STRANGE BUT TRUE: THE WEIRD HISTORY OF CARNIVAL SIDESHOWS: Sword Swallowers, Human Oddities, Flea Circuses, Fire Eaters, Fake Mermaids, Tattooed Performers, and Other Bizarre Attractions

Step right up and discover the strange, outrageous, sometimes troubling, and frequently hilarious history hiding behind the painted banners of the carnival midway.Before television, social media, and suspicious online advertisements, carnival sideshows promised audiences sword swallowers, fire eaters, tattooed performers, human cannonballs, flea circuses, mysterious giants, impossible creatures, and mermaids whose fishy origins had very little to do with the ocean. Some attractions displayed extraordinary skill. Others relied on clever machinery, shameless exaggeration, creative taxidermy, and the public's willingness to pay for something it already suspected was complete nonsense.Strange But True: The Weird History of Carnival Sideshows explores the rise of dime museums, traveling circuses, ten-in-one shows, midway talkers, famous hoaxes, dangerous performances, and the remarkable people who made their living beneath the canvas. Meet P. T. Barnum and his celebrated frauds, learn the secret language of carnival workers, examine the tricks used to manufacture monsters, and discover why skeptical customers kept buying tickets anyway.Funny, cheeky, surprising, and carefully researched, this book also looks beyond the outrageous advertising to reveal the real lives of performers-people who found fame, independence, exploitation, community, opportunity, and hardship in a business built around human curiosity.The banners may be gone, but the sales pitch still works: You have never seen anything like this before.