Hartford circus fire


Tent on fire

Coordinates: 41°47'41.9"N 72°40'28.0"W

The Hartford circus fire, which occurred on July 6, 1944, in Hartford, Connecticut, was one of the worst fire disasters in the history of the United States. The fire occurred during an afternoon performance of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus that was attended by 6,000 to 8,000 people. The fire killed 167 people and more than 700 were injured.

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Background

In mid-20th century America, a typical circus traveled from town to town by train, performing under a huge canvas tent commonly called a "big top". The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus was no exception: what made it stand out was that it was the largest circus in the country. Its big top could seat 9,000 spectators around its three rings; the tent's canvas had been coated with 1,800 pounds (820 kg) of paraffin wax dissolved in 6,000 US gallons (23,000 l) of gasoline, a common waterproofing method of the time.

The circus had been experiencing shortages of personnel and equipment as a result of the United States' involvement in World War II. Delays and malfunctions in the ordinarily smooth order of the circus had become commonplace; on August 4, 1942, a fire had broken out in the menagerie, killing a number of animals. When the circus arrived in Hartford, Connecticut, on July 5, 1944, the trains were so late that one of the two shows scheduled for that day had been canceled. In circus superstition, missing a show is considered extremely bad luck, and although the July 5, 1944 evening show ran as planned, many circus employees may have been on their guard, half-expecting an emergency or catastrophe.

The next day was a Friday; the crowd at the afternoon performance was dominated by women and children. The size of the audience that day has never been established with certainty, but the best estimate is about 7,000.

The fire

The fire began as a small flame after the lions performed, on the southwest sidewall of the tent, while the Great Wallendas were performing. Circus bandleader Merle Evans was said to have been the first to spot the flames, and immediately directed the band to play "The Stars and Stripes Forever", the tune that traditionally signaled distress to all circus personnel. Ringmaster Fred Bradna urged the audience not to panic and to leave in an orderly fashion, but the power failed and he could not be heard. Bradna and the ushers unsuccessfully tried to maintain some order as the panicked crowd tried to flee the big top.

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Because of the paraffin wax waterproofing of the tent, the flames spread rapidly. Many people were badly burned by the melting paraffin, which rained down from the roof. The fiery tent collapsed in about eight minutes according to eyewitness survivors, trapping hundreds of spectators beneath it.

It is commonly believed that the number of fatalities is higher than the estimates given, due to poorly kept residency records in rural towns, and the fact that some smaller remains were never identified or claimed. It is also believed that the intense heat from the fire combined with the accelerants, the paraffin and gasoline, could have incinerated people completely, as in cremation, leaving no substantial physical evidence behind. Additionally, free tickets had been handed out that day to many people in and around the city, some of whom appeared to eyewitnesses and circus employees to be drifters who would never have been reported missing.

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Most of the dead were found in piles, some three bodies deep, at the most congested exits. A small number of people were found alive at the bottoms of these piles, protected by the bodies on top of them when the burning big top ultimately fell down. Because of a picture that appeared in several newspapers of sad tramp clown Emmett Kelly holding a water bucket, the event became known as "the day the clowns cried."

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Notable survivors

• Hal Blaine, renowned rock/pop session drummer
• Eunice Groark, first female lieutenant governor of Connecticut
• Charles Nelson Reilly, actor, comedian, and director
• Emmett Kelly, renowned circus clown

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Tears of a Clown

By William Browning July 6, 2016



RALPH EMERSON’S FAMOUS PHOTO OF EMMETT KELLY.

Seventy-two years ago today, in Hartford, Connecticut, someone photographed a clown carrying a bucket of water toward a fire. It’s a surreal image, haunting in the old black-and-white way. The clown is stepping through an arid landscape littered with what appear to be wooden crates, a lone railroad car, and the suggestion of bleachers. As clowns go, he’s the sad tramp kind, a pained grimace on his face. In front of him, to the left, someone is exiting the frame—a portion of a leg is visible—and the clown follows, gripping his bucket, exuding dread. He’s heading toward something unseen and tragic, something almost ghostly. ... The Hartford Circus Fire occurred during a midafternoon Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus show on July 6, 1944. Some 167 people died; about 700 were injured. No one knows for sure how it started.

The show was twenty minutes in when the flames started near the entrance to the big top. The Great Wallendas were beginning a high-wire performance. The bandleader noticed the fire first and cued up “The Stars and Stripes Forever,” circus code for trouble. For waterproofing purposes, the tent’s canvas had been coated in paraffin and gasoline. The flames spread across the top quickly. There were about seven thousand people there, and panic followed: crowds surging toward small passageways, pieces of flaming canvas falling on people, horrific screams. Some broke ankles jumping from bleachers. There is a story of a woman who spent the rest of her life toting a pocketknife because a man pulled his out and cut a hole in the canvas to help people escape. The comedian Charles Nelson Reilly was thirteen and in attendance, and one story claims he avoided sitting in audiences for the rest of his life. The whole thing is said to have lasted fewer than ten minutes.

At some point, the sad tramp clown known as Weary Willie came running. He was the creation of Emmett Kelly, a cartoonist-turned-clown from Kansas who’d been performing in circuses for decades. By 1944, he’d been with Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus for two years, and his Weary Willie character was cementing an iconic place in clown lore. Willie was forever down-and-out. He wore a dirty derby, threadbare attire, and had a frown painted on his unshaven face. In every performance, something good got away. Kelly once described the character this way: “Weary Willie is a melancholy little hobo who always gets the short end of the stick and never has any luck, but he never loses hope and keeps on trying.” For a generation who had lived through the Great Depression, this haplessness resonated. Willie became very famous. Loren MacIver painted his portrait. He met Churchill.

It’s not clear where Kelly was when the Hartford fire began. Stewart O’Nan’s book The Circus Fire: A True Story of an American Tragedy puts him in his dressing room, drinking a beer, preparing to inhabit Weary Willie. Another version has him touching up his makeup; another has him just outside the big top, waiting for his cue to join the Wallendas’ show. Weary Willie would spread a handkerchief out to catch the performers if they fell from the high wires. ... Wherever he was, once he heard the screams of “Fire!” Kelly is known to have acted quickly. Some say the bucket of water he picked up was the one he used to wash his makeup off after performances. Others say he picked it up and dipped it into a horse trough. ... As Weary Willie made his way toward the big top through the hysteria, a circus attendee named Ralph Emerson snapped the famous photo of him in full stride. He’s gripping the heavy bucket in his right hand, and his left arm is raised up in a sort of balancing motion. As a result, the left side of his face is partly covered. You can sense his determination, though. Six years ago, on an Internet message board somewhere, one of his descendants wrote that when Kelly reached the raging fire he realized how futile a bucket of water was.

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William Browning is a reporter from Mississippi.

Charles Nelson Reilly

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Early life

Reilly was born January 13, 1931, in The Bronx, to an Irish-Catholic father and a Swedish Lutheran mother. When young, he would amuse himself by creating puppet theater, and his mother often told him to "save it for the stage".

At age 13, he survived the 1944 Hartford circus fire which killed 167 people in Connecticut, and he never sat in an audience again after that. Because of the event's trauma, he rarely attended theater, stating that the large crowds reminded him of what happened that day. As he often stated on the Johnny Carson show and other such venues, that even as the director of a play or stage production he preferred to sit at the back of the house or the back of a balcony near the exits to preview his work including one time where his leading lady’s costume caught fire (but on recounting this episode to Johnny, Reilly assured him “but you know, these things always work out okay”).

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