Here are the answers that were posted on the CHS Facebook Group as of 10/6/2021
April Zink - Fav: Water for Elephants (book!); only slightly over shadowing Gus the Great; most used is Tom Ogden’s 200 years of the American Circus.
Chris Berry - April - I agree that Gus the Great is a terrific book. I may be able to narrow it down to two. BIG TOP BOSS. The biography of John Ringling North by David Hammarstrom and WHERE THE WORLD FOLDS UP AT NIGHT, Dixie Wilson’s memoir about her time with Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey in the 1920s.
Bruce Charlie Johnson - My all time favorite is CLOWNS by John Towsen. I think it had the biggest impact on my career. It is also the book that got me interested in circus history. I didn't like my history classes in school because the emphasis was memorizing names and dates that would be on the tests. Towsen's book showed me that history is really stories about interesting people and lessons we can learn from and use today. My two other favorites are THE CIRCUS FROM ROME TO RINGLING, by Earl Chapin May, and THE CIRCUS IN AMERICA, by Chappie Fox and Tom Parkinson. Those were the two that cemented my interest in clown history. I think those three books, plus Emmett Kelly's autobiography, were the first ones in my personal circus history collection.
Aíne Norris - Impossible to choose a favorite, but I reference this one often and love it! ❤ The Circus Age: Culture & Society Under the American Big Top by Janet M. Davis.
Tom Wilds - Spangle by Gary Jennings The travels of a tented show starting at the end of the last Civil war. Three paperback volumes or one hardcover. Great book!
Paul Holley - Billers, Banners and Bombast
Bruce Hawley - I still like Connie Clausen's historical fiction I Love You Honey, But the Season's Over. Terrific insight into life on the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus in the early 1940s!
William Duncan - Circus Baggage Stock by Chappie Fox
