The Light of Asia (elephant)
The Light of Asia aka Tiny (* approx. 1884 ; † January 16, 1932 in Sarasota ) was an elephant who was presented as a white elephant in Adam Forepaugh's circus . He was a victim of the "White Elephant War" ( English White Elephant War ), which was waged between Forepaugh and PT Barnum .
The colored elephant
According to a report in the New York Times on April 11, 1884, the young animal The Light of Asia , then still called Tiny , had been bought from the animal dealer William Cross in Liverpool and shipped to New York on March 8, 1884 , from where it was had been promoted to Philadelphia by agent Samuel Watson . About three weeks before the elephant was shipped, Watson had begun treatment with a substance containing white to flesh-colored plaster of paris and glue to bleach the elephant. The mixture had been applied about 50 times and caused severe skin irritation in the animal, which was treated with Friar's balsam . Although the elephant was clearly suffering from the treatment, Forepaugh, who had flaunted a canary-yellow horse the year before, continued the bleaching process in Philadelphia.
The zookeeper George Gillespie, who looked after the elephant in Liverpool, traveled to the USA on the Alaska ship . In New York, according to the newspaper report, a Forepaughs middleman came on board and offered Gillespie a well-paid job in Forepaugh's circus. However, the condition was not to disclose the coloring of the elephant. However, Gillespie approached the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Philadelphia and put his observations on record. These were confirmed by a Gillespies companion.
The assassination
Forepaugh, who had three or four spare elephants the same size, to be colored in case The Light of Asia died from the procedure, exhibited the animal as a real white elephant, despite press reports, according to Gillespies. On May 13, 1884, an unknown perpetrator fired five pistol shots at the elephant through the wall of the tent in which The Light of Asia was shown. They didn't seem to cause any major damage, but they did panic the audience.
The background
Forepaugh and Barnum had been in tough competition for years. Barnum had presented the real white elephant Toung Taloung in London in early 1884 , which came from the possession of the King of Burma , and then had it transported to the USA, where it was to perform in Madison Square Garden . A few days before this performance, Forepaugh countered with his elephant Light of Asia , which was initially even better received by the audience because it was much brighter than its competitor due to the plaster treatment. He claimed to have bought it in Algiers .
Barnum, in turn, responded to this provocation by having one of his own, normally colored, elephants painted over white and presented as a white elephant in the style of Forepaughs. This experiment in turn prompted the New York Times, on April 21, 1884, to speculate about what would happen if dark-skinned people could also be bleached. The author came to the conclusion that representatives of the " Caucasian race " would then be addressed as niggers and discriminated against.
As early as April 27, 1884, it was stated in a newspaper article that the evidence of the forgery had been provided and that only Barnum's elephant actually had a naturally light skin. In a test with water and a sponge, the Reading Eagle journalist was able to clearly establish that The Light of Asia actually had dark skin. In his article he also quoted a statement from the press agent Barnums, who had found the young people who had dyed the animal in Liverpool, and the animal dealer Cross, who confirmed that the elephant came from Ceylon and was by no means among those regarded as sacred white specimens. Nevertheless, Forepaugh continued to show the animal as a white elephant: The Light of Asia was always wrapped in shawls and led to its performances and shown in an alleged religious ceremony. Attentive observers noticed that his skin, which always appeared bright white at the beginning of the week, tended to become blotchy as the days went on, but Forepaugh tried several times to prove that the animal was not painted. He presented his report by an expert and ultimately even claimed that a member of the Siamese court had confirmed the authenticity of the white elephant. But that was probably not the case. Together with The Light of Asia , Forepaugh, whose co-director RF Hamilton concluded contracts with employees obliging them to prevent discoloration of the elephant, later had a white monkey perform.
The fate of the elephants
Toung Taloung was killed in a fire on November 20, 1887 in Bridgeport. There are different statements about the fate of the colored elephant. Some sources claim that The Light of Asia had a long circus career with Forepaugh, Ringling and Ringling-Barnum under his later name John , and that he did not die until January 16, 1932 in winter quarters in Sarasota. But there are also reports that he, poisoned by the paint applied, died at the end of his first season in the circus. In any case, both animals were no longer shown as white elephants after the White Elephant War of 1884.
In the Sarasota Herald of May 3, 1935, the report of the former press agent Barnum, David S. Thomas, appeared again, in which he revealed that George Gillespie and his companion did not come to the USA of their own accord and for animal welfare reasons, but that they were found by Barnum made and brought to America. They then, according to Thomas, had actually proven that The Light of Asia listened to the name Tiny , and Barnum had also proven that the alleged expert whom Forepaugh had hired to verify the authenticity of his white elephant was not qualified to do so.
Others
In the year of the White Elephant War, James V. Lafferty erected an elephant-shaped building in Cape May that was named The Light of Asia . Unlike its predecessor Lucy , it has not been preserved.
literature
- Sarah Amato, The White Elephant in London. An Episode of Trickery, Racism and Advertising , in: Journal of Social History Vol. 43, No. 1, 2009, pp. 31-66 ( online )
- Neil Harris, humbug. The Art of PT Barnum , University of Chicago Press 1981, ISBN 978-0226317526
- Glenda Riley, The Life and Legacy of Annie Oakley , University of Oklahoma Press 2002, ISBN 978-0806135069 , p. 23
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1955&dat=18840427&id=tZUtAAAAIBAJ&sjid=pJoFAAAAIBAJ&pg=4467,3560032
- ↑ http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9F07EED9113BE033A25752C1A9629C94659FD7CF
- ↑ http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9A00EED7113BE033A25757C1A9639C94659FD7CF
- ↑ The Great Elephant ( Memento from June 25, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ ITS EXCELLENCY "TOUNG TALOUNG" ( Memento from February 9, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ http://www.thefreelibrary.com/The+white+elephant+in+London:+an+episode+of+trickery,+racism+and+...-a0209577948
- ↑ http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1787&dat=19350503&id=nYQcAAAAIBAJ&sjid=RmQEAAAAIBAJ&pg=3800,2439497