It’s A Small World After All!     2/10/18

O’Leno State Park, High Springs, Florida

 

I’ve already talked about the Old Bellamy Road, but today, we turned right instead of left and took a scenic drive.  The road no longer goes all the way to Tallahassee, but it was quite diverse in the nature of things we saw – everything from run-down trailers to mansions, from horse farms to cattle ranches, congested (relatively speaking) to wide open spaces.  It was a nice drive, and we ended up further from our intended destination than we thought we’d be.

 

Remember The River Rise from the other day?  Today, we planned on walking some other trails in the same vicinity.  There wasn’t much that was photo-worthy, even for me!

 

Home for dinner – Cajun Grilled Shrimp.  Tasty!!  I’ll put the recipe at the end . . . for the seafood lover in you!

 

 

Now the really interesting part begins!

We planned on visiting the movie theater in town (The Priest – weird name, huh?) – first-run films in this small, historic (not as nice as The Civic in Akron, Ohio though!), 240 seat theater, and only $5 per person.  We arrived about 45 minutes before the 6pm showtime, thinking we’d buy our tickets then walk around town for a bit, only to find a couple dozen people hanging out on the grass and near the ticket booth!

Apparently, based on our experience today, they open for sales about 45 minutes to an hour early, but don’t open the doors until about 15-20 minutes before the show is scheduled to start.  It seemed the locals knew that and they didn’t seem to care.  That’s the difference between small town life and the city.  Or maybe it’s the difference between the North and the South . . .

Oh!  And they’re only open on Friday, Saturday and Sunday – one showing each day.  Usually.  Sometimes, they have more or open on Monday . . .

They don’t stick to strict start times either.  I think they wait for the concession to clear out.  Our movie was about 20 minutes late.

Tonight’s presentation was “The Greatest Showman”.  It’s about PT Barnum (of circus fame) and starred Hugh Jackman.

 

As we waited (semi-impatiently) in our seats, the most amazing thing happened!  A woman and her teenage daughter sat right next to me.  We exchanged pleasantries and then I asked if she was from the area.  When she said yes, I told her we were from out of town and asked about the theater.  She wanted to know where we were from, I told her, “Ohio.”  She wanted to know where.  I said, “Akron.”  And then it happened!  “Really!?!  I grew up in Uniontown!”  “You did not!  Seriously?”  “Yes!”  “Well, I grew up there too! And my family’s still there!”

We spent until the movie started, reminiscing about Uniontown!  She’s quite a bit younger than me, having graduated about 15 years later, but there was still a lot we both remembered!

 

It sure is a small world!

 

The movie was great, by the way.  We didn’t realize it was a musical though.

 

And now. . . . time for some history lessons!  (BTW – all this history research is one of the reasons I’m now a week behind!)

 

The Priest Theatre

The more than one century old building “The Priest Theatre,” has quite the history. It was built in 1910, at 15 NW First Street in High Springs, Florida by William Jefferson Priest, who also owned the Priest Ford Motor car dealership.

Once built, W.J. Priest thought he would find the perfect name for the wonderful building by having a contest. The winning entry was “Dreamland Theater,” but the city fathers of that era thought the name was much too risqué. Therefore, it seems very fitting that the building was named after its founder, W.J. Priest.

Some tales are that the building was built to store cars and parts for the Priest Ford Motor dealership business on Main Street. It was used for storage awhile when traveling vaudeville shows ceased. But after much research into the architecture and construction of the building, we found that the original purpose of the tall, cavernous building was for entertainment. The building includes a large open lobby and also a large auditorium that seats 240 people, along with a balcony, sloping floors in the main auditorium, a main entrance from the front and a side door entrance that led to the balcony, a balcony restroom, lobby restrooms for men and women, a complete raised stage including an arched opening with two great columns on both sides of the stage and stairs on opposite sides of the stage that led to the actors’ dressing rooms. All these features still exist and most are functional.

