I don' think 28 is identified
And the puppet on 31 is definitely not the one on the photos of Russ Lewis...

Thanx for a great thread of one of their best albums.

Good interview with Ward Hall on how he got his start etc.
Heck of a showman, may have to buy his book now.
[www.sideshowworld.com]

List of women executed in the electric chair:
[deathpenaltyinfo.org]

Quote
Blueranger
List of women executed in the electric chair:
[deathpenaltyinfo.org]

I don't think she's getting executed ...

POSSIBLE COLLUSION

^#28
^#34

---

---

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-06 17:53 by schillid.

Quote
Doc
the puppet on 31 is definitely not the one on the photos of Russ Lewis...

Apparently he had a different puppet back in those days...


He talks about it in an interview

Quote

Were you performing with the Jerry Mahoney doll at the time you were working 12 shows a day at the 42nd street flea circus in New York?

No. The Jerry Mahoney doll had been set aside when I first met Professor Heckler at Hubert’s Museum... A fella named Eddie Marino, a ventriloquist and ticket taker at Hubert’s, had placed a professional figure on consignment in Al Flosso’s magic shop on 34th Street. [Martinka and Co.] They told me if I had a professional looking puppet they would give me a job. I went down to the magic shop and there was the puppet on consignment in the display case. Mr. Flosso gave it to me on time payments. I really got lucky with that.


Is this the puppet that eventually became Brooklyn Birch?

Yes. Eventually I ended up in Los Angeles. Went to work doing club dates, worked for the USO, came back to the States and a Mortgage Company saw me at a night club that was on the west coast in Santa Barbara and wanted me to do a television show. (The Russ Lewis Show KTTV) Well, I had come up through burlesque and strip houses as well as circus and sideshows. I knew I was going to have to set aside all of the material that I was doing at that point. So along with a change of material, I had to remake Brooklyn Birch.
Rene’ Zendejas (1927-2014) a wonderful puppeteer and puppet maker in California was going to do the puppets on the Television show. He remade the features of the doll. Gave him a pointy nose, large eyes, brand new skin and hair. And so, that is how Brooklyn Birch came about.


To be clear, who originally made Brooklyn Birch?

Here is the best answer I can give you. Eddie Marino (Hubert’s Museum) came from England with the puppet. I think it was made somewhere in Great Britain. It had been in use about 70 years before I got it in my hands.


.

(See HERE)





Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-06 20:24 by schillid.

From: [chronology.wildabouthoudini.com]

