Four Years in Europe with Buffalo Bill

James Anthony Bailey

four years in europe with buffalo bill 13 james anthony bailey The subject of this sketch was born at Detroit, Michigan , July 4, 1847, of Scotch-Irish parentage.4 He left home at ten years of age, and for a time worked on a farm at $3.50 per month. While serving as a bell-boy in a hotel at Pontiac, Michigan, Fred Bailey, general agent of the Lake & Robinson Circus, came there and engaged young Bailey to assist him. This was his opportunity, and he took advantage of it. His rise from billposter to general agent was rapid, and finally a proprietor in 1872, when he entered into partnership with J. E. Cooper, forming the celebrated “Cooper & Bailey Great International Allied Shows,” visiting Australia, New Zealand, South America and India, returning to America in 1878 and consolidating with Howe’s Great London Shows. 4. Born James Anthony McGuiness, James A. Bailey rose through the ranks of the circus world from teenage runaway to successful owner and manager—along with P . T. Barnum—of the so-called Greatest Show on Earth. On the involvement of Barnum and Bailey with Cody’s partner, Nate Salisbury, and the circumstances by which Bailey came to be a partner and co-owner of the Wild West Show, see in particular Russell, Lives and Legends of Buffalo Bill, 378–82; Kasson, Buffalo Bill’s Wild West, 144–51; Bridger, Buffalo Bill and Sitting Bull, 408–10; and Carter, Buffalo Bill Cody, 380–81. 10. James Anthony Bailey. four years in europe with buffalo bill 15 In 1880 he forced P. T. Barnum into a partnership , forming the “Barnum & Bailey Greatest Show on Earth,” which, with the exception of one year, he continued to manage up to the time of his death. “The little Napoleon of show business”—what an apt synonym! What Napoleon was to the military world, James A. Bailey was to the circus business. When Bailey picked up a newspaper he did not first turn to the baseball score, nor did he stop to read the news of the day until he had first scanned the market reports and ascertained the price of cattle, hogs, flour, potatoes, cotton, tobacco, butter, eggs, etc. That told him more than the most thrilling headline—that was his barometer to business conditions. It was Bailey’s master mind which conceived and executed the idea of making the Buffalo Bill Show a one-day stand show. The Wild West was so tremendously cumbersome that Colonel Cody himself never dreamed that it was possible to make one day stands with it, and for years it would take them two or three days to move from place to place, and would consequently make long stands at expositions and large cities. In 1904 he invited the five Ringling brothers into partnership with him by selling them a half interest in the Forepaugh-Sells Show, probably seeing in them his only possible successors. He was united in wedlock to Ruth L. McCaddon, of Zanesville, Ohio, who was his constant companion in all his struggles and triumphs, and the great 16 four years in europe with buffalo bill showman paid a touching tribute to her devotion in his will. “I know of no one more entitled to the results of our combined labors than my beloved wife, Ruth L. Bailey.” And all his vast estate, amounting to millions, was left to Mrs. Bailey, she being named as administratrix, without bond. Mr. Bailey passed to the “great beyond” at his beautiful mansion at Mount. Vernon, New York, Wednesday afternoon, April 11, 1906, erysipelas being the cause of death. He was interred at Woodlawn Cemetery on Saturday, April 14. Requiescat in Pace. ...