I’m In the beginning, vaudeville and traveling acts were performed. A talented ballet instructor tried to find talent from the area to perform on stage, but with no luck, only found what she called a bunch of “clumsy kids.” In addition to the regular traveling acts, older members of the town would put on plays, one titled “The Womanless Wedding,” in which all the actors were male.

There were many impressive performances on stage at the Priest. Smiley Burnett, who worked with Gene Autry, Roy Rogers and his horse Trigger, as well as on TV’s Petticoat Junction, gave a great performance along with his dog. Other performances included a show where a Native American excited the locals by showing his bow and arrow skills. Lash La Rue, later a TV star who starred in works with Eddie Dean, performed his expert whip handling skills.

Eventually vaudeville and live performances were replaced with silent movies and music; usually a piano was used as accompaniment. Then in 1927 silent movies upgraded to “talkies” with the first commercially successful one being The Jazz Singer. As time progressed, people were enjoying the cinema and Hollywood was growing into a huge business. By the 1950’s, the Priest Theatre’s venue included up to five different movies each week. Today the Priest Theatre features three shows weekly: Friday, Saturday, and Monday evenings at 8pm.  ~ copied from their website  – – so are the pictures.

 

After watching the movie, I just HAD to get into who P.T. Barnam was!  Here’s a sort-of shortened version of what I discovered.

 

P.T. Barnum

1810 – born Phineas Taylor Barnum on July 5^th in Bethel, Connecticut.  By age 12, he was successfully peddling snacks and cherry rum to soldiers.

1829 – married Charity Hallett and they had 4 daughters

 

 

 

 

1834 – moved to New York City

1835 – he paid (technically leased) $1,000 for an African-American slave woman named Joice Heth and billed her as being 161 years old and a former nurse for George Washington.  He took in an estimated $1,500/week.

1836 – Joice died and he still made money off her, when he held an autopsy in a saloon and charged 1,500 spectators 50 cents each to watch it.

1841-68 – bought Scudder’s American Museum in lower Manhattan and reopened it as Barnum’s American Museum. There he displayed the “Feejee Mermaid” (a monkey head sewed onto a fish tale)  and other oddities of dubious authenticity among what eventually expanded to a collection of 850,000 exhibits. Also, from it’s opening, it had roughly 4,000 visitors per day.  He charged 25 cents per person.

1842 – met with the parents of 4-year-old Charles Stratton who was a dwarf and Barnum’s 5^th cousin twice removed.  He became General Tom Thumb.  (He has his own biography following Barnum’s)

1850-52 – Tour with Jenny Lind.  (I’m sorry, but she requires her very own biography following Tom’s)

1850’s – went bankrupt when he tried to bring the Jerome Clock Company to Bridgeport, Connecticut (his hometown that he was trying to build up)

1865 – the museum burned to the ground, but was relocated close by soon after

1866-69 – served multiple terms in the Connecticut Legislature

1868 – second museum burned down, but was never rebuilt

1871 – teamed up with some circus owners (Castello and Coup) and billed it as “The Greatest Show on Earth”

1875 – took full ownership of the circus. It was very successful.

1875-76 – became mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut.  Soon after, he helped found a hospital and was named its first president

1881 – joined with circus managers, James Bailey and James Hutchinson

1882 – Jumbo joins the circus.  He was a 11 ½ foot, 6 ½ ton elephant from the Royal Zoological Society in London.  He was a huge hit until he died in 1885.  (I don’t know, I guess people weren’t used to seeing elephants because I checked . . . . “Jumbo” was average size.)

1890 – Barnum suffers from a stroke

1891 – on April 7^th, Barnum dies.  He was 80 years old.

 

1907 – the Barnum and Bailey circus is purchased by the Ringling Brothers for $400,000.  The equivalent of $10,450.000 today.

1919 – the two separate shows were combined into one show.

2017 – May 21^st, the Ringling Bros and Barnum and Bailey Circus held their last performance.  They had approximately 500 employees.

