Top 10 Most Dreadful Circus Accidents from the Past

When it comes for us to think of circus, we start thinking of fun and entertainment. A circus is a kind of company of performers including clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, and jugglers etc. Circuses were first originated around 150 years ago. The credit goes to Philip Astley “the father of circus” who opened the first circus in England during 1768. Today the world has various circuses, almost every city has its own performers who are known for their distinctive performances and skills. Let us check out the list top 10 most dreadful circus accidents from the past.

10. St Louis Trapeze Accident

We know it very well that all forms of training and performances cannot be survived through by every performer. In case, a mechanical failure occurs, this can lead lives. The same happened in 1872, when trapeze, a dangerous circus act, enacted by two daring and reckless trapeze performers, Fred Lazelle and Billy Millson, was about to meet a sorry end. Due to a technical fault, both of the performers crashed to the ground. Another person was seriously injured named George North. Millson’s ribs were broken and North suffered from serious internal injuries, fortunately they survived.

9. The Elephant Named Mary

On September 12, 1916, Mary, who is an elephant of circus squashed her handler into the ground. The reasons for this couldn’t be determined, but serious injuries occurred. According to sources, she was mishandled and poked at by the handler, Red Eldridge. This led her get angry. Another source says that she wanted to do something exciting and new. Whatsoever the reasons may be, but the fact is that such a mass outrage occurred at the sport that the people started demanding revenge. As a result, Mary was hung by her neck with an industrial crane before 2,500 people.

8. Wallace Brothers Circus Train Disaster

In this incident, the failure of breaks became the reason of huge collision of two Wallace Brothers Circus performers. This happened in 1903. The first train was halted and the engineer of second though saw red signal, failed to stop his train. This led to serious crash. The end result was the killing of several circus animals and 30 workers. The rest of the circus performers managed to escape with minor injuries.

7. Hagenbeck-Wallace Train Wreck

This train accident took place on June 22, 1918 when the traveling Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus was halted for the night. This led to over 350 performers get stuck into the train. At night when they were about to sleep, the train was heading straight towards them at 35 miles/hour. Finally, around 4am morning, the troop train slammed into the circus train. This killed over 80 individuals at the spot and over 120 were seriously injured.

6. The Hartford Circus Fire

The Hartford Circus Fire is one of the deadliest circus accidents in the history. It took place on July 6, 1944 at Hartford Connecticut, United States. Although a small fire started in the southwest sidewall of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey big top circus tent, but it was able to manage spreading rapidly. Unfortunately an accident occurred when tent’s canvas was coated with 820 kg of paraffin wax dissolved in 23,000 liters of gasoline. This led to severe fire production at the sport. About 6000 individuals lost their lives in the accident, and 160 got serious injuries.

5. Dessi Espana

She was one of the most prominent circus performers and the favorite of the audience. She is the one who held a Guinness World Record for twirling 75 hula hoops at once. This Bulgarian-American belonged to a family of talented circus performers. Dessi died in 2004 in an accident. She lost her life while performing ariel acts with chiffon scarves. The failure of holding the chiffon in place led her lost her life at the spot. She had landed to the ground on her head.

4. Dreadful Circus Accidents: Lion-Tamer

Thomas MacCarte, also known as Massarti, was a professional lion tamer. This brave hearted man lost one arm to the lion but still was in this business. In January, 1872, he was killed by lions in front of hundreds of audience. This happened when he was about to finish his act, but one of the lions named Tyrant seized him by his hips, followed by the other lions that sunk his teeth ripped open his scalp. Eventually they brought him to the cage and killed at the spot.

3. The Duluth Lynchings

This accident took place on June 15, 1920. A 19 year-old Irene Tusken had gone for watching African-American circus workers how they used to load the circus wagons. Unfortunately, this boy was raped by six of the James Robinson Circus employees. The police came at the spot and quickly arrested several men. Also there were some black men accused of committing the crime on the white woman. During the evening, a mob broke into the jail and declared Elias Clayton, Isaac McGhie and Elmer Jackson guilty. Also the mob lynched them on a light pole. This led the black community call for justice, but the lynch mob was punished.

2. The Flying Wallendas

The Wallendas family is still known for the great acrobat skills. The head of the family, Karl Wallenda was expert of an acrobatic act, “Seven-Person Chair Pyramid” which involves the family members performing simultaneously. In this act seven dare-devils are to maintain the balance on tightropes and a chair which is about 30 feet above the ground. As they weren’t habitual of using safety nets, a tragedy occurred when the lead man faltered and they all crashed into the ground. The incident happened in 1962.

1. Cleveland Circus Fire

This accident took place in 1942, and led to severe deaths of a hundred circus animals. The fire suddenly began near the tent of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus. The people tried to manage getting the animals out but most of them burned at the spot. Around 100 tigers, zebras, camels, lions and other beasts owned died in the flames. 26 of surviving animals got burnt so badly that they were killed by the humans later on.