Ringling Brothers

Ringling Brothers

John Ringling

(credit: Keystone—EB Inc.)

Family of U.S. circus owners. After five of the seven brothers formed a song-and-dance troupe (1882), they began to add circus acts to their show. In 1884 they organized their first small circus in their hometown, Baraboo, Wis., and toured the Midwest in circus wagons. In 1890 they began moving their wagons by railway. They acquired smaller circuses from 1900, and in 1907 they bought the Barnum & Bailey Circus, thus becoming the leading U.S. circus. The guiding managers were Charles Ringling (1863–1926) and later John Ringling (1866–1936), whose acquisition of American Circus Corp. in 1929 brought 11 major circuses under Ringling control. The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus continues to perform, though it passed out of Ringling family hands in 1967.