Um, Tony Dean. And today we'll be calling history to speak with P T Barnum. He'll be answering our call on April 1st, 1891. Just before his death at the age of 80 in his youth, PT, Barnum witnessed an older woman claiming to be 161 years old. And George Washington's nurse, instead of arguing the absurdity of the claim, he purchased the rights to exhibit her and used his uncanny ability to promote and lure the paying public to his event. After making an enormous amount of money.
And after her death, he then charged admission. To watch her public autopsy disproving her claims claims that he was promoting. Years later after his wealth had grown, he'd heard there was a gifted opera singer in Europe. What did he do? He signed over his entire fortune for her to come to America, to sing for his audiences. He bet it all. And then more or less split an enormous amount of money made between himself and Jenny Lind.
The singer of the world became to know as the Swedish Nightingale. This was Barnum's extraordinary life searching the world for things and people that would satisfy the curiosities of his audience yet in our time, his reputation is under scrutiny. Did he take advantage of the 25 inch? 15 pound 11 year old. He called general Tom thumb by making him sing and dance. Maybe. But what would his life had been like in the 18 hundreds without Barnum?
Bleak, I assure you yeah, because of their affiliation. Tom thumb retired rich with a family at 25 years old. He bought a yacht. It's easy to look at Barnum's life and say he was a liar and a con man in our cancel culture, it takes almost no thought to accuse him of abusing animals and taking advantage of people who had disabilities or strange qualities yet after listening to him, you might think differently. Those people needed to make a living.
And he made them wealthy celebrities and gave them family. And don't forget like it or not, the people of the world demand entertainment. The reality is he might've just been helping us all scratch that itch. But see what you think, is he a scoundrel or is he an entertainer? Ladies and gentlemen, fellow history, lovers, and humbugs everywhere. I give you PT, Barnum Hello, is that you, Mr. Barnum? Oh, yes, it is me. Hello? sir. I am so excited to speak with you today.
My name is Tony Dean and I'm talking to you from the future in the 21st century. That device that you're holding in your hand, it's called a smartphone. And it allows us to speak as if we were sitting next to each other in the same room On a bench and maybe under one of your circus tents. And it also allows me to share a record of our conversation with people all over the world.
And Mr. Barnum, I was hoping that I could ask you some questions today, but before I do, I understand this is a very strange introduction. Can I answer any questions that you may have for me Well, first of all, I'd like to find out if I could purchase this I think that this would make an excellent addition. pour an exhibition that I'm creating about the future. . And I wonder what it would take to get this into my collection.
I am not surprised at all to hear you say that as the first thing that you would say to me because sir, it seems like your whole life has been running around the world looking for these curiosities, creating and purchasing things like this. In fact, as you mentioned that it kind of makes me think of the money that you paid Jenny Lind. Is it Lin or Jenny Lind? Jenny Lind, , the Swedish nightingale, yes.
She was one of my great successes, as an exhibition, and one of , the wonderful times that I brought culture and astonishment to the people of America. Didn't you spend all of your money? I mean, didn't you bet it all? Hadn't you made a fortune by that point? And then just spend all of your money to have her, , come to the United States and Well, Tony, I must say, I have I've spent all of my money, plus some, several times over. And it is often a necessity to take your money.
And spend it as you see fit, , if you believe in something, you must bet on it. And that's the best way that you will go forward to take risks. And yes, I I took out several loans in order to bring Jenny Lind to the United States. In fact, I brought her to the United States . Without ever hearing her sing.
I feel like I am a risk taker, but I feel like that when I take risks, that they are very calculated risks, but I certainly am willing to take them and yet, how is it a calculated risk to have somebody like Jenny Linden spend this huge amount of money, like all your money, and then even take loans and you've never heard her, how is that just not maybe even irresponsible.
Well, I wouldn't call it irresponsible, Tony ? The important thing is that you must have a vision and strike out towards that vision. But if you hesitate, a bolder hand will stretch out before you and take the prize. The prize that you had desired. So it was necessary. When you see a possibility. To grab it as quickly as possible, , and then to grab the imagination of the paying public. Boy, that makes sense. , I mean, literally one of my favorite quotes is fortune favors the bold.
