Peter Sells and Alfred were close friends. The Sells Bros. Show had opened early—April 16, 17, 18. It rained or snowed every day during their engagement in Columbus. The show was to appear in Chillicothe a few days after leaving Columbus. Peter Sells came into the stage office and arranged to go to Chillicothe. He had returned from Kentucky to confer with his brothers. Alfred accepted his invitation to accompany him to Chillicothe. The after concert, with no performers to present it, had been omitted for three days. Alfred advised Ephraim Sells that could he find wardrobe a concert could be given that afternoon and night. The wardrobe was secured. The announcer made much of the "great minstrel comedian" who would positively appear in the concert for this day only. Nat Goodwin and his company, who were to appear in the opera house that night, were in the audience.
Ephraim, Allen and Peter Sells, and Alfred were seated on a bench in front of the hotel. Allen Sells was endeavoring to persuade Alfred to remain with the show.
While the dicker was pending, a young clerk from a store door, yelled to a passer-by on the opposite side of the street: "Were you at the circus?" The other yelled: "Yes." "How was it?" "Bum, but the concert's good. That Al. G. Field that was here last winter in the opera house, is with them. The concert's the best part of the whole thing. I guess the minstrels are busted, or Field wouldn't be with such a bum circus."
The Sells Brothers appreciated the joke.
The argument ended abruptly by the engagement of Alfred.
Ephraim Sells was exacting in all his dealings. Severe with the drunkard, he endeavored to assist all temperate and deserving employes, advising men to secure their own homes. "Own your home. You will never accumulate anything without a home. Establish a home, raise a family, be somebody." There are many men living in Columbus today who owe all their possessions to Ephraim Sells' advice.
The Sells Brothers Shows were larger than the Thayer & Noyes. In fact, the Sells Shows had the advantage of a menagerie. The circus performance was not so meritorious as the first circus Alfred was connected with. The Sells brothers, with the exception of Peter, were not good showmen; that is, they were not producers, although good business men. Had the Sells brothers possessed the talent for originating and producing displayed by James A. Bailey, or Alfred T. Ringling, their organization would have been second to none, as they had the opportunities but did not take advantage of them.
They were undoubtedly exhibiting the finest menagerie in the country, the collection of animals, with the exception of a giraffe, was most complete. Peter, the advance agent, returned to the show. He severely criticized the appearance of the show, particularly the lack of decorations. Nashville was a two days' stand. Ephraim gave Alfred orders to buy all the decorations, banners, flags, etc., necessary to convert the interior of the tents into a bower of beauty. Nashville stores were ransacked. Printed calico or other goods with the national colors emblazoned on them were the only decorations available. Wagon loads of these goods were purchased. Side poles were festooned with the gaudy colored calico, and lengths of it hung in front of the reserved seats, on the band stand, the entrance to the dressing tents. The decorations were the wonder and admiration of the circus folks. Drivers, razor-backs, car porters, cook tent, side show people came again to gaze upon the riot of color presented by the decorations. It rained as it only rains in Nashville. The surrounding country is fame's eternal camping ground. Here sleep men from all the States of the North and South. It is the bivouac of the dead. The hills have trembled with the tramp of armies. Blood has flowed as freely as the rushing waters of the murky Cumberland. Hills now green with nature's garb were once stained with the blood of those who struggled for the mastery. But no battlefield near Nashville ever presented the sight that did the hill on which stood Sells Brothers tents in the soft haze of that October morning. Running rivulets of red percolated in a hundred gulleys from under the circus tents. The gaudy red calico was now white, but all the plains below were red. Thousands came to view the sight. One negro spread the news that "the varmints wus all loose and had et up all de circus folks case de blood was leakin' out de tents in buckets-full." Another surmised "De elephans had upset the lemonade tubs."
The decorations had faded white, the hills were red, Ephraim and Lewis made the air blue.