P.T. BARNUM PAPERS

Phineas Taylor Barnum, self-proclaimed "Prince of Humbugs" was an American showman, entertainer, politician and businessman. Barnum became one of the most well known entertainers of the nineteenth century and the founder of what became the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey Circus. Barnum was born July 5, 1810 in Bethel, Connecticut to Philo and Irene Taylor. In his twenties, Barnum owned several businesses, including a general store and a statewide lottery network. He was active in local politics and in 1829 founded the weekly paper, The Herald of Freedom. On November 8, 1829, Barnum married Charity Hallet. They had four daughters: Caroline Cornelia (1833-1911), Helen Maria (1840-1915), Frances Irena (1842-1844) and Pauline Taylor (1846-1877). Following Charity’s death in November 1873, Barnum married Nancy Fish, a woman 40 years his junior, on February 14, 1874 in London, England.

Barnum moved to New York City in 1834 to seek his fame in entertainment. His earliest ventures included a variety troupe called "Barnum's Grand Scientific and Musical Theater." His first success came in 1842 when he purchased the Scudder's American Museum, soon renamed the Barnum's American Museum. From 1842 to 1865, his museum was New York’s most popular attraction promoting 850,000 exhibits dedicated to the bizarre and unusual, including Feejee the mermaid and little person Charles Sherwood Stratton aka General Tom Thumb. After bad investments bankrupted Barnum in the 1850s, he turned his energies to politics, lecturing and touring England and Europe with General Tom Thumb. Barnum served two terms in the Connecticut legislature (1865-1867) and was the mayor of Bridgeport in 1875. In 1867, he was nominated by the Republican Party for the United States Congress but was defeated. He also toured the country giving temperance lectures.

In 1871, Barnum returned to his life as a showman when he established, P.T. Barnum's Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan and Circus in Brooklyn. The circus found a permanent home in 1874 at the New York Hippodrome, later Madison Square Garden. In 1880, Barnum developed a partnership with James Bailey, who managed The Great London Show. Together the Barnum and London Circus, from 1887 known as the Barnum and Bailey Greatest Show on Earth, traveled the United States and Europe with 28 rail cars and more than 1,000 employees. After Barnum’s death in 1891 and Bailey’s death in 1906, their one-time rival, the Ringling Brothers, bought the famous circus. The shows were merged as the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey Combined Shows, The Greatest Show on Earth.

Barnum combined philanthropy and business throughout much of his later life. He made several donations to Tuft University and was appointed to the Board of Trustee’s prior to the university’s founding. Barnum also had investments throughout the country, including several in Colorado. Barnum’s interest in Colorado began in 1870 when he gave temperance speeches in Denver and Greeley (Union Colony), and soon he began to invest in local property. He owned land and rental property in Greeley, managed by the law firm Haynes, Dunning and Gipson. He also held shares in the Huerfano Cattle Company in Huerfano County and owed land, cattle and horses. Finally Barnum owned several acres of land in Denver called Villa Park, and now known as the Barnum, Barnum West, Villa Park and Valverde neighborhoods. Most of Barnum’s investments were disappointments. His Greeley tenants were constantly late with rent. One of his cattle company partners, David W. Sherwood, was a persistent debtor, always on the edge of bankruptcy. And Barnum’s Villa Park property needed repairs to the house, a fence and water to make it viable.

Many myths and legends exist about Barnum’s interest in Denver. He did not buy Villa Park property to house his animals during the winter. He never intended on living in Denver. He visited Colorado in 1870, 1872, 1877 and 1890 to tend to his investments and see his daughter, Helen, who had created a huge family scandal when she left her husband, Samuel Henry Hurd, and three children for Dr. William Harmon Buchtel. Helen and William married on March 2, 1871 in Indiana but as William had tuberculosis, they headed to Denver to seek a cure. While Barnum never truly embraced Buchtel, he continued to support Helen with his Colorado investments. The Buchtels lived on the Greeley property, ran a tuberculosis house called Prospect Villa Park, and assisted Barnum with Villa Park. The property was renamed the P.T. Barnum Subdivision of Denver in 1881, and Barnum transferred his holdings to Helen in 1884. Today’s Barnum and Barnum West neighborhoods began to take shape in 1887, when incorporation papers were filed. Barnum died on April 7, 1891 at his home in Bridgeport, Connecticut.