 

Charles Stratton aka General Tom Thumb

Charles Stratton was born January 4, 1838. In 1842 when Charles was 4 years old, PT Barnum met with his parents.  He was 25” tall and weighed 15#.  His father, long embarrassed by the miniscule stature of his offspring, gladly agreed to consign his son to a month-long trial as an attraction in Barnum’s New York Museum. The agreed rate of pay was $3 as well as room and board. This was a modest financial arrangement but the elder Stratton was simply content to see his tiny toddler be of some use.

Barnum taught him to sing, dance, mime and impersonate famous people.

They soon embarked on an American tour about the age of 5.  He was so popular, they toured Europe and he was commanded to appear before Queen Victoria. He was a great favorite of The Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII. Appearing on stage dressed as Napoleon Bonaparte, his farce won over the English public as well. All this and he was barely six years in age.

Under the guidance of Barnum, Tom Thumb became a wealth young man. At his financial peak he had wardrobes of finely tailored clothes, a customized home in a fashionable part of New York and even a steam yacht. So great was his popularity that when Barnum himself faced bankruptcy, the teenaged Tom Thumb once again toured Europe for his mentor and friend. While there, he was again invited to perform before the Queen.

In the early 1860s, Barnum hired another little person, Lavinia Warren (born Mercy Lavinia Warren Bump), who had been working as a performer on a Mississippi River boat. According to accounts at the time, when Stratton first laid eyes on Warren, it was love at first sight. Barnum encouraged the match, and on February 10, 1863, they were married.

The wedding was front page news and featured on the cover of Harper’s Weekly Magazine. The wedding took place at utterly packed Grace Episcopal Church. At the reception, held at the Metropolitan Hotel, the newlyweds stood atop a grand piano to greet some 2,000 guest. Following the reception, the couple was received by President Lincoln at the White House.

Following the wedding, the two lovers toured Europe as well as Japan and Barnum displayed Lavinia’s wedding gown in the front window of a store on Fifth Avenue. The frenzy surrounding the wedding, both before and afterwards, generated a staggering amount of money for both Barnum and Tom Thumb.

To keep the interest going in the coming years, a baby was added to the mix. The child was not the biological offspring of Tom and Lavinia, in fact it was a different baby in every town they visited, but still the public came.

In 1881, the famous midget couple reunited had one final season with Barnum under the banner of the Barnum and London Circus. By this time, in his early forties, Tom had grown to 2 feet and 3 inches in height. People still came and they still loved him.

On 15 July 1883, while Lavinia was away on a solo tour, Tom died suddenly of a stroke at home in Middleborough, Massachusetts. He was only 46 years old.

Ten thousand people attended his funeral.   ~ taken from various sources

 

Jenny Lind

Although he became famous for championing the weird and wacky, one of Barnum’s most successful ventures came with the promotion of Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind in the early 1850s. After hearing about her sold-out concerts in Europe, Barnum made the “Swedish Nightingale” an offer of $1,000 per performance for 150 shows in the United States and Canada, a tour which earned him a profit of more than $500,000.

She was one of the most highly regarded singers of the 19th century. At the height of her fame she was persuaded by the showman PT Barnum to undertake a long tour of the United States. The tour began in September 1850 and continued to May 1852. Barnum’s advance publicity made Lind a celebrity even before she arrived in the U.S., and tickets for her first concerts were in such demand that Barnum sold them by auction. The tour provoked a popular furor dubbed “Lind Mania” by the local press, and raised large sums of money for both Lind and Barnum. Lind donated her profits to her favored charities, principally the endowment of free schools in her native Sweden.

Everywhere Lind went, crowds of people pressed inward, hoping to catch a glimpse of the famous singer. Often the result was that some of them lost consciousness and had to be carried away to receive medical attention; a dangerously packed-in crowd became known as a “Jenny Lind crush,” and her name was also attached to a new locomotive on the London & Brighton Railway. Lind’s image showed up on candy wrappers, handkerchiefs, snuffboxes, small ceramic figures, and many other mass-produced objects, and songs and instrumental dances were written about her.

