Cirque

1930 · réf. 54026 — Petersburg VA: Carl J. Lauther Amusements ca. 1930. 8vo. 4 pp unpaginated. With three photo illustrations self-printed softcovers fold creases minor shelfwear slight dustsoiling still VG exemplar. First edition of this exceedingly scarce promotional pamphlet for the hermaphrodite sideshow featuring “Aileen” who was born in California in 1907 raised as a girl until puberty when only one side developed a female breast and other side developed as man and appears to have dressed primarily as a man although on occasion as a woman for his/her amusement. Later she would often appear with another “hermaphrodite” in the Lauther sideshows who appeared under the name Claude. After World War II the Lauther b. 1888 sideshows would become the staple acts for the Cetlin-Wilson Circus whose winter quarters were in Petersburg VA. Generally the “hermaphrodites” were female impersonators often with deformed genitalia such as prolonged clitoris or misshapen penis creating the illusion of a double-sex and these acts proved notably popular and profitable. No copies located in Worldcat; See: Hartzman American Sideshow: An Encyclopedia of History’s Most Wondrous and Curiously Strange Performers 2006; Alison Oram Her Husband was a Woman! Women’s Gender-Crossing in Modern Popular Culture 2007. Carl J. Lauther, Amusements, paperback