Dr Stephen Juan - Odd News

FREAK SHOW

Being a "freak" could once bring fame and fortune--as well as misery.

So argues Dr. Robert Bogdan, a professor of special education and cultural history at Syracuse University in New York. His book, FREAK SHOW: PRESENTING HUMAN ODDITIES FOR AMUSEMENT AND PROFIT is still the definitive work on this topic. Dr. Bogdan explores how humans once treated--and mistreated--those among us who happened to have been born seriously "different".

Before the era of film and television, entertainment was often obtained by attending traveling carnival "amusement" exhibitions that were often attached to circuses--"freak shows". Hundreds of such shows crisscrossed the globe from the early 19th century until the 1950s. Their "exhibits" placed on public display included dwarfs, giants, Siamese twins, those with misshaped heads, with too much hair, or with too few or too many limbs. Individuals who would today be classified as suffering from physical or intellectual handicaps were shamelessly paraded in front of a gawking, awe-struck public.

Although cruel, shockingly insensitive, and shamelessly exploitative by today's standards, Dr. Bogdan argues that such "pornography of disability" was widely accepted as one of the most popular forms of entertainment in the era.

The public would queue to view those with horrible birth defects. Pasqual Pinon, "The Two-headed Mexican", was born with the head of a sibling protruding from his forehead. Piramal and Sami, "The Brother and Sister, Double Bodied Hindoo (sic) Enigma", were born with the headless torso of the sister dangling limply from the brother's abdomen. Charles Tripp, "The Armless Wonder", entertained audiences by cutting out paper dolls faster using his toes than anyone in the crowd using their hands.

The "freak show" did not discriminate. Age or sex made no difference--both were exploited without impunity. "The Jones Siamese Twin Babies" were put on exhibition by their parents almost immediately after birth. Ella Harper, "The Camel Girl", from childhood was made to walk on her hands and feet to expose her misshapen hips--180 degrees malaligned. Annie Jones, "The Bearded Lady", merely suffered from what is now classified as hypertrichosis--yet her picture sold in the thousands around the world.

Entire families of "human curios" were often put on display: "The Horvath Midgets", "The Doll Family", and "Lavina, Her Husband, Count Primo Magri and His Brother, Baron Ernesto Magri" are a few examples.

Gullible and unsuspecting individuals, including children, were bought, sold, kidnapped, and passed from promoter to promoter. Often, life as an "amusement" meant a life-long horror existence. Ruthless entrepreneurs had no qualms about acquiring humans for "freak show" exhibition by whatever means were necessary. Nor did they hesitate when robbing them of their human dignity or reducing them to mere objects--kept alive solely to fatten one's wallet.

Promoters often scoured the four corners of the planet to find ever more exotic examples of human "oddities". However, such attractions had to be sufficiently bizarre to cajole the public into parting with its brass. Public ignorance was played upon and the crudest pseudo-science invoked. A man named Krao was passed off as "The Missing Link" and one, Henry Johnson, was billed simply as "What Is It?". Racism abounded in the "freak show". Pacific Islanders were promoted as "The Cannibals From Figi" (sic), "Fiji Jim and Wife", or "The Wild Men of Borneo". Africans became "The Savage Zulus" while two South Americans emerged as "Aurora and Natali, The Ancient Aztecs".

The money making potential of the "freak show" was so great that "freaks" were often invented by shameless profiteers where they could not be acquired "naturally". Dr. Bogdan adds that "for every real physical anomaly, the promoters conjured countless more." Moreover, he observes, in one way or another, "every exhibit was a fraud" since whatever strange characteristic that did exist was exaggerated in order to make the "attraction" all the more "amusing". For example, perhaps the most famous "freak" of all time, P.T. Barnum's "Tom Thumb", was first exhibited as an eleven-year-old, British-born member of the lower nobility. But in reality, "Tom Thumb" was a five-year-old commoner named Charles Sherwood Stratton who was born in the U.S. state of Connecticut. And the relatively famous "Maximo and Bartola, Aztecs of Ancient Mexico" were in reality mentally retarded siblings sold by their El Salvadoran mother to an unscrupulous American huckster.

Dr. Bogdan maintains that some "freaks" managed to find fame and fortune as a result of their exhibition. Indeed, a handful even became famous celebrities of their time. For example, the events of the 1844-47 European tour of "Tom Thumb" were chronicled by the media and followed by the public much as the exploits of touring rock bands are today.

It was common for individuals to try to pass themselves off as "freaks" when clearly they were not. For instance, non-identical twin brothers, "Adolph and Rudolph", tried to fool the public into thinking they were Siamese twins. In fact, one brother merely sat on a hip of the other while both fit their legs into one pair of baggy trousers. In the "freak show" trade, this was known as a "gaffed freak" or "type". Such frauds were outwardly condemned by the "freak show" industry, but usually allowed to exist--as long as one could get away with it. The irony is inescapable: A "freak" condemned for phoniness in a business based on phoniness.

Dr. Bogdan points out that audiences came not only to jeer, but also to marvel and wonder. And he believes that this reflects important cultural tendencies of the time. Furthermore, he argues that the reasons for the popularity of the "freak show" are also the reasons for its demise. The public became more sophisticated. Films and television de-mystified "freaks". By showing them on the screen, they were rendered almost commonplace. Strides in modern medicine defined the conditions of many "freaks" as treatable if not curable. Thus, Dr. Bogdan writes, "society came to view human oddities not as marvels, but as pathological."

What does the former popularity of the "freak show" tell us about ourselves? Certainly, Dr. Bogdan's account gives us insights into how humans once perceived the "deviant". He also reveals how private greed and public gullibility intertwined.

Nevertheless, the "freak show" should make us both ashamed and proud. It emerges as yet another example of man's inhumanity to man. Humans were regarded as circus animals--captured, bought and sold, transported, manufactured, and put on display--all to entertain members of the same species. No other creature does this.

But it should also please us to reflect upon our progress. The heyday of the "freak show" is now long ago--dead and buried. And the definition of "freak" has come full circle. In recent years, promoters of dwarf throwing in Queensland, writers of exploitative articles in certain pulp magazines, and the few who still cruelly joke in poor taste about those with handicaps who are fast becoming the "oddities", the "curios"--the modern day "freaks".

Their lack of common decency, sensitivity, and respect for human dignity makes them so.

References and More Information:
Bogdan, R. (1988) FREAK SHOW: PRESENTING HUMAN ODDITIES FOR AMUSEMENT AND PROFIT.
Chicago: University of Chicago.
http://www.disabilityhistory.org/freak1.html