, the number and the size of the tents they
carried also grew. The largest tent, in which the
main performance was given, became known as
the big top. There might also be a sideshow tent, a
menagerie tent, dressing tents, a dining tent called
the cookhouse, and tents for the concessionaires,
who sold such things as lemonade and fairy oss.
In the popular sideshow tent the circus gathered
its human peculiarities and other oddities. This was
the home of the midget and the fat lady, the giant
and the bearded lady, the Siamese twins and the
tattooed man.
A menagerie was part of almost every circus
well into the 20th century. It was supposed to bring
knowledge of zoology to the public. Menageries
have been credited with showing the rst giraffe,
rhinoceros and hippopotamus seen outside their
natural habitat.
The Circus Parade
In the days when a circus travelled in wagons, its caravan
would often halt at daybreak at the edge of a new town.
The performers would put on their most fabulous costumes.
Workmen would groom the animals. The wagons, horses,
camels, and elephants would be lined up in parade formation.
At the end would be placed a steam calliope a noisy
musical instrument added to the circus world in the 1850s.
Its band blaring and its calliope screaming, this loud and
showy parade would march down the main street, telling
everyone the circus had come to town. Crowds would race
behind the parade to the vacant lot where the big top was
to be raised. Such colourful processions were the beginning
of the grand and glorious free street parades that were long
the great attraction of circus day in every city visited by the
circus.
T
h
e

G
r
e
a
t
e
s
t

S
h
o
w

o
n

E
a
r
t
h
act Not until the late 1700s did the modern
Birth of th
al
s
was
d the
TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT
With th
tent th