Monday, December 26, 2016

A MILLION DOLLAR PAGEANT



Cortland Evening Standard, Monday, September 18, 1893.

A MILLION DOLLAR PAGEANT.
Barnum & Bailey's New Free Street Parade.
   For the first time in many years the public will be treated to an absolutely new free street circus and spectacular procession. With the usual disregard of expense and with the energy that has characterized every effort of Barnum & Bailey, they have designed an entirely new street parade for the pleasure of the people, and when it is stated that it is freely offered upon the same generous scale as the performances within the tents, one can easily imagine its magnificent splendors.
   All the principal events in American history are illustrated by living figures on costly chariots, and Arabian Nights stories, nursery rhymes, children's fables and childhood's dreams are likewise beautifully pictured by living tableaux. As the bills on the fences say, "It is worth coming miles to see, and once seen never forgotten."
   The following order of march will tell the story of its magnitude. The parade will take place at about 9 o'clock to-morrow morning:
ORDER OF MARCH.
Military Band.
Gentlemen fox hunters and cavaliers.
Lady performers and side-saddle experts.

PERFORMING WILD BEAST DISPLAY.
Band chariot, drawn by ten horses.
                            Open den of five tigers and trainer.
                            Open den of four lions and trainer.
    Open den of five leopards and trainer.
     Open den of four panthers and trainer.
   Open den of four hyenas and trainer.
Open den of four bears and trainer.
  Open den of five wolves and trainer.

HISTORICAL GROUPS.
Tuberonicon car, drawn by six horses.
Living tableau, Landing of the Pilgrims.
Living tableau, Capt. Smith and Pocahontas.
Living tableau. William Penn's Treaty.
Living tableau, Signing Declaration of Independence.
Living tableau, Washington's Inauguration.

HIPPODROME AND ZOOLOGICAL.
Band chariot Euterpe, drawn by ten horses.
Mounted ladies of the hippodrome.
Gentlemen hippodrome riders.
Three teams of Roman standing racers.
Three four-horse Roman chariots.
Two elephants with howdahs and oriental beauties.
Caravan of twelve performing elephants.
Dromedaries with Asiatic riders.
Dragon chariot with harnessed camels.
Troupe of Japanese performers.

FAIRY TALES AND NURSERY RHYMES.
Steam musical chariot, drawn by six horses.
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves.
Nursery rhymes illustrated.
Toys and games. Blue Beard.
Puss in Boots.
The Sleeping Beauty.
Beauty and the Beast.
Queen of Hearts.
Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp.

ARABIAN NIGHTS STORIES AND FABLES.
Chariot of India, drawn by ten horses.
Columbus orchestra of twenty pieces.
Cinderella's Fairy Coach.
Blue Beard and His Curious Wife.
Old Woman who Lived in a Shoe.
Santa Claus and his reindeer sleigh.
Little Red Riding Hood.
Sinbad, the Sailor.
Mother Goose. Steam Calliope.

CHANGE OF SITE.
Barnum Will Show on Owego-st. Tuesday.
   The Barnum and Bailey circus, which exhibits in Cortland to-morrow, has decided not to show upon the lot between Cortland and Homer, but it will show upon the lot of James R. Schermerhorn on Owego-st., for which arrangements were formerly made.

