Picturing Disability: Beggar, Freak, Citizen and Other Photographic Rhetoric

2. Freak Portraits: Sideshow Souvenirs

7 From the mid–nineteenth to the mid–twentieth century in America, the public exhibition of people with real and alleged physical anomalies in museum, circus, carnival, world fair, and amusement park sideshows for amusement and profit was widely popular and for the most part respectable.1 People displayed as “freaks” included those without arms and legs, dwarfs, unusually large individuals (obese people as well as the very tall), conjoined twins, and others with physical and mental differences that we call “disabilities” today. Starting in the early 1860s, when large-scale commercial production of photographic images became technically possible, and ending with the demise of this form of entertainment, the people on exhibit sold photographs of themselves to patrons both to supplement their income and to advertise their appearances. Because of these photos’ popularity , thousands of them still remain in archives and in the hands of private collectors. Illustration 2.1 is an 1885 studio portrait of Charles Tripp, a man born without arms. Charles Eisenmann, a well-known New York City photographer who specialized in “freak” portraits, took it (Mitchell 1979). Tripp was a famous sideshow performer and sold this portrait to people who came to view him while he toured as the “armless human wonder” (Bogdan 1988). Note the fancy Victorian parlor wallpaper on the studio backdrop. Tripp is shown performing with his versatile feet and prominently displaying the props he used in his appearances. Examples of his penmanship and other footwork are in the foreground. Central in the composition is his limbless torso. The images make clear that his lack of upper appendages has 1. For a more comprehensive history, see Bogdan 1988. 2 Freak Portraits Sideshow Souvenirs 2.1. Charles Tripp, “The Armless Wonder,” 1885. Photo by Charles Eisenmann. Cabinet card. 8  Picturing Disability not impaired his ability to function. Tripp is holding a dainty cup with his toes over a fragile table covered with an ornamental cloth and bearing a China tea set. He is dressed in a spiffy but conventional suit and tie, and his hair and moustache are neatly combed. Illustration 2.2 is also an Eisenmann portrait of another freak show exhibit that was sold in conjunction with the subjects’ appearances. “Maximo” and “Bartola” were the subjects’ stage names, and the two were exhibited as the “Last of the Ancient Aztecs” in freak shows in the 1880s (Bogdan 1988, 127–34). The unusual physiology that made Maximo and Bartola a potential attraction was microcephaly , a condition characterized by an abnormally small head and typically accompanied by a mental deficiency, or what is today called a developmental disability. Both the Tripp image and this one were taken in the same studio at approximately the same time. In the Maximo and Bartola illustration , the background studio screen depicts the out of doors, nature; the props consist of papier-mâché decorative stones and plants. Maximo and Bartola are dressed in loose-fitting ornamental robes that mimic Aztec dress. The tailors who made the outfits crafted a representation of the sun on Maximo ’s chest that is meant to be emblematic of the Aztecs. Their hair is not neatly combed; rather, it has been frizzed and is unruly. Although at first glance the two images are very different, they have underlying similarities. Both were produced for the same purposes by a photographer who knew the ways of the amusement world. Charles Eisenmann probably took more commercial freak photographs than any 2.2. Maximo and Bartola, “The Last of the Ancient Aztecs,” ca. 1885. Photo by Charles Eisenmann. Cabinet card. Ronald G. Becker Collection of Charles Eisenmann Photographs, Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Library. 2.3. Charles Eisenmann with Colonel Goshen, ca. 1885. Photo by Charles Eisenmann. Cabinet card. Robert Wainwright Collection. Freak Portraits  9 other American photographer. The best known freak exhibits came regularly to his studio in New York City’s Bowery whenever they and their managers were in town, where they posed for him and placed their photo orders. Illustration 2.3 shows a self-portrait of Eisenmann standing with the very tall Colonel Ruth Goshen, in sideshow lingo “a giant,” who had dropped into Eisenmann’s studio for a shoot.2 In this chapter, I explore Eisenmann’s and other freak show photographers’ depictions and investigate the underlying motivation and culture that produced them. Freak Shows and Presentations Freak shows were part of the popular-amusement industry, and the...