And I mean, that's exactly what you're saying there. If you wait, somebody is going to capture that. , you're absolutely right. that's happened to me several times in the past, although we're talking about Jenny Lind now. But just a few years ago, we had laid a telegraph across the ocean. And I offered 5, 000. To be the first person to send that telegraph. While my message would not have meant very much, I believe that the fame would have brought me much more than that.
However, Queen Victoria was first. And my offer was rebuffed. Would you have spent 10, 000? If they had given me the opportunity, I think I would have, yes. That is amazing. So that people can understand , who Jenny Lind is , at that point in your life. I think you have your museum up and running. And then she's living in, is she actually living in Sweden? Is that what She was, she is, she's from Sweden, the Swedish Nightingale.
She was actually living in England and performing all over Europe. And I had heard her reputation and had never heard her sing. , , I had my agents bring her an astonishing proposition. I proposed , to bring her to the United States and to pay her the princely sum of 500 per night, every night. That she performed for an entire year. , naturally, my understanding was that she was a little upset at first. A little surprised and had no idea who I was, this upstart from America
. Bringing the Swedish Nightingale, the woman with the most beautiful voice in the entire world, to the States. But she studied my proposition and she agreed. And therefore we began our foray into bringing the greatest culture that Europe had to offer directly to America. , so you say that she had some hesitancy about this, or you may have even said she was offended. Why would she not want to travel and go sing for probably more money than she'd ever make? What was the hesitation?
Well, , she is a very godly woman, and , I had a bit of a reputation as well as a bit of a shall we say, a scalawag, and I think that she had heard of my reputation, and she was a little afraid that I was bringing her over to the United States for some ungodly purpose. Most of the money that she earned in my keep, and I should say, after about three weeks, I had nearly recouped all of the money I had spent, and I decided to offer her twice , what I had offered her originally.
So instead of 500, she made 1, 000 per performance, which was quite a large sum. Yeah, I think for the people listening to this recording, if you're trying to understand how much 1, 000 would be in that time, in our time, sir, I think that's 25 or 26 times that amount. So it is a huge amount of money. And so she got rich by you bringing her Yes, but I Well, I won't say that she got rich because she took most of her earning and she gave it to charity.
She was and is one of the most generous people I know. And most of the money that , she earned, she was able to start up several scholarships. To bring Swedish youth to school and university and thus give them an occupation they might not normally have. So she's , not just the Swedish nightingale. This woman sounds like she's an angel. Well, if you heard her sting, you would think so.
Yes. She was a beautiful stinger and many people would remark that they felt closer to God , after hearing her sing than any other time in their life. So here she is, this person who uses the money that she makes to give to charity and set up scholarships. And it appears that you also have some philanthropy, a significant amount of philanthropy in your life. But in most of the earlier years, it seems like your focus was whatever it took to make dollars. How, at least that's how it appears.
How did the two of you match? , did you get along well? , did you have difficulty communicating? We did not have difficulty communicating. She spoke English excellently. But in terms of our styles, we definitely had different thoughts about how money should be spent. She was most pecunious , and was very interested in giving the money away.
And I was very interested, and have always been interested, In making money a tool, I feel that money is a terrible master, but it is an excellent servant, and therefore necessary to put it to work. Did you look at all of the people in your shows similar to the way that you look at your money?
So if you think, you know, we've heard of the bearded woman, and of course, everybody knows who Tom Thumb is the, general Tom Thumb, this very small person that was obviously a huge part of your early success is what it appears were these And a close friend. way And a close yes, of course. We had a partnership for over 30 years. In fact when I had some financial difficulties, and General Tom Thumb came out of retirement to help me, and went back on the road with me. Did he enjoy that work?
I, it's my belief that he did, yes. It was the only work he knew. I met him when he was a scant 11 years old and He and I grew up together, I dare say he, he saw me as a sort of uh, father figure as we spent three of the most formative years of his life touring Europe and England, appearing before the likes of Victoria and King Leopold , meeting Charles Dickens uh, And And other famous and infamous peoples. So let's talk about him for a minute. Actually, let me ask my previous question.
