Agency through Otherness: Portraits of Performers in Circus Route Books, 1875-1925 Main Menu Introduction Introduction to the book and information about ways to navigate the content. The American Experiment: Circus in Context Circus performers and American history timeline Routing the Circus: The Things They Carried Circus Routes Map, 1875-1925 Ethnological Congresses and the Spectacle by Rebecca Fitzsimmons Outsiders in Demand: Chinese and Japanese Immigrant Performers by Angela Yon and Mariah Wahl Shattering Gender Roles: Women in the Circus by Elizabeth Harman Side Show Sounds: Black Bandleaders Respond to Exoticism Annexed Circus Musicians by Elizabeth C. Hartman Native Performance and Identity in The Wild West Show by Mariah Wahl Showmen's Rests: The Final Curtain Circus Cemetery Plots by Elizabeth C. Hartman List of Performers Performers covered in this exhibit Bibliography & Further Readings Bibliography and readings for each chapter Acknowledgements Creative Commons License

Portraits of Midwest Musicians

38294 Native Performance and Identity in The Wild West Show by Mariah Wahl

A striking number of sideshow musicians hail from the Midwest.

Not only that, many are from north-central Missouri - and if not there, then east Kansas. Why is this?

One hypothesis is that they or their parents were Exodusters, the name given to disenfranchised African Americans who participated in the mass emigration northwards into the Kansas area starting in the 1870s, the first post-war migration of Black people. However, census records of the musicians in question - and their parents - do not support this theory. Many Black sideshow musicians were not only born in the Midwest (usually Missouri, Kansas, Ohio, or Kentucky), but their parents were as well. These musicians and their families were usually local to the area going back into the days of slavery; most parents of these musicians were previously enslaved, with their children escaping the binds of slavery only by a few years. The earliest Black sideshow conducter was likely an escapees from slavery: T. S. Roadman. Considering Missouri specifically, this is probably largely in part due to the Missouri Compromise; slavery was legal in Missouri until 1865. (Regarding Ohio, the Scioto Valley south of Columbus, home to S. P White, was an important leg of the Underground Railroad.)

Why then were so many Black sideshow musicians from this area of the Midwest? There are a few other potential reasons. First, the Midwest was big money for traveling circuses. The circus utilized every inch that it could of the railroads that rapidly expanded like spiderwebs through the Midwest, hurrying to get to the pocketbooks of small Midwest towns; before the reign of planes, there was no fly-over. Perhaps this visibility engendered the possibility of circus music as a vocation in the minds of Midwest African Americans, further spurred on by the lack of other opportunities in the Midwest?

Regardless, many Black musicians in the circus circuit not only shared the African American experience, but a Midwest experience. Even more granular than that, several musicians were hit by the same 1883 tornado that ripped through north-central Missouri, including Wolfscale, McNutt, Pleasant, Powell, and the Enix brothers.

Below are biographical portraiture timelines of Black musicians, mostly bandleaders, who performed in sideshows and were integral to the success of the circus. Many of these timelines focus on members of J. O. McNutt's sideshow band that traveled with the Walter L. Main Circus in 1895, as this was the first year that group and individual portraits of Black musicians were included in the circus route books digitized by Milner Library.

This page has paths:

  1. Side Show Sounds: Black Bandleaders Respond to Exoticism Angela Yon

Contents of this path:

  1. The Firsts: T. S. Roadman (1844-1909) & R. N. Thompson (1858-1936)
  2. The Soldier: S. P. White (1867-1943)
  3. The Macon Jaybird: J. O. McNutt (1867-1931)
  4. The Engineer: Fred D. Powell (1869-1922)
  5. The Macon City Kid: Joe W. Pleasant (1870-)
  6. The Brothers: W. T. (1872-1918) & C. E. (1874-1943) Enix
  7. The Big Band: James Wolfscale (~1868-1921)

This page has tags:

  1. Circus bands Angela Yon
  2. Sideshows Angela Yon
  3. African Americans Angela Yon

This page references: