1. Clyde Raymond Beatty was a famed animal trainer, zoo owner, and circus mogul.
19 Facts About Clyde Beatty
1. 2.
Clyde Beatty joined Howe's Great London Circus in 1921 as a cage boy and spent the next four decades rising to fame as one of the most famous circus performers and animal trainers in the world.
3.
Clyde Beatty was born on June 10,1903, in Bainbridge, Ross County, Ohio, the eldest of nine children.
4.
Clyde Beatty graduated from nearby Chillicothe High School, but had already succumbed to the world of the circus.
5.
Clyde Beatty became famous for his "fighting act", in which he entered a cage with wild animals with a whip and a pistol strapped to his side.
6.
Clyde Beatty had his own rail car in the 35-car circus train.
7.
Clyde Beatty's fame was such that he appeared in films from the 1930s to the 1950s and on television until the 1960s.
8.
Clyde Beatty was the star of his own syndicated radio series, The Clyde Beatty Show, from 1950 to 1952.
9.
The stories were no doubt more fictitious than real, and Clyde Beatty actually appeared in name only; Vic Perrin impersonated him on the show.
10.
Clyde Beatty's "fighting act" made him the paradigm of a lion tamer for more than a generation.
11.
Clyde Beatty was once mauled by a lion named Nero and was in the hospital for ten weeks as a result of the attack.
12.
Clyde Beatty later faced down Nero in a cage for the 1933 film The Big Cage.
13.
In 1957, Clyde Beatty performed his act on The Ed Sullivan Show.
14.
Clyde Beatty had complained during rehearsal that the stage was too small and unsafe for his act, but Sullivan convinced him to perform anyway.
15.
Luckily, Clyde Beatty was able to subdue the lions by firing blank cartridges, without injury to himself or the lions.
16.
Clyde Beatty married Harriett Evans, an aerialist, on September 16,1933.
17.
Clyde Beatty let her have an act in 1935 and she did well, proving to be popular with the public and the press.
18.
Clyde Beatty stated that Beatty's gift to her was understanding his instincts regarding the animals and how best to control them.
19.
Illinois State University has a 1960 route book for the Cole-Clyde Beatty circus posted online.