Lind, who by this time was commanding large paychecks for her concerts, took the commotion in stride and became attached to England after an initial period of uncertainty caused by her lack of familiarity with the language. It was in England, not America, that Jenny Lind mania really had its start. But it took the fine art of American publicity to raise it to a new level.

One of P.T. Barnum’s representatives enjoyed perfect timing when he approached Lind in Lübeck, Germany, in 1849. Uncomfortable with what she saw as the taint of immorality associated with opera, she was in the process of giving up operatic performances and was ready for new income-producing opportunities. Gifted with strong business sense, Lind negotiated a profitable contract with Barnum, who was forced to borrow money to meet her demand that he deposit $187,500 in a London bank as upfront money prior to her departure.

Opera in the United States was in its infancy, and Lind was hardly known there, so Barnum’s associates predicted that he would suffer embarrassing financial losses in mounting her expensive tour. But Barnum stuck with his plans; he was hungry for new respectability after being associated with such dubious entertainments as the dwarf Tom Thumb and an African-American woman whom he fraudulently claimed was 161 years old and had nursed George Washington.

Barnum seized on Lind’s new nickname, the “Swedish Nightingale,” and promoted her less as a famous European artist than as a miraculous natural talent. Detractors termed her “Barnum’s Bird,” but they were silenced as a crowd of 30,000 turned out to meet Lind’s ship in New York Harbor on September 1, 1850. Thousands surrounded her hotel, and Barnum began to recoup his investment when a hotel owner paid him $1,000 a day for the privilege of hosting Lind.

The frenzy grew as Barnum announced that tickets would be auctioned for her first New York concert; even the unflappable Lind was amazed when the bidding rose to $650 a ticket and beyond. As Lind made triumphant appearances in New York and then toured the eastern seaboard and the cities of the West along the Mississippi River, the British Jenny Lind mania was repeated and amplified.

The list of products to which her name or image was attached grew to include the Jenny Lind crib, still so called today (it is the common wooden type of crib with vertical bars on the sides) She met President Millard Fillmore, and her photograph was taken by Mathew Brady, photography’s first big star.

The only reason she agreed to the American tour was because P.T. Barnum promised her a great deal of money. However, she didn’t keep a dime of it and had never planned to. She donated the $350,000 in profits to charity, specifically the endowment of free schools in Sweden. The $350,000 would equal roughly $10 million today.  Barnum made perhaps five times as much as Lind did.

She quit the tour because she became uncomfortable with Barnum’s relentless marketing of her.   ~ taken from various sources

 

 

CAJUN SHRIMP

2 # large shrimp, peeled and deveined

¾ C. vegetable oil

½ C. onion, diced

2 T. Cajun seasoning

6 cloves garlic, minced

2 t. ground cumin

½ t. rosemary

½ t. thyme

1 C. butter

1 t. fresh basil, chopped

1 t. fresh tarragon, minced  (I don’t usually use this.)

1 t. Cajun seasoning

½ t. garlic powder

3 drops hot pepper sauce (Tabasco)

In a small bowl, combine the first seven ingredients.  Place the shrimp in a large zip-lock bag and add half the marinade.  Seal and refrigerate for 2 hours.

In a small saucepan, combine the butter, basil, tarragon, 1 t. Cajun seasoning, garlic powder and hot pepper sauce.  Heat until butter is melted.  Keep warm.

Drain and discard shrimp marinade.  Place on the grill, or thread the shrimp onto eight skewers.  Grill, uncovered, over medium heat for 2-4 minutes on each side or until the shrimp turn pink, basting once with the reserved marinade.

Serve with the Cajun butter.

Serves 8

 

TOTAL HIKING MILES:  5

Year to Date:  136

Daily Average:  3.31