List of Houdini's suspended straitjacket escapes

Sept. 8, 1915: Kansas City Post Building in Kansas City, MO.
Sept. 29, 1915: 4th St. between Nicollet & Marquette Ave. in Minneapolis.
Oct. 19, 1915: Seattle Times Building at 2nd Ave and Union St. in Seattle, WA.
Oct. 25, 1915: Oregonian Building in Portland, OR.
Nov. 23, 1915: First National Bank Building at Broadway & 14th in Oakland, CA.
Nov. ?, 1915: Los Angeles, CA (unverified).
Dec. 22, 1915: Walker Bank Building at 2nd South & Main in Salt Lake City.
Dec. 30, 1915: Denver Post Building at 1577 Champa St. in Denver, CO.
Jan. 13, 1916: Star-Telegram Building at Throckmorton & 8th St. in Fort Worth, TX.
Jan. 18, 1916: Dallas News Building at Commerce & Lamar St. in Dallas, TX.
Jan. 25, 1916: Houston Chronicle Building in Houston, TX.
Feb. 2, 1916: Express Building at Navarro & Crocket St. in San Antonio, TX.
Feb. 10, 1916: Littlefield Building at 6th & Congress in Austin, TX.
Feb. 23, 1916: The Daily States Building on Canal Street in New Orleans, LA.
March 16, 1916: Milwaukee Journal Building in Milwaukee, WI.
March 28, 1916: Police halt advertised escape in Times Square, New York, NY.
March 29, 1916: Bowling Green subway construction site in Battery Park, New York, NY.
April 19, 1916: Munsey Building at Pennsylvania & E. St. in Washington, D.C.
April 26, 1916: The Sun Building on Charles St. in Baltimore, MD.
Aug. 2, 1916: Pier Tower in Atlantic City, NJ,
Oct. 18, 1916: Toronto, Canada.
Oct. 31, 1916: Erie Canal & Exchange St. in Rochester, NY.
Nov. 6, 1916: Post-Sun Building on Liberty Ave. & Wood St. in Pittsburgh, PA.
Nov. 15, 1916: Pickering Building in Cincinnati, OH.
Nov. ?, 1916: Citizen's Trust and Savings Building at corner of High & Gay Street in Columbus, OH.
Nov. 29, 1916: Roof of County jail in Grand Rapids, MI.
Dec. 13, 1916: Daily News Building in Dayton, OH.
Dec. 20, 1916: John Harkness Brown Building at 1019 Euclid Ave. at 9th St. in Cleveland, OH.
Feb. 27, 1917: B.F. Keith’s Building at Tremont St. in Boston.
March 7, 1917: Brownell Building at Exchange Place in Providence, RI.
Nov. 5, 1917: Subway construction site in Times Square, New York, NY.
May 15, 1918: Inside Madison Square Garden for NYPL War Stamp rally in New York, NY.
May ?, 1919: Harbour Apartments in Los Angeles as movie stunt for The Grim Game.
Aug. 21, 1920: NYPD Field Day Games at Gravesend Racetrack in Brooklyn, NY.
Aug. 28, 1920: Repeats NYPD Field Day Games at Gravesend Racetrack in Brooklyn, NY.
Sept. 10, 1921: NYPD Field Day at Gravesend Racetrack in Brooklyn, NY.
Dec. 21, 1921: Boston Post Building at Washington & Water streets, Boston, MA.
Jan. 5, 1922: Palace Theater at Broadway & 47th St. in New York, NY.
Jan. 12, 1922: Albee Building at 15th & G Street in Washington, D.C.
Jan. 18, 1922: Munsey Building in Baltimore, MD.
Feb. 17, 1922: 4th floor of City Hall in St. Louis, MO.
March 7, 1922: Pittsburgh Post & Sun Building in Pittsburgh, PA.
Oct. 9, 1922: Fyfe Building at Woodward & Grand Circus Park in Detroit, MI.
Nov. ?, 1922: Newark, NJ.
Feb. 7, 1923: Tribune Building at 4th Street & Marquette Ave in Minneapolis.
Feb. 21, 1923: Free Press Building on Carlton St. in Winnipeg, Canada.
March 1, 1923: Pender & Beatty St. in Vancouver, Canada .
March 19, 1923: Hearst Building at 3rd & Market St. in San Francisco, CA.
March 27, 1923: Tribune Tower in Oakland, CA.
April 4, 1923: Examiner Building in Los Angeles, CA.
June 11, 1923: Park Avenue exhibit pavilion at Silver Jubilee Exposition in New York, NY.
Sept. 6, 1923: World Herald Building in Omaha, NB.
Oct. 24, 1923: The Journal Building in Sioux City, IA.
Oct. ?, 1923: Dallas City Hall on Commerce Street in Dallas, TX.
Nov. 8, 1923: Chronicle Building in Houston, TX.
Nov. 12, 1923: San Antonio City Hall in San Antonio, TX.
Nov. 16, 1923: 5th floor of Littlefield Building in Austin, TX.
Nov. 22, 1923: Star-Telegram building at Seventh & Taylor in Fort Worth, TX.
Nov. 28, 1923: Beacon Building in Wichita, KS.
Jan. 23, 1924: State Journal Building on St. Carroll in Madison, WI.
Sept. ?, 1924: Providence, RI [unverified].
April 2, 1925: The Indianapolis News Building in Indianapolis, IN.




EDIT: Looks like none of the above...
See next post ...





Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-21 20:49 by schillid.

IT IS NOT HOUDINI, apparently...

I emailed the owner of [wildabouthoudini.com] and he responded.

I wrote:

Quote
schillid
... I am writing to you to ask you if the blurry figure in this picture is Harry Houdini...
Attempting to identify all of the individuals depicted on Rolling Stones album “Exile On Main Street” ...

He replied:

Quote
WildAboutHoudini
That doesn’t appear to be Houdini...

Then he added:

Quote
WildAboutHoudini
Sorry, I don’t know who this is...
It almost looks like it might be a woman.

Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-09 21:16 by schillid.

Quote
schillid
Now it's getting more difficult.

Hard to tell what's going on with the legs ...

Wade mentioned something about the smallest mother and daughter...

^#40 ...? ? ?

One would think a mother/daughter sideshow act would be easier to find..

This pic of members of the Ovitz Family who performed in sideshows looks a little like them..

Quote
schillid

Quote
Doc
the puppet on 31 is definitely not the one on the photos of Russ Lewis...

Apparently he had a different puppet back in those days...


He talks about it in an interview

Quote

Were you performing with the Jerry Mahoney doll at the time you were working 12 shows a day at the 42nd street flea circus in New York?

No. The Jerry Mahoney doll had been set aside when I first met Professor Heckler at Hubert’s Museum... A fella named Eddie Marino, a ventriloquist and ticket taker at Hubert’s, had placed a professional figure on consignment in Al Flosso’s magic shop on 34th Street. [Martinka and Co.] They told me if I had a professional looking puppet they would give me a job. I went down to the magic shop and there was the puppet on consignment in the display case. Mr. Flosso gave it to me on time payments. I really got lucky with that.


Is this the puppet that eventually became Brooklyn Birch?

Yes. Eventually I ended up in Los Angeles. Went to work doing club dates, worked for the USO, came back to the States and a Mortgage Company saw me at a night club that was on the west coast in Santa Barbara and wanted me to do a television show. (The Russ Lewis Show KTTV) Well, I had come up through burlesque and strip houses as well as circus and sideshows. I knew I was going to have to set aside all of the material that I was doing at that point. So along with a change of material, I had to remake Brooklyn Birch. Rene’ Zendejas (1927-2014) a wonderful puppeteer and puppet maker in California was going to do the puppets on the Television show. He remade the features of the doll. Gave him a pointy nose, large eyes, brand new skin and hair. And so, that is how Brooklyn Birch came about.


To be clear, who originally made Brooklyn Birch?

Here is the best answer I can give you. Eddie Marino (Hubert’s Museum) came from England with the puppet. I think it was made somewhere in Great Britain. It had been in use about 70 years before I got it in my hands.


.

(See HERE)

Not to get sidetracked, but I always associated the Jerry Mahoney doll with Paul Winchell- in fact I still have the head of a '60's toy replica version on display at my studio that used to belong to my older brother in the mid '60s. I found it in a storage box after he passed away, and it immediately brought back lots of memories. The rest of the body must have fallen apart, but the head survives!

From the Smithsonian: Jerry Mahoney Ventriloquist Puppet

Ventriloquist dummy Jerry Mahoney, created by Paul Winchell around 1938. This is the first of many "Jerrys" which the puppeteer used over the course of his decades-long career as a performer on stage and screen.
Ventriloquist Dr. Paul Winchell and his puppets, Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff, were popular acts from 1938 through the 1980s, appearing on stage in variety acts, in their own television show, "The Paul Winchell and Jerry Mahoney Show," and in guest appearances on the Ed Sullivan Show and other variety programs. Jerry’s wise-cracking, outspoken persona would exasperate straight man partner Winchell in comical songs, skits, and quiz segments on these programs. In addition to his ventriloquist skills, Winchell was an inventor and holds a patent on an early version of the artificial heart. He was also a well known voice over for children's movies and television shows. One of his most memorable characters included acting as the voice of Tigger in the Disney movies, "Winnie the Pooh" for which he received a Grammy award.