Cause I, I do want to get an answer to this. When you look at the bearded woman, when you look at Tom Thumb, when you look at Jenny Lind, , these people are friends as you're saying, but are they also assets? Are they tools? I wouldn't say they are tools, , I don't believe , in indolence. And I believe that every one of us has a purpose. And it's important to take your purpose, to take the tools that God has given you and to use them to best effect. Whether or not you are three feet tall.
Or, you are female with a beard. Or, as Chang and Eng another set of personas that I presented quite successfully and made a lot of money for the Siamese twins whatever your gifts are, you must use them to your best effect. And that way you will , Excite the public. You will educate the public and you will earn your way in life.
This is one of the things that fascinates me about this collection of people that you have, that some people would call freaks, and maybe they were even promoted as freaks, but I imagine somebody like Tom Thumb in your time. Here's a young child who is from my understanding is roughly 25 inches tall, like weighs 15, weighs, yeah, weighs 15 pounds. I will say that by the end of his life, he was a little bit taller and a lot heavier. Okay. I think I saw that picture.
I think that he made some money cause he was eating well. And those two seem to follow one another very well, but in his youth, he's a very tiny person. And as a a small person in that time, if you had not taken him under your wing and given him a way to use. What ended up being an advantage for him? What would his life have looked like without you? Well, an interesting question. I think it's hard to say it's almost certain that he would have exhibited himself in some other way.
He was an oddity, as you say, a freak. But He was, therefore of interest to the public, but would he have achieved the success that he achieved without my intervention, without , my sure hand? I'm not sure that he would have. I feel that I had a certain flair for exciting The imaginations of the public and creating moments that would create a fervor among the public and create a desire for the public.
Of course, let's be clear Tom Thumb was a well educated performer who delighted the audience. But I was able to bring the audiences to him in a way that another small person may not have been able to. And Tom Thumb Without the audiences, what do you have? I like to say, without promotion, something terrible happens, which is nothing. Well, that was definitely not your weak spot at any point in your life was promotion. That's for sure. But it is incredible to me.
I always had a picture of, , you having collecting all these oddities, , you had mentioned Chang and Ang and and and I keep mentioning the bearded woman because that amazes me and of course, Tom Thumb, it seems like a lot of these people were treated very well by you and your organization. I mean, you weren't paying , these people, slave labor you were paying them well. I mean, this was a real profession for them. Is that correct? Yes, it was a profession, and yes, I paid them well.
They were worth it. One of my most important Realizations early in my showman's career was that if the talent's not happy, then they will move elsewhere. And it was my desire to make sure that the talent had everything that they needed. And so my friends and some of it is friendship, and some of it is, yes uh, financial remuneration. Um, But, and some of it is bonhomie the willingness and ability to build a family of sorts, a friendship to build a life in the theater.
Fascinating. So I'm not a hundred percent sure who you are. And what I mean by that is, is it appears that you are everything because you are a politician. Some people have called you a humbug. You are a philanthropist. You're a business person. You're an entertainer. You're a writer. I mean, what are you? What, how would you describe Well, I've mentioned a number of profession, and I have been, yes, all of those things.
, I've put my hat into the realm of politics and served in my state congress and even as the mayor of my city, Bridgeport. Thank you very much. I ran a newspaper for several years and have invested and gained and lost money in several large enterprise businesses and have been a real estate holder and, yes, but all through it all, I've been a showman. I think that you could say that no matter what else I've done. , no matter how else you gild it, , showman is in my profession.
Let's talk about the newspaper for a minute. So this is something that happened in the early days. Is this a newspaper that you bought or you started? Did you work there? I even heard that you did some time. Like, you went to jail for a libel a couple times. Indeed,, I purchased a newspaper in the early 1830 and ran over a hundred issues. Most of it there was some shady dealings going on in the early times in Connecticut. And I wanted to be made clear my position on some of these issues.
I was outspoken in my beliefs. And yes, I paid a price. I spent some of my liberty in jail. I feel, of course, very guilty. wrongfully acute. I felt like I spoke only the truth, but the judge saw it differently. I spent three months in jail, and the day I came out, we had a parade and a party, because I would not be stopped. I was put on jail three times, in fact. And after the third time, I decided that my point had been made.
