Virtual Exhibitions

This week’s photo is of Barnum reading in front of his fire place.  Aside from the showman antics that Barnum was best known for, he also did a fair amount of writing.  Over the course of his life he published an autobiography titled "Struggles andTriumphs", an advice book titled "The Art of Money Getting", an adventure story book titled...

Nancy Barnum, born Nancy Fish, was Barnum’s second wife who he married mere weeks after Charity's death.  Nancy was about 40 years younger than Barnum and was, in fact, younger than any of his daughters.  She was the child of John Fish, a friend that Barnum had made over the course of his many trips toEngland.  Before the death of C...

This week’s picture is of Charity Barnum, P.T. Barnum’s first wife.  The pair met in Bethel, CT, Barnum’s home town, where Charity was a tailoress.  He fell for her quickly and they married before he was even twenty years of age. The couple did not always see eye to eye, as Charity was relatively prim and proper, the opp...

This week’s picture is of Jumbo the “Largest Elephant in the World” and his adoring keeper Matthew Scott.  As a baby Jumbo had been captured in Africa.  Captured as a baby in Africa, Jumbo became a prominent feature of the Zoo in London where he gave rides to children.  Barnum managed to acquire him for the impressive su...

This week’s picture portrays P.T. Barnum and Commodore Nutt, a little person who gained almost as much fame as General Tom Thumb himself. Born George Washington Morrison Nutt, the Commodore first met Barnum in 1862. At the time Barnum was interested in finding a new act to repl...

This week’s picture is of Chang Yu Sing, exhibited by P.T. Barnum as the Chinese Giant. Chang Yu Sing was well over seven feet tall, and may have been over eight, as the caption on the bottom of the image claims. He was a man of many talents including immense strength, skill at chess, and the ability to speak several languages. Perhaps most interesting, is the fact that he achieved great fame in the United States at a time when people of Chinese descent were facing immense ...

This week’s photo is of Waino and Plutano, better known as the “Wild Men of Borneo”. The two men made up an act for P.T. Barnum’s circus. Their small stature combined with their impressive strength attracted audiences across the country. Their draw was also partly due to the stories that Barnum spread about them though adverti...

This week’s photo is of P.T. Barnum as a family man. The two children in the picture are his grandchildren. By the time Barnum passed away in 1891 he had lived to see not only a great many grandchildren, but a number of his great grandchildren as well. Barnum was immensely fond of his family and he liked to have them all together. He generally...

Helen B. Rennel was one of P.T. Barnum’s granddaughters.  She shared a name with her mother, Barnum’s second child, Helen M. Hurd.  In 1871 her parents were divorced, which was a relatively rare occurrence for the time. Helen and her siblings remained in their father’s care, and near their grandfather, when their mother ...

This "Photo of the Week" is of Caroline Barnum Thompson, P.T. Barnum’s eldest daughter, who was born May 27, 1833. In 1852 she married David W. Thompson and, on the day of her wedding, her father’s mansion, Iranistan, was almost destroyed in a fire. Caroline travelled with her Father during Jenny Lind’s tour of America in 1850, and s...