Found via google search, this is the version I have:



--------------------------------
"Rip this joint, gonna save your soul..."

Quote
MisterDDDD
the Ovitz Family ...

Yes, I've seen their names while Googling.
Hoping for the actual photo to surface...





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-06 21:34 by schillid.

Quote
schillid
IT IS NOT HOUDINI, apparently...

I emailed the owner of [wildabouthoudini.com] and he responded.

I wrote:

Quote
schillid
... I am writing to you to ask you if the blurry figure in this picture is Harry Houdini...
Attempting to identify all of the individuals depicted on Rolling Stones album “Exile On Main Street” ...

He replied:

Quote
WildAboutHoudini
That doesn’t appear to be Houdini...

Then he added:

Quote
WildAboutHoudini
Sorry, I don’t know who this is...
It almost looks like it might be a woman.

Not too surprising.. too much hair.
Timothy Dill-Russell could be the escape artist.. although the grainy pic makes it appear older. This is Dill-Russel in 1966

Suppose he's too young ...
the photos on the wall montage @ Huberts were all from before Robert Frank snapped his picture in 1958 ...

Quote
MisterDDDD
One would think a mother/daughter sideshow act would be easier to find...
This pic of members of the Ovitz Family who performed in sideshows looks a little like them...

Ward Hall could be wrong... He didn't have his glasses on ...

Quote
schillid

Quote
MisterDDDD
One would think a mother/daughter sideshow act would be easier to find...
This pic of members of the Ovitz Family who performed in sideshows looks a little like them...

Ward Hall could be wrong... He didn't have his glasses on ...

Definitely could be... shame no one had some readers to toss him

He mentioned mother/daughter a couple times and that they had also worked for him tho.. but tough to say.

Quote

^#40 ...? ? ?

They kinda resemble tiny LaVonda Stapp and her husband, Alva Evans, a dwarf circus clown.

LaVonda Stapp (1920-1963) was variously billed as Tiny LaVonda, Little LaVonda, Princess Lavonda, and Lady LaVonda, and always “The Smallest Woman in the World.” At about 24 inches tall she had a fair claim to the title, although her condition made it impossible for her to stand so she could never be properly measured (she had no legs; her feet sprang directly out of her torso). She performed with the sideshow at the Clyde Beatty circus, and had to be pushed around in a tiny wheelchair.

LaVonda Stapp and Alva Evans were married in 1945.

Tiny Lavonda couldn't be the world's smallest mother that Ward Hall spoke of...
Although LaVonda Stapp and her husband did have a baby, It was a baby son and it died shortly after birth.





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-06 23:43 by schillid.

Quote

(Uncertain of their names)

IDENTIFIED


^#45
Yvette and Yvonne McCarther, Conjoined Twins
(1949 - 1993)



The sisters' biological father, John Jones, was out of the picture by the time they were born, but they are sometimes referred to as Yvonne and Yvette Jones.
Their stepfather, Charles McCarther, died in 1970.





From : [articles.latimes.com]

When they were born in 1949, Yvonne and Yvette McCarther, Siamese twins with separate brains and hearts but inextricably joined at the crowns of their heads, were not supposed to live more than a few months.

If they did live, doctors said, certainly they would never be able to manage more than a crawl, and they would most likely be retarded, too. The mother was advised to have them institutionalized. But Willa (Willie) McCarther, then a struggling 38-year-old divorced mother of five normal children, had more faith in her God than in medical predictions.

"God gave them to me," she told the doctors, "so I guess he'll show me how to raise them."

And for the next 40 years, she did. Willie McCarther, a garment worker, taught her babies not only to walk but, more important, to accept their lot as the grace of God and to respect themselves as two people, not one. "I went to a movie last night," Yvonne would say.
"So did I," Yvette would remark. Nor were McCarther's twins retarded, although their education was spotty, provided by home tutors from the school district until they earned an equivalency degree.

