Discussion Barnum's Christmas Show - or Where Union Soldiers Would Go On Leave in NYC to see 200 Educated Rats

[NH Civil War Gal]

Barnum’s Christmas Show in 1864

If you wanted a hippopotamus for Christmas, then heading to Barnum’s American Museum for the 1864 holiday season is just the ticket! I find it fascinating to take a closer look at the culture…

emergingcivilwar.com

 

[NH Civil War Gal]

Having a snake phobia - I LOVE the description of the "Monster Snakes - More wonderful than pleasing, yet always surrounded by crowds of interested spectators."

 

[captaindrew]

Must've been a heck of a tank for the whale

 

[NH Civil War Gal]

Must've been a heck of a tank for the whale

Well, you'll just have to put on your Federal disguise and escort @Eleanor Rose and me in to protect us from the ribald crowd and we'll take a look to see - especially the hippo and those Monster Snakes!

 

[captaindrew]

Well, you'll just have to put on your Federal disguise and escort @Eleanor Rose and me in to protect us from the ribald crowd and we'll take a look to see - especially the hippo and those Monster Snakes!

We can eat the snakes!

 

[NH Civil War Gal]

My kind of guy!

 

[NH Civil War Gal]

Or ask the educated rats how to get rid of them!

 

[JOHN42768]

Didn't most of the Rats end up in Washington? They are supposedly educated.

 

[mofederal]

I think the rats are still in Washington. Not very educated, but they are greedy.

 

[mofederal]

P. T. Barnum’s 10 Most Famous Human “Freak” Show Attractions - YouTube

 

[Gary Morgan]

I suspect that the uneducated rats were sent to visit the snake exhibits.

If memory served, it was a "great white whale from Labrador," meaning that it was likely a beluga, which are pretty small as whales go.

When I was a kid, I saw the original Jumbo the elephant, skinned and stuffed and in the middle of a museum of circus memorabilia at Tufts University in Medford. Massachusetts, shortly before the museum burned down, taking the stuffed elephant with it (his skeleton and heart are in other museums). I remember thinking he didn't look all that big to me (shrinkage!) and at 5 feet tall, the top of my head came up to about his "elbow" where his front leg met his body. His trunk was full of coins, because apparently the students used it as a sort of wishing well before exams, and his tail was held on with tape, because apparently someone had tried to use it as a rope swing at some point. It was kind of sad, actually. The Tufts sports teams are still called "The Jumbos."

There is a Barnum Museum in Bridgeport, Connecticut, but I've never been. I also liked the 1980s Broadway musical Barnum with Michael Crawford, which is in its entirety on Youtube somewhere.

 

[Lubliner]

It must have been a landmark establishment, very well known by location. No address is given on the Billboard.
Lubliner.

 

[kholland]

Didn't most of the Rats end up in Washington? They are supposedly educated.

I thought that' "rats" were what the Confederate prisoners were fighting for in the conversation with Tom Chamberlain in the movie "Gettysburg".

 

[Gary Morgan]

It must have been a landmark establishment, very well known by location. No address is given on the Billboard.
Lubliner.

If I remember from the musical, it was a multi-story building made of brick, located on the corner of Ann Street and Broadway (Broad Way?)

 

[Gary Morgan]

If anyone's interested, here are the two songs that deal with the American Museum from the '80s play "Barnum!" starring Michael Crawford. Ignore the Japanese subtitles, and the song that I really wanted to post starts at about 4:40, but the "One Brick at a Time" number, sung by Barnum's wife, Charity, is pretty good, too. After Hamilton, this is the play that I'd most like to see live before I die. Most of the background actors were circus performers, and it shows! Enjoy!

 

[JOHN42768]

I think the rats are still in Washington. Not very educated, but they are greedy.

Notice I said "Supposedly" Totally agree on the "Greedy" part

 

[Lubliner]

If anyone's interested, here are the two songs that deal with the American Museum from the '80s play "Barnum!" starring Michael Crawford. Ignore the Japanese subtitles, and the song that I really wanted to post starts at about 4:40, but the "One Brick at a Time" number, sung by Barnum's wife, Charity, is pretty good, too. After Hamilton, this is the play that I'd most like to see live before I die. Most of the background actors were circus performers, and it shows! Enjoy!

That made me think how many kids back then dreamed of running away and joining the show!
Lubliner.

 

[Gary Morgan]

That made me think how many kids back then dreamed of running away and joining the show!
Lubliner.

I have to say, I miss the days when clowns were funny and everyone loved them.

(And the last number in the show is "Join the Circus" and it goes "Join the circus like you wanted to/When you were a kid.")

 

[Grant's Tomb]

Had no idea he did a Christmas show at his museum that year. To avenge Sherman's capture of Atlanta, on November 25th, a few Confederate officers came into the city and set fire to the museum but thankfully volunteer fire fighters put it out before it did any real damage. All but one of the Confederates got away. There's a book about it called A Vast and Fiendish plot by Clint Johnson. And it was also the avenge the death of General John Hunt Morgan and the burning of the Shenandoah Valley

 

[donna]

Barnum always did like to do everything on a grand scale.