Can you see the difference in height between these two men?  No, these are not identical twins.  They are the same man, Clarence E. Willard, the Vaudeville attraction known as the “The Man Who Grows Before Your Eyes.” Williard, who died in 1962, could grow – ON STAGE – from 5’ 10” to 6’ 4”!  He did so by elongating his spine.  He could also make one leg four inches shorter than the other – in short period of time on stage.

This past week a significant piece of Americana shuttered its doors, so to speak.  Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey held it last performance. For a century and a half elephants, trapeze artist, bearded ladies and lion tamers toured America bringing the world to the streets of small and large town America.

And men like Clarence E. Willard are vanishing from the pages of history. In a decade, how many young Americans will even know that once upon a time, clowns were as American as apple pie and just as accessible.