Bigtops to Billboards

"BIGTOPS to BILLBOARDS" follows the astonishing career of Colonel Burr Robbins beginning with rare, original letters from the Civil War frontlines and then Burr Robbins' promotion at twenty-seven to colonel in the Union Army. The war concluded in 1865, with his love of showmanship, He opened a cabaret theater in the boom and soon bust Pennsylvania oil rush which rapidly collapsed. Having briefly worked for the mid-west's largest traveling circus as a teenager before the war, he set his not modest goal on building a circus of his own in southern Michigan beginning with only two white hens dyed red and green and touted as "the sacred fowl of India", one talented monkey, a young local dancing bear, a mule with an unusually broad head said to tell fortunes, one hawk (also colorfully dyed) and his own talents at singing, storytelling and advertising. Joining forces and networking with other small shows and signing on partners with major connections in the circus world, he built the Burr Robbins Circus into the third largest circus in America and changed the look of American towns and cities with his giant posters. It was a rough life moving a large circus and menagerie about the war-torn mid-west and across the Mississippi into Indian territories, but the circus was the only entertainment, and everyone came. By the mid-1880s Colonel Burr wanted to move on to greater projects and sold the circus to the Ringling Brothers who had not yet formed a significant show. The sale was completed in 1888. With his belief in poster advertising, he bought up most of the advertising companies in Chicago and formed the American Billposting Company which eventually turned into the giant General Outdoor Advertising Co. and retired a very rich man with oil fields in southern Kanas and hundreds of Chicago properties. The book is richly illustrated with "cabinet card" photos of performers, animals, wonderfully exaggerated wording in circus advertising and much good advice on how to honestly make your way in the world from seemingly hopeless beginnings to fame and fortune.