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RBBB Mechanical Seat Wagons

  • 22 Jun 2021 10:01 AM
    Message # 10683978
    Bruce Hawley (Administrator)

    What was the final disposition of the mechanical seat wagons that Art Concello designed for Ringling Bros. in the late 1940s?  Do any of them still exist? 

    Last modified: 9 Jul 2021 7:32 PM | Bruce Hawley (Administrator)
  • 22 Jun 2021 10:03 AM
    Reply # 10684011 on 10683978
    Bruce Hawley (Administrator)

    Response from Fred Dahlinger:  Unless a recent discovery would dictate otherwise, all of the RBBB seat wagons have been scrapped.  The last remaining remnants were discussed in Fred Pfening Jr.'s comprehensive article on the topic in the Nov-Dec 1994 issue of Bandwagon, pp.21-32.

    Last modified: 9 Jul 2021 7:34 PM | Bruce Hawley (Administrator)
  • 23 Jun 2021 3:31 PM
    Reply # 10690933 on 10683978
    Chris Berry (Administrator)

    When I was a kid my dad was friends with a guy named George Roan who owned the Tru-Value hardware store on Longboat Key. His father, Al Roan, had been John Ringling's yacht captain back in the 1920s.  In any event, George said that he was working at the Venice winter quarters in about 1962 when they were cutting up the seat wagons for scrap with acetlyne torches. According to George Roan, the 1956 big top (which was actually the same one used in 1955 because of the blowdown in Geneva New York) was in a wagon that was on the Venice railsiding. The torches caught the high grass along the right-of-way on fire and the wagon with the canvas inside burned, and that is why there was no remaining big top from the last year of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey....
  • 23 Jun 2021 3:33 PM
    Reply # 10690937 on 10683978
    Chris Berry (Administrator)

    Here is a great picture of the seat wagons from the Kelly-Miller circus being set up. These were designed by D.R. Miller and are different than the Ringling Seat wagons (and those used by Beatty Cole) because of the slant that was created when the wagon was opened up. Kelly-Miller tested the wagons in 1956, and put them into service in 1957. This photo is from the Robert Parkinson Library at Circus World Museum. 

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  • 23 Jun 2021 4:50 PM
    Reply # 10691248 on 10683978
    Bruce Hawley (Administrator)

    Thanks Chris.  Great info!
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