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Step right up . . .

The World of Wonders sideshow still beckons, its emphasis now more on performers than human oddities.

By COLETTE BANCROFT
Published February 9, 2006

[Times photo (2004)]

SLIDE RULE: Remember to hold on to your hat as you take a trip down the Giant Slide.

	[Times photo: Bob Croslin]
	Poobah — real name: Pete Terhurne — is 76 and has worked the sideshow for more than 50 years.
	[Times photo (2005): Mike Pease]
	PIG IN: A project hog and some of its porcine pen mates from Gaither High School are unloaded. Area schools with FFA programs compete in several agriculture categories.
	[Times photo (2002): Cherie Diez]
	PIG OUT: The fair is where diets go to die, and this deep-fried Snickers bar is evidence of that.

It's easy to find a sideshow on television: From Fear Factor to The Jerry Springer Show, postmodern freak shows are a pop culture staple.

But for a glimpse of the real thing, head for the Florida State Fair.

Old-fashioned sideshows may seem like a piece of quaint Americana, or a whiff of a politically incorrect past.

But when the fair opens today, the bright banners of the World of Wonders will be luring fairgoers with the promise of a fire-eating dwarf, a blockhead who drives nails into her skull, the world's smallest woman and more.

Overseeing the whole crew will be partners Ward Hall and Chris Christ, lifelong sideshow performers and impresarios.

Hall, who has been in the business for almost 60 years, says it isn't what it used to be. In the 1970s, he and Christ ran 16 shows in three countries; now it's just the one.

Things got so slow in 2003 that Hall, 76, retired to the home he has owned for years in Gibsonton, the southern Hillsborough County town that has long been home to circus and sideshow people.

Retirement didn't stick. Hall ran away to join the circus when he was 15, and he just can't stay away.

And he knows people can't stop coming to the sideshow: "They always want to look. It's human nature."

Marc Hartzman agrees. The New York writer's 2005 book American Sideshow (americansideshow.com) assembles the histories and photos of dozens of the turtle boys, bird girls, pinheads, parasitic twins, midgets, giants, fat ladies and conjoined twins who earned their livings in sideshows over the last 175 years.

The book includes Hall and Christ as well as some of their former attractions, such as Sealo the Seal Boy and Dolly Regan the Ossified Girl, also billed as the Half Lady, Half Baby.

"People are naturally curious about anything different, always have been, always will be," says Hartzman, who dates his own fascination with sideshow performers to seeing the movie The Elephant Man when he was 7.

But the nature of sideshows has changed.

Originally, they consisted of two types of performers: working acts, such as magicians, sword swallowers and fire eaters, and so-called human oddities or freaks, people who were exhibited because of physical attributes such as malformed bodies or extremes of size.

Many performers were both. One of Hall and Christ's longtime employees is Poobah, the fire-eating dwarf, whose real name is Pete Terhurne. He's 76, and he will be performing at the fair.

"Pete has been with me for 53 years," Hall says.

Exhibition of human oddities became less common as medical advances allowed prevention or treatment of birth defects and diseases that used to cause unusual appearances.

Conjoined twins are surgically separated, bearded ladies take hormones, people born without limbs learn to use prostheses.

Attitudes toward people with disabilities have changed dramatically as well, making it less socially acceptable to pay money to ogle them.

Hartzman, though, points out that television news shows and documentaries often focus on people with physical anomalies under the guise of science. "So they're not on stage, but we're sure interested in watching them on TV."

And medical innovations have led to new types of body modification. Hartzman says, "Self-made freaks are becoming more and more extreme."

His book includes the Enigma, who is completely tattooed with blue puzzle pieces and has had horns implanted in his head, and the Lizardman, who has undergone various cosmetic surgeries to make him look like a lizard.

As exhibition of human oddities has changed, interest in the other half of traditional sideshows, the working acts, has grown. Whether it's the Jim Rose Circus of Lollapalooza fame, which has included such acts as the Enigma and the flesh-skewering Zamora the Torture King, the gonzo magic of Penn and Teller, or amateur hours like TV's Jackass, extreme bad behavior appeals as much as ever.

Hall finds evidence for the popularity of sideshow working acts in the fact that many of the performers in his World of Wonders are young people, some with college degrees.

"It's a weird ambition," he says.

They include Loren Foley, who lifts weights with piercings in his chest and ears; sword swallower Tommy Breen; and Alexandra Kaminsky, who dances on broken glass and a ladder of swords.

But most of the show's human oddities, like the two-headed girl and the headless woman, are "smoke and mirrors," Hall says.

He got a call last year from a reporter who wanted Hall to introduce him to "circus people" in Gibsonton.

"I said, let's cut to the chase. You want to meet the freaks. Well, you're 40 years too late."

- Colette Bancroft can be reached at 727 893-8435 or bancroft@sptimes.com

The Florida State Fair opens today and runs through Feb. 20. Gates open at 9 a.m. daily; midway rides open at 11 a.m. today and Mon.-Thur., 10 a.m. Fri.-Sun. Closing hours vary. The Florida State Fairgrounds is on U.S. 301 off Interstate 4, east of Tampa. Regular admission: $10, $5 ages 6-11. Admission special today: $5, ages 5 and younger free. Pepsi Armband Days pay one price for unlimited rides: Fri., Sun. and Feb. 17, 19 and 20, $25. Senior Days: Mon. through Feb. 16, $6 ages 55 and older at gate. Student Days: Fri. and Feb. 20, $5 for youth grades K-12. (813) 621-7821; www.floridastatefair.com

All in the Ford Amphitheatre at the fairgrounds; fair admission required.

TODAY

U.S. Navy Band, 3:30 p.m. Free.

Lee Greenwood, 5:30 and 7:30 p.m. Free.

FRIDAY

Univision Tampa's Fiesta Gigante with Banda El Recodo, Los Razos and Jenni Rivera, 6 p.m. $46-$85.

MONDAY

Felix Cavaliere and the Rascals, 7:30 p.m. Free.

TUESDAY

Boots Randolph, 7:30 p.m. Free.

WEDNESDAY

The Supremes with Mary Wilson, 7:30 p.m. Free.

FEB. 16

Country Gold Tour with Barbara Fairchild, Billy Walker, Helen Cornelius, Jack Greene, Jett Williams, Jim Ed Brown, T. Graham Brown, Steve and Rudy Gatlin, Jimmy Fortune, Leroy Van Dyke & the Auctioneers and Moe Bandy, 6:30 p.m. $10.

- A daily wine festival, 9 a.m.-9 p.m., Florida Center.

- A preview of the Kids' World's Fair, coming to Orlando in April, 9 a.m.-10 p.m. daily, Bob Thomas Equestrian Center.

- Super SportsFest, an interactive pavilion with football, hockey, baseball, soccer, golf and basketball, 9 a.m.-9 p.m. daily, Entertainment Hall.

- The Fresh from Florida Showcase & Marketplace, 9 a.m.-9 p.m. daily, Ag Hall of Fame building.

[Last modified February 8, 2006, 09:04:06]