And I was able to sell my newspaper to another person who had their own axes to grind. You know, of course, everybody, when they get out of jail, Mr. Barnum, they all throw a party when they get out of jail and there's a parade. I mean, this sounds so you as the showman. I can't help, but wonder if perhaps going to jail and maybe pushing the boundaries to that level where that could happen might've been intentional. Am I on the right path here?
I, I have no idea of what you're talking about, young man. I can tell you that I I would have preferred not to have been in jail. The food there was not very good. But I made do. And when I left I emerged more of a people's hero than when I went in. So Whether or not it was my intention or not, I made the best of what God gave me. So now you're done with the newspaper. Where does your life go from there?
well, just around the time that I finished with the newspaper, I had heard of a marvelous attraction. A a woman by the name of Joyce Heff, who was the oldest woman in the world. She was purportedly 161 years old. She was being exhibited in Philadelphia. And I went to visit and see it for myself, and when I saw her, I knew instantly that I could make this an attraction that people would like to see. What an amazing thing. I was convinced that she was who she said she was.
She was an older woman, a black woman, nearly blind. She could barely move. You could barely understand anything she said. But she talked about George. She sang hymns that no one else could possibly have known. And I was convinced that she was who she said she was. So I purchased the right to exhibit her. And I did. for nearly a year. and with great success. our exhibition of Joyce Heff.
up and down the East Coast, from Providence to New York, to Washington, D. C., to Baltimore, even down as far south as Atlanta, and we were able to attract the crowds. And I'll tell you a little secret now, I'm older, this was , almost 50 years ago. I can tell you that , how shall we say, humbugs up my sleeve when we when we did exhibit. For example in one of the other rooms that we were exhibiting in Philadelphia, there was an automaton, a chess player that had been built at great expense.
And it was not doing quite as well as Joyce Heff, but it was doing okay. When our ticket sales started to die down, I wrote several letters to the newspaper as if I was another person. And I wrote to them, claiming that Joyce Heff was an automaton similar to the chess playing robot. And that she wasn't a real person at all. And that brought a new round of people to come in and see if she was in fact real. So if she's not a person, what is she Well, she was a person.
But I created a little bit of a fervor, a little bit of an excitement, a little bit of an idea, so that even the people that had seen her before decided they must pay their admission and see her again to know what they were seeing. And that was my secret. All through my career as a showman, I've been a showman. is to excite the imagination of the public, and to make them happy. Curiosity. Yes to create curiosity, excitement, imagination. The noblest art of all is that of making people happy.
And sometimes you have to make them happy with things they did not know would make them happy. And I feel I had no small talent in this regard. Wow. Let's talk about Joyce for a minute. I agree with you, by the way. I absolutely agree with you. I mean, people need to explore. People need to experience new things. And sometimes a little mystery is the best thing that can happen to somebody. But when it comes to Joyce. You had to know she wasn't 161 years old, right?
Well, the paperwork that I received from the previous owner showed that she was, in fact, who she said she was. You know, unfortunately, after almost a year of exhibitions she was quite old and she passed away. And by clamor, public acclaim and it was deemed necessary to have an autopsy to prove who she was. And in that , we hired an independent autopsy witnessed by the public in which it was discovered that, , in the doctor's opinion, she was a woman of no more than 80 years old.
And I was shocked! Shocked. I had always assumed that she was, she claimed to be, and who Her previous owner had claimed her to be. When you say owner, Joyce was a slave, is that correct? Yes, she was a slave, and that's one of my biggest regrets, really, that in my younger youth, I was a slave owner. I owned her and I had owned several slaves throughout that period of my life, and it's one of my biggest regrets as a person.
That I did not see it as evil at the time, but I later came to realize just how evil it was. I had a realization, 10 years or 15 years after the middle part of my life that a human soul that God created and that Christ died for is not to be trifled with. It could occupy the body of a Chinaman, a Turk, an Arab, a a Negro, a Hottentot, still an immortal spirit. And for the things that I've done and thought of the past, I myself should have been whipped a thousand times over.