Ferris Wheel at 1893 Chicago World's Fair.
The Wonder of the World's Fair.
   There are hundreds of thousands of Americans who to this day do not know what the greatest thing at the World's Fair is. What is the one particular object which is to our exposition what the Eiffel tower was to the Paris exposition? In brief, it is the Ferris wheel. In many respects it is the greatest mechanical achievement of modern times.
   Its architect is modest. Few persons know even that his name is George Washington Gale Ferris, and that he is a civil engineer, only 35 years old, a native of Illinois and a graduate of the Troy Polytechnic school. The Ferris wheel is greater than the Eiffel tower because it will move. It was not merely a scheme to get money out of the pockets of World's fair visitors. It was the reply of an American engineer to the taunt of a World's fair director that our mechanicians [sic] had been able to give us nothing that [as] a wonder and novelty corresponded to the Eiffel tower.
   This mighty wheel weighs 2,200 tons. The axle on which it swings weighs 70 tons. It is turned by sprocket wheels and an endless link chain. It was built in Detroit piece by piece by machinery invented by Americans—not by handwork, like the Eiffel tower. What perfection American iron and steel casting machinery has attained may be learned from one fact—Ferris felt so sure every part of his wheel, 250 feet in diameter, would fit into its adjoining part that he did not even take the trouble to put it together at the iron works in Detroit before he shipped it to Chicago. There, after the 55 foot foundation had been dug, walled and braced and the eight cement and steel towers sent up to the height of 140 feet in the air, the axle was lifted into place upon them. Then the mighty wheel was set up piece by piece. There were thousands of these pieces. As its ingenious deviser had calculated, every piece dropped into place as intended.
   When all was done, June 21, there was nothing but to swing the wonder off, and it has been swinging ever since gently and unerringly as the solar system itself. The reason the wheel was not ready sooner was that the directors would not consent to let Mr. Ferris construct it till the 16th of December, 1892, in 4 1/2 months from that time it was ready.
   The Eiffel tower required three years to build. The especial mechanical idea emphasized in the Ferris machine is that of the tension wheel—that is, a wheel with jointed spokes instead of stiff ones.

