The circus does not run its season, dissolve, and disperse. In winter the entire establishment is maintained. Only the performers and workmen are dropped, and with the former this is generally a mere suspension of service, for contracts are frequently made for several years. Owners, managers, contracting agents, advertising agents, press agents, treasurer, bookkeepers, and others, find no idle moments. Rolling stock, suffering from the hard effects of a season’s campaign, needs painter and carpenter; new acts and novelties must be secured to keep abreast of the times; the new route must be laid out and considered; and to do this the management must know the population and character of every town; have information of the condition of business, vicissitudes of the year and the prospects for the coming season; know the national, state, and municipal law and the character of licenses, and the price of food for man and beast; keep track of floods, droughts, or disasters to crops or people; be conversant with the periods of ploughing and harvesting; learn what railroads run in and out of town, their grades and condition, the extent, strength, and height of tunnels and bridges and the relative positions of railroad yards and the show lot; and find out the condition of the soil wherever the circus is booked in case of rain, and provide in advance for such a contingency. The circus is a fair-weather show and the management must have a definite knowledge of wet and dry seasons, to avoid encountering, so far as human foresight is possible, unpropitious meteorological conditions.
The question of transportation is the most careful one involved, and upon its cost and facilities the route of the circus is in a great measure determined. For instance, up in agricultural Windsor county, in southeastern Vermont, nestles the village of White River Junction. It boasts a weekly newspaper, a public school, and a national and a savings bank. Its population does not exceed fifteen hundred; yet the big circuses make annual pilgrimages thither because it is a local trade centre, the Boston and Maine, Central Vermont and Woodstock railroads converge upon it, and there the White and Connecticut rivers merge their waters. Its selection for exhibition purposes is a good illustration of the important part transportation facilities play in arranging routes. White River Junction itself would not turn out patrons enough to pay for the menagerie’s food, but the throngs conveyed there by train and boat always fill the tents. So it is all over the country, barring the large cities. It is not so much the character and size of the place picked for the tents as its topographical position and drawing powers.
All through the winter a corps of women is busy on new uniforms and trappings for man, woman, and beast. There are rich plush and gold bullion galore in this workshop. The pretty spangles that will glitter in the ring are being sewed in place, the elephants are getting new jackets of royal purple and gold, and the camels are being fitted out afresh for the parade. Some of these gorgeous fittings are very expensive, but the circus management calculates that they must be renewed every year. The outlay for hats, boots, and other articles of attire for the army is heavy and ceaseless.
Circus day, to the men who have hundreds of thousands of dollars invested, it will be seen, means the culmination of long and careful and systematic preparation. To get ready for the day has been the work of many months and has employed the talents and attention of men wonderfully expert in their particular fields. The advance staff of one of the “big shows” usually consists of a general agent, a railway contractor, an executive agent, several general contracting agents, and assistants; car No. 1, carrying eighteen to twenty persons; first regular advertising car No. 2, bearing the chief press agent, car manager, and from twenty to twenty-five men; car No. 3, with eighteen to twenty men; car No. 4, carrying a special press agent and car manager and from twelve to fourteen men, including “route riders” and special ticket agents; next and finally, the “layer-out,” who is one day ahead of the circus.
The railroad contractor is the first man out. He is familiar to the finest details with every railroad in the country—its mileage, connections, yard facilities, bridges and tunnels. He plans, besides arranging for the transportation of the circus trains, the special excursions which will converge upon the town on the specified day of exhibition. The general contracting agent follows. He makes contracts for feed, lot, accommodations for advance men, livery teams, and billboards. The contracts of these two men involve many thousands of dollars every week and must pass the rigid scrutiny of the experienced general agent. No detail of the business is unfamiliar to him.
Car No. 1 is professionally known as the “skirmishing car.” It is most frequently called into service to fight opposition. As soon as a railway contractor of a rival circus puts in an appearance on the route the general manager is promptly notified. There is at once a formidable concentration of forces at the threatened point. No stone is left unturned or chance overlooked to gain an advantage; and the circus man is resourceful of schemes and plots. Billboards, barns, fences, hedges, trees, windows, and all other available space is bought up with apparently reckless expenditures. Banners, printed on muslin, are swung from walls and awnings. Sometimes more money than will be realized on show day is spent in this fight for publicity, but the circus regrets not a cent of it if the opposition has been taught a lesson and will not venture again to cross the path.
Attached to a passenger train and about four weeks ahead of the show, comes car No. 2. The general contracting press agent is aboard with his advertising cuts and prepared advertising matter, or keeping pace with it on the route. Sometimes there is a steam calliope, which produces marvellous sonorific effects at sundown, to the dismay of all who live in the immediate neighborhood, but calling obtrusive attention to the approach of the circus. The force of men bills and lithographs for miles around. Each team has a native driver who knows every road and every inhospitable bulldog. Permission is always secured from the owner or lessee of the spot selected for decoration, for without his consent, the astute showman knows, a poster becomes soon a thing of shreds and tatters. In return for the privilege an order is given on the circus for tickets, which is promptly honored if the agreement has been honestly kept.
The men on two other cars see to it that the work of their predecessors is followed up carefully. Various neglected preliminary work is in their charge. They replace posters torn down or mutilated and try to find new points of advantage. They check up and report every discrepancy of the other advance men, too, and send a detailed report to the general agent. The last man before the arrival of the circus is the “layer-out” or “twenty-four-hour man.” He inspects the lot, fixes the route of the procession, and performs a variety of other final duties.
Sometimes a stereopticon man is sent out, but not unless there is opposition or the outlook for the day’s business is bad. He stretches a big white sheet on a popular corner and entertains the town for an evening, adroitly advertising the show and putting the people in good humor.