I've spent the better portion of my life trying to right those wrongs that I had perpetrated. including part of my decision to get into politics was to ensure once that the slaves were freed, that they did have the right to vote. Thank you very much. And I lobbied incessantly and tirelessly for that. And indeed, hoped to make it happen , in the state of Connecticut, where I served. When you say that you deserve to be whipped, did you whip your slaves?
It is a terrible confession that I did on occasion. Whip a slave. Yes I wonder if there are a lot of people in your time that in their youth looked at slavery as one thing, but as they grew older, saw a more divine aspect to this, that, , people are people and everything that you had just said about the soul. I wonder if a lot of people have had this sort of revelation. . I believe it to be true, yes. I don't see how it cannot be true.
When you are a youth, you see things as your parents tell you. You see things as society tells you, but then, as you grow older, you begin to make up your own mind, and I, unfortunately, was slow to that. I didn't do it as a young adult, , I was slow, but once I found what I knew to be true, I could not go on. And I knew that I needed to make restitution. Let me ask a few more questions about Joyce. So Joyce Hath, so you said that she was already on exhibit when you met her.
So were there a lot of people that were exhibiting and I know this is a person, so I'm going to use the word curiosities as if I'm talking about an object, but I don't mean it that way. I don't mean to speak poorly of her. Were there a lot of organizations, a lot of people that were exhibiting Joyce Hath? You know, people that were different, people that had stories like this. Whatever the public has an appetite to find out about people would exhibit it.
, we didn't have devices like this one that you've mysteriously whisked to me in the past, this smartphone, as you say. By the way, is that related to telephone? It is very much related to a telephone. Imagine that you would love this device in your time, because first of all, . You could reach a hundred thousand people in a minute with this device. Very could add more, actually more. Yeah. And it actually does work like a telephone, but it does a lot of other things as well.
Yeah. You would be fascinated with this. If I were to let you keep this, this is all you do for a year. I, undoubtedly I am of course familiar with the telephone, and Mr. Bell of whom I have a personal acquaintance. But, I'm sorry, I forgot where we were. We were talking about something else when I digressed. no, I was asking you, I was asking you about Joyce and were there exhibits like this?
Yes, people and curiosities people with strange uh, faculties and many of those I have exhibited in the past people with strange faculties. Heads, or fat babies, or very tall people, or very skinny people. The living skeleton, and the fattest woman in the world. All of them have been exhibited. As well as other fancy and astonishing things. In my museum, I often presented an astonishing array of attractions.
Including jugglers, dancers an Italian gentleman named Bertolotto who had trained fleas, insects who did remarkable stunts including Recreating Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo? With fleas, fleas, yes. how do you communicate with fleas to teach them to do waterloo? I don't know his secrets. He did not he did not impel them on me, but this is exactly what I mean, Tony. This is something of curiosity. This is something you would pay to see.
This is something that you would tell, this is something that you would tell your friends about and say, hey, let us go up out on the town and find out what this handbill says. And for just 25 cents, We can see a number of things, including these educated insects. Educated. Well, there's a headline right there. Educated insects. If somebody said that they were educating insects, I would be like, what? I have to see this. So you're absolutely right.
So, and what I would say, Tony, is that it's important as a burgeoning showman, perhaps that if you were thinking about creating an exhibition, You must ask yourself, what does the public want to see? And then you should endeavor to give it to them. And sometimes, Tony, they will not know what they want to see. So you must decide for them what they would like to see. And sometimes it will be something of great intelligence and great importance. And I think that Jenny Lind was such a creature.
No one had heard European opera. I Before I brought it to America, and yet even I had not heard it, but I was convinced it was important, and I decided, based on her reputation, to bring her. And I was able to convince , hundreds of thousands of people to come and see and pay. When Jenny Lin first appeared in America we created an auction for the very first ticket. And I advised one of my neighbors of the museum Jenin the Hatter to bid high for the auction.
And he , actually won the first ticket. That ticket, he bought it for $225, which was a princely sum, bigger than a year's salary for many people. And that night, because of the Telegraph journals, went from Portland, Maine all the way to Houston, Texas. And in between announced that fact to their readers. And 2 million readers read the announcement and asked Whose jenin, the Hatter? And they became famous in a day.
Every man in America picked up his hat and looked under to see if they had a jenin. And I read later, an Iowa editor told me that that one man had discovered the name of Jenin in his hat and announced that fact in front of the post office, and was able to sell his hat at auctioned for $14. Gentlemen around the city, around the country rushed to Jen's store to buy hats.
And would pay an extra dollar, even if they could just see get a glimpse of Jenin himself that $225 that he spent , a crazy sum, some that no one possibly expect to spend on a one single evening of entertainment. Brought in thousands of dollars for Jenin and made him a household name. Okay. Oh, geez. So he buys a ticket, which has nothing to do with hat sales. And yet he becomes a celebrity because he makes the newspaper. Yes he becomes a person of famous stature from buying a ticket. And why?
I would argue that he became famous because People have an insatiable curiosity. They wanted to know who was Jenin and why are his hats so good that he can afford to spend 225 on a single ticket. And if his hat is that good, my gosh, I would love to have that kind of a hat. that's, that is something. Okay. So this makes me think of another story that I heard. Maybe you can clear this up. So , when you eventually buy this museum, and maybe we can talk about that for a minute.
My understanding is you buy a museum. So you have a place to put your curiosities. And I read some story about like a guy that picked up bricks and walked back and forth. Does this ring a bell? Yes, of course but I must Let me correct you a bit. I did not buy a museum to house my curiosities. I was rather successful in presenting Joyce Heff and other oddities and attractions. And I had the opportunity to purchase a museum that was already intact.
It was called Scudder's American Museum, which was in New York in the lower part of the island and at that time I had that opportunity. Of course, I did not have the actual funds to purchase it.
So I went to the landlord and asked him if he would purchase the museum for me and I would endeavor to pay him back that I had experience Attracting audiences and the public, and he considered my offer, and asked for references, which I gave, and he later told me that , he was a little afraid that my references were too good because they spoke too highly of me. And I assured him that they were not in cahoots with me. And so I was ready to purchase the collection.
However, a syndicate of other gentlemen , who owned a different museum, offered him a little bit more. And they offered it , to him directly. And he felt , impelled to take it. And I understood that, but I said they were expected to purchase it on 26th. And I said if you would give me the last minute rights. , if they didn't purchase it on the 26th, that he allowed me to purchase it that I would endeavor to do so. And he agreed.
And through a series of events, of which I had a small part, I'm proud to say the group of gentlemen who thought they were purchasing the museum decided to delay their investment. And , on December 27th. I exercised my right to purchase the museum and by early January I had opened it under the new name of Barnum's American Museum and proceeded to remake the museum in my vision. And now we were talking about the bricklayer.
I Well, actually, before you talk about the brick layer, you had said through a series of events that some of those earlier bidders that their minds changed what was your role in that? I well, it wasn't so much that their mind changed, they had expected to defraud the landlord and to defraud the public. They were going to issue a large amount of stock in the company. And then once they had issued that stock, they would sell off the museum . And pocket most of the money for themselves.
And I felt that was unconscionable. And I wrote a number of articles in newspapers decrying them. And in that process, they were not able to raise the funds necessary. And although they perhaps could have paid for it outright, they did not realize that I had my rights. And they were not in a hurry to purchase. So when their day, December 26th, had come and gone, they thought they still had the opportunity. But. I bought it out from under them. And the rest, as they say, is history.
You didn't need to outbid them. You knew that you just needed to delay. Yes, , in this particular instance, I needed to have them. lulled into a false sense of security. And that's what happened. It's brilliant. Oh, yeah. Okay. Keep going. Yeah, so about this brick story. I read this over and I'm fascinated by it and it sounds really simple, but I, it can't be as simple as I think it is. So , the museum, always had a great deal of customers and a great deal of the public coming in.
But, not enough. And I needed a way to bring people in. So I hired a young man off the street really, and I asked him if he could follow instructions, and he said yes he could. And so I told him to take five Brit, and to lay them on the street, on the half hour. And he would lay them in a particular order on the street. He would wait.
And then he would pick them up, he would bring them into the museum, lay them again, and in various different places around the museum, he would do his ritual, his brick laying ritual, and excited the curiosity of the public. And as they began to watch him on the street, they followed him into the museum, and as they followed him into the museum, they paid their ticket prices. And so we were able to get quite a good amount of people following our man to see what happened next.
We built an excitement, a curiosity, within them. And they were willing to pay the 25 cents to get in to satisfy that itch of curiosity. Something so simple and as people we look at that and we're thinking, What is happening? Like we have to set down everything else we're doing, all the important things that we're doing and we have to stop and figure out Why this person is doing this thing with these bricks. I had several other ideas to bring people into the museum.
And another one was I had widened the group. And supported the route and provided a free band an orchestra to play music. But my requirement was that they would be not such a good orchestra, loud, and not very well trained. And the only place that you could not hear their music from around was inside the museum. how's that possible? So is the band outside? band was outside on the route, so when you go into the museum, it is a relief from the noise, basically. it was. Indeed.
And people were happy to pay it. In fact, I had one musician who I contracted to play in the band, and he expected to be paid. And I said to him, This is a place where people can practice free of charge, without worry of the public. You are far above the public. You can get as loud and as raucous as you like. Many of these players have actually paid me.
For the privilege of performing here , okay, , you've purchased the museum and you, and given it a fresh coat of paint and filled it full of over by the end of the museum, over 800,000 objects of curiosity wonders that have never , been seen before. And yes. , human curiosities that had never been seen before, all exciting the intelligence and imagination of the American public and of any tourists who might come by.
In fact, we had many foreign people who made an express trip to the United States in order to visit our museum. Mm hmm. Now, Joyce Hect, she the 160 1-year-old nanny to George Washington she never was in the museum. She passed along before passed long before that, yes. Is it true that to make her look older, that you pulled some of her teeth? No, of course not. That would be cruel, and of course, yes, I was the slave owner, but I was not cruel on purpose.
She, but she was very old, and she had most of her teeth gone when I met her. We did employ a dentist. And I believe that one or two of her teeth needed to be pulled because she had not kept good care of them. But we didn't pull them to make her look older. Any teeth that were pulled under my expense were pulled strictly for health reasons. Well, that makes sense., you don't come across to me as being a person whose intentions are cruelty by any means.
And yet, would some of the, some people have accused you of cruelty to animals. Do you feel like there were times looking back that maybe you didn't treat some animals as well as they should have been treated in some of your exhibits? it's hard to say. I believe that even in my lifetime the idea of what is cool to an animal has changed dramatically. Yeah. And I don't believe that I was ever cruel to an animal. , did I beat a horse asking it to go faster? Yes, of course.
At the time that was a standard practice. Do I regret it? No, not really. , I assume that there will come a time when that will be seen as a monstrous cruelty. And that might be true. But during my time, that was not a cruelty. The horse is a work animal and must be made to work. Just as an oxen must be made to work. And being able to harness the work of those animal and to feed them and to care for them and to give them sustenance when possible. . And love when possible was part of my mission.
And part of what I did. What about the elephant so the this giant elephant that you had this six ton elephant I speaking of Jumbo. You're speaking of Jumbo. Jumbo. Yeah, of course his name is Jumbo. He's six tons Yes, the largest in all the How do you get it to do what it's supposed to do. How do you move something that's six tons? How do you keep it from trampling the crowd? Like I'd heard that that he was given alcohol to be calm or something like that.
to be clear, Jumbo was not, I did not raise Jumbo from a young sprout. Jumbo was an elephant that was from , I think the Sudan or some place in Africa. And had come to the London Zoo , and his enormous proportions made him quite popular. But he had become a little testy.
And knowing the public's taste, as I do, and having been at this point associated with Mr. Bailey and our circus my name P. T. Barnum's Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan, and Ibidrome, I knew that it was necessary to bring Jumbo to the circus. So, I engaged. To purchase Jumbo from the London Zoo, and they were receptive to my offer, I paid approximately 10, 000 for this elephant that was 25 years old and a little testy, and I engaged his keeper to Bring him back to the United States.