BREVITIES.
   —Over sixty Cortland people are attending the state fair at Syracuse to-day.
   —The STANDARD office will be open on Monday and Saturday evenings until 8 o'clock.
   —Mr. Charles Rowe has purchased a $500 well-matched cream team of Mr. Charles Antisdel of Homer.
   —The H. M. Whitney Co. are taking their annual inventory of stock and the factory is entirely shut down.
   —Barnum & Bailey's circus exhibits in Syracuse to-day, and will be in Cortland early to-morrow morning.
   —The vacation of the Forty-fifth Separate Co., N. G. S. N. Y., closed to-day and their regular drill begins to-night.
   —Every laboring man in Cortland should read the editorial in to-day's STANDARD upon "Democratic Witnesses for Protection."
   —The regular meeting of the Woman's Relief corps will be held to-morrow afternoon, Sept. 19, at 3 o'clock. A full attendance is requested.
   —Christopher Columbus Sheridan was discovered drunk on Main-st. yesterday. He was fined $3 in police court this morning. His mother paid his fine.
   —Barnum & Bailey's circus exhibited in Oswego on Saturday and six daylight robberies were reported to the police. The work was all done during the street parade.
   —The STANDARD is indebted to Mr. John C. Birdseye of the civil service department at Albany for a copy of the Report of the Civil Service Commission of 1891 and 1892.
   —The nine months old child of Mr. and Mrs. C. M. Swift, Tremain L., died at 3 P. M. yesterday of cholera infantum. The funeral will be held at the house Wednesday at 10 A. M, interment at Summer Hill.
   —The many friends of Mrs. Agnes Outt Nason of Blodgett Mills, who have known of her protracted illness, will learn with regret of her death yesterday from cancer. The funeral will be held on Thursday at 10:30 A. M.
   —There will be a meeting of all of the Christian Endeavor societies of Cortland at the Baptist parlors on Tuesday evening, Sept. 19, at 7:30 to arrange for a district convention of the society. Every member is urged to be present.
   —Ex-President Harrison gets good pay when he takes his pen in hand to write a few lines. The Cosmopolitan sent him a check for $1,666 in payment for an article of less than 8,000 words which appeared in the September number.
   —There will be a "Welcome social," Wednesday evening at the Homer-ave. M. E church given by the Epworth league. Light refreshments will be served free of charge. All are invited to come and spend a pleasant evening.
   —L. R. Lewis says that in spite of the hard times the sales of the Kelsey furnace are increasing. Six were sold the past week to the following persons: P. Gilbert, Geo. Leach, J. J. Loring, H. S. Bliss, H. B. Hubbard and Burdett Pierce of Truxton.
   —An exchange says that the craze for souvenir spoons is dying out, probably because most collectors have all they care to own. In its place is springing up a fad for collecting hat pins. This has nothing to commend it, except that it is all the rage.
   —The Normal foot ball team went to Dryden Saturday to play the team from the Dryden Union school. The Normal boys put up a good game, but they had not yet had enough practice to compete successfully with the Dryden team, and they came home beaten by a score of 26 to 4.
   —A farmer who tried the experiment of rubbing the hide of a cow with a raw onion, reports that the result was to rid the animal of lice, and it is believed that onions will serve to rid animals of all such pests as lice, flies, ticks and fleas. The farmer, however, added that the cow was socially shunned among her associates.—Exchange.
   —The next meeting of the Cortland Sunday-school association will be held in the parlors of the Baptist church next Friday evening at 7:30 o'clock. A general invitation is extended. Program: The "Intermediate Teacher" by Miss Mary S. Blackmer; "How Best to Conduct a Review," by Rev. W. H. Pound. General Discussion.
   —Two brilliant planets are seen in the September sky—Venus and Jupiter. The former is conspicuous in the western sky early in the evening and constantly grows brighter. Jupiter is in the east and at 10 o'clock is a brilliant object. The planet is between the famous clusters of Taurus, the Pleiades and Hyades, is approaching opposition and increasing in brilliancy.
   —Rev. E. N. Jenks of Lindley, N. Y., will preach in the Free Methodist church at 7:30 this evening. There will be present a number of clergymen and delegates who expect to take the 7:20 train to-morrow morning for Camden, N. Y., to attend the Susquehanna conference of that church. There will be no preaching services at that church next Sunday as the pastor will be at conference.
   —Since the announcement that a man had made a will in which he left Mr. Chauncey Depew half of his fortune of $2,000,000 because Mr. Depew had once loaned him $500, the genial post-pranial [sic] orator has received the following from a correspondent who signs himself Daniel Gaveston. "Please send me by return mail check for $500 and when I make $2,000,000 I will leave half of it to you."
   —Chief Sager has received a communication from John Cooper, traveling detective with Barnum & Bailey's circus, asking the co-operation of the entire police force of Cortland and all other officers to guard against the gang of crooks which habitually follow the circus. Detective Cooper also advises all persons to see that their houses are securely closed and locked when they go out to see the parade and attend the circus.
   —The School Bulletin for September contains cuts of Messrs. Herbert P. Gallinger, Thomas B. Fitch and Charles E. Osborne, all of Cortland, among the new principals who have this year obtained schools through the Bardeen agency of Syracuse. Mr. Gallinger is located at Oxford at a salary of $1,100. Mr. Fitch is at Dundee, having the income of the school. Mr. Osborne is at Brookfield at a salary of $700. The Bulletin also contains a cut of Mr. James. C. Van Etten of Van Ettenville, a graduate of the Cortland Normal, who has secured a position in the Elmira Reformatory at a salary of $1,500, also through the Bardeen agency.

The Big Excursion.
   The largest excursion of the season will leave Cortland on Thursday morning, Sept. 21, at 7 A. M., for Auburn, via D., L. & W. R. R , under the auspices of the Cortland fire department. This probably will be the last excursion run out of Cortland this year, and it is expected that least 1,200 tickets will be sold. Complete arrangements have been made with the railroad companies whereby a through special train will be run both ways and plenty of cars to accommodate all who wish to go. The train will stop at Syracuse both ways enabling those who wish to visit Syracuse to do so.
   The Cortland City Band will accompany the Cortland Fire Department thus assuring the excursionists of an enjoyable time en route. The Homer Fire department will accompany the excursion, headed by Goettel's Military band of Syracuse. The program after reaching Auburn will be hose races, prize drills, hook and ladder races, and the grand firemen's parade, which it is estimated will consist of 60 fire companies and 20 bands.
   Fare for round trip tickets only $1.50. The Cortland City band will give an open air concert on the corner of Court and Main-sts., Wednesday night, in honor of the excursion. Procure your tickets in advance.
 

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