Phineas Taylor Barnum

Born: Bethel; July 5, 1810
Died: Bridgeport; April 7, 1891

Entry by James P. Walsh

There is a temptation, especially after looking at their photographs, to believe that people in the nineteenth century were all rather grim. The success of P.T. Barnum demonstrates that they did have a sense of fun and would even pay to have their legs pulled.

Barnum was born in Bethel where his father owned a tavern. At the age of twelve he joined a cattle drive from Southington to New York City, his first visit to the metropolis that would make him wealthy and famous. Until he was twenty-five, however, Barnum held a succession of odd jobs and seemed destined to obscurity. His big break came in 1835. He had just moved to New York and was suddenly offered the chance to buy the exhibition rights to Joice Heth, a black woman who claimed to be 161 years old and to have been a wet-nurse to George Washington. Barnum seized the chance and began his career as a showman. He immediately demonstrated his understanding of the value of publicity, even bad publicity, when cynics began to question Heth's age. Barnum wrote anonymous newspaper articles attaching her as a fraud while at the same time publicly defending her. Joice Heth soon became a person worth staring at simply because she was controversial.

In 1842 Barnum opened "The American Museum" in lower Manhattan where he exhibited various curios such as the Fiji Mermaid, bearded ladies, and the famous midget, General Tom Thumb. Many of the museum visitors fell for Barnum's trick sign: "This way to the Egress," and apparently most of them took it in good humor when they found themselves outside. In 1871 Barnum organized a circus, the chief attraction of which was Jumbo, the elephant. By that time Barnum was America's most famous entertainer. He had correctly estimated the growing affluence of the American people and their willingness, even perhaps their need, to spend leisure time attending events that entertained without requiring intellectual or physical involvement. For a society able to sit back and relax, Barnum supplied an endless variety of laughs.

While Barnum became a world-renowned character and traveled extensively, he kept his main residence in Bridgeport. He even maintained an interest in Connecticut politics. Before he became famous, he published a newspaper that was so vigorous in its political commentary that Barnum spent sixty days in jail on a libel charge. During the Civil War he risked his life leading a mob to break up a gathering of "Copperheads," people regarded as disloyal to the Union because they wanted peace with the South. After becoming successful, Barnum was an important member of the Republican party in Connecticut and was even elected for a few terms to the Connecticut General Assembly. But it would be wrong to stress the serious side of a man who used to hitch Jumbo to a plow just before the New York to Boston train went by to convince the passengers that he turned his fields with an elephant.

For Further Reading

Barnum wrote an autobiography in 1855 and kept updating it. It may not be totally reliable, but it is delightful. A recent, lively biography is Irving Wallace, The Fabulous Showman; The Life and Times of P. T. Barnum (New York, 1959).

* Entry under revision.