But in 1987, at age 38, they decided that they had lazed about long enough. Without telling their protective mother--who always seemed more hurt by the cruel stares of others than did the twins themselves--they enrolled in Compton Community College and, soon after, got their own apartment. Although it took the twins longer than most to complete their degree because of their inadequate educational background, they finished their courses. In June, they would march down the aisle with their classmates to receive their degrees.

Instead, they received them Saturday at their funeral.

They were 43. According to the coroner, they died of heart failure. They were found Jan. 2 lying in bed in their Long Beach apartment. Yvonne, who had an enlarged heart, apparently died first, but beyond that the details are uncertain because the family did not want an autopsy performed. They were the oldest surviving pair of conjoined twins on record.





Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-09 21:20 by schillid.

That's a fantastic story, and congrats to Yvette and Yvonne McCarther for their accomplishments.
Sad ending...

--------------------------------
"Rip this joint, gonna save your soul..."

I emailed RUSS LEWIS today! ...
Turns out that he's still performing and it wasn't diificult to track him down on the internet...

I wrote:

Quote
schillid
Hello Mr. Lewis

Recently, I learned that you are on the front cover of the Rolling Stones album “Exile On Main Street”.
Did you know that?

Although this record was released in 1972, the images on the album cover are from a Robert Frank photo taken in 1958 in Hubert’s Museum.
Can you confirm? Is this a picture of you at Hubert’s ?
Do you recall any details about the puppet or the photo or Hubert's?
Here’s an enlargement:


Thank you kindly for reading this!
And for your consideration!

All the best,
DS

Tonight, Russ Lewis replied:

Quote
Russo Russ Lewis

Yes it is. It is from the fifties at Hubert's Museum on 42nd st. !0 am to about 10 pm, 12 shows a day. The character's name is Zampano after a 1954, film: La Strada. featuring a Greek roving entertainer, named Zampano, played by Anthony Quinn.
I had heard of the Rolling Stone cover but had never seen it. Thank you so much.
Blessings. Russ

Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-15 17:43 by schillid.

Fantastic!!

Great work... this thread gets better and better.

Quote
MisterDDDD
Fantastic!!

Great work... this thread gets better and better.

-------------------
Keep On Rolling

YES!
schillid!!!

...........Thanks, Russ...........

Quote

Quote

Quote

Quote

Quote







............

This guy's been lurking down near the corner ...





Edited 15 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-07 21:26 by schillid.

He appears to be a magician too.

---

I'm wondering if it is this same magician, Chuck Windley
who is shown prominently here:
(Earlier post on Chuck Windley HERE.)

---

Not certain ... Maybe it's somebody else



.

...................Maybe it is him...



This poster is from from later in Mr. Windley's career.
The features are similar, I guess.

Disregarding the hairline, which may have receded...
Ditto which side hair is parted on... the artist may have flipped a photo when designing the poster.

Quote
schillid
IT IS NOT HOUDINI, apparently...

I emailed the owner of [wildabouthoudini.com] and he responded.

I wrote:

Quote
schillid
... I am writing to you to ask you if the blurry figure in this picture is Harry Houdini...
Attempting to identify all of the individuals depicted on Rolling Stones album “Exile On Main Street” ...

He replied:

Quote
WildAboutHoudini
That doesn’t appear to be Houdini...

Then he added:

Quote
WildAboutHoudini
Sorry, I don’t know who this is...
It almost looks like it might be a woman.

Could it be Hubert the Great?!
He was doing this trick in 1933 in NYC...








Magician Dangling from Rope
(Original Caption) Hubert the Great suspended from the 23rd story of the Earle Theater building where he lowered the time for slipping out of the straight-jacket to two minutes.
The previous time was three minutes flat, set up by Houdini, also a magician. (Photo by © Bettmann/CORBIS/Bettmann Archive)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2019-02-07 23:16 by Kurt.

Quote

looks like it might be a woman ...

... especially when you look at it turned around: