Jim Dorr

It is not a cherished object. I did not even know I had it until I discovered it while looking through materials for another story.  And I am glad I did.  It may not be cherished, but it certainly is storied.

Every year Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey circus would come to town – Dubuque, Iowa in my case. We - and it seemed the whole town - would get up before dawn and rush down to meet the circus train as it unloaded. No school that day. Excitement grew as lions, tigers, elephants, performers, equipment all came off the train and made their way to the circus grounds. We would watch them pitch the tents and set up the midway. Then there would be a parade downtown. Circus wagons, animals , acrobats, clowns, bands - and us. We all joined in. It was one big party as excitement built for what we knew was to come that evening: “Step right up ladies and gentlemen for the Greatest Show on Earth.” Walking past the tattooed lady on the Midway at night, playing the games, eating cotton candy or sno-cones, buying a chameleon to take home as a pet and then the show itself, with its feats of daring and clowns capering under the Bigtop.

Sights, sounds, smells.

All those memories came back looking at this program. The circus I saw is now a thing of the past; that is for the good in retrospect, particularly given the treatment of the animals. But I can’t help being nostalgic myself – a part of me sad that my grandkids will never experience anything like it.