And when it was announced that I did the school children of London went, but it was necessary to bring Jumbo to a larger audience than only London. And I brought him to the United States where he performed for quite some time. How we trained the elephant. I was not my department. But , the elephant, like the clown, the peg on which a circus is held. And it was important for me to have the biggest elephant to amuse and amaze. The public. And so that's what I did. And why did he do it?
Elephants have quite large brains, I would say. And I think that he was engaging with the public. And there's a certain part of me that believes that Jumbo felt that he owed it to the American people. That he owed to his public. to show them the true elephant kind? you find one of these new curiosities, you find the biggest elephant in the world and you know, you find the Siamese twins, these people that are connected. Do you see them as something that is going to excite the public?
Or are you personally excited? , are you the first person to enjoy that attraction? Or are you thinking business? That is an excellent question, and I would say that it is a little bit of both, but I believe that my excitement is a bellwether for the public's and if I am excited, it's very likely the public will be excited. It's not to say that I am perfect, certainly not. I have made plenty of attractions that were not up to snuff, that did not do as well as one would have hoped.
But, we don't dwell on our failures, do we? We dwell on our Well, for sure. Let's not dwell on them, but I'm curious if one comes to mind. , Here's an example of something that did not work out as well as I hoped, but it worked out better than I had imagined. I don't know if you've heard in your time perhaps you've heard of the Cardiff Giant, I have, but I don't totally understand what this is. It's been lost to the relegation of ancient history.
, the Cardiff Giant was a fossil that was found in the ground in Cardiff, New York which is why it's called the Cardiff Giant, and it was found on farmland, and it was believed and examined by scientists and believed to be of a race of biblical giants, much as the Bible mentioned, and people were quite excited to see it. And some people were doubters, and some people were believers, but all people wanted to pay to see it. And it was doing great business, great guns.
And I heard about this, and I thought to myself, this is something that I would like to see. , and so I offered them the sum of 20, 000 to purchase the Cardiff Giant to put on display. They disagreed. They did not take me up on my offer. And after further discussion, and I hired an expert to go and look at it, and he convinced me that it was a fraud. That it was a hoax. And so I created my own Cardiff Giant. And I exhibited it , by itself, as the true Cardiff Giant.
And I declaimed theirs as false. So what happened? well, I was taken to court. He claimed that mine was fake and I claimed that his was fake. And he took me to court for defamation because I was saying that his was fake. And the judge with much fanfare, we won our case. He could not prove that his giant was genuine and his name was David Hannum.
And so, as a matter of fact it is said that she said, When he heard about my humbug of the true Cardiff Giant he is purportedly to have said, there's a sucker born every minute. Uh, about the people that came to see my giant. And I took great umbrage at that remark. Because I believe that the public has a right to its curiosities. And, but I understand now that some people think that I said that. There's a sucker born every minute. But, it got attached to me, but I've never said it.
It was said by my competitor. , as the two of you were disputing whose fake cardic giant was real. Well, yes, and I leave it to your imagination as , which of the Cardiff Giants made more money in exhibition. I think we both know that. That is for sure. You know, we, you've said a couple of times throughout this conversation, you've said the word humbug.
And I thought I knew exactly what that word meant, but I looked it up before we, we started this conversation and I think I was pretty close, but I'm curious how you describe humbug and how is that different from just outright fraud? PT Barnum liked making money. There's no question about that. There's also no question that he would alter the truth or look the other way if needed. But is he really a fraud or is he an entertainer? Remember back then there was no internet.
And yet we searched the internet now for all kinds of things that interest us. Uh, odd things, weird people, and his Barnum would call it curiosities. Back then in the 18 hundreds, people didn't have an easy way to explore the world. PT Barnum knew that. And brought the world to the people, through his circuses, his exhibits and his museums. In the next episode, I'm going to question him about the difference between what he calls a humbug and a fraud.
And honestly, after listening to him, I couldn't tell if I'd been swindled myself or if he was right. After all, we all need to be entertained. I'm so glad you're enjoying the podcast. If you haven't liked the podcast yet, please do. And subscribe. And we'll see you at the next episode of the calling industry podcast with part two of PT, Barnum.