(no audio) (cat meowing) (no audio) - [Narrator] It was August 1944.

The circus was coming to Akron, as it had for years.

(lively music) The Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey show was going to be in town for three days of highly anticipated performances.

Clowns, high flyers, elephants, lions, tigers, oh my.

(lively music) But this year would be different.

(lively music) (gentle music) Ringling's Akron show would be the first since the deadliest fire in circus history.

(gentle music) Just a month earlier, on July 6th in Hartford, Connecticut, more than one hundred and sixty people died in a horrible fire that engulfed the big top during an afternoon performance.

Ringling Brothers was heading to Akron with major legal problems, serious financial issues, and no big top.

(lively music) How could it ever pay off the millions of dollars in law suits that were being filed daily?

Could it be forced out of business completely?

An Akron newspaper editor had dubbed the re-started tour, "The Blue Heaven Circuit."

He had no idea how far from the truth that nickname would be.

(lively music) This is the story of Ringling Akron, and the Blue Heaven Circuit.

(lively music) (lively music) Ringling brothers, Barnum & Bailey was the circus.

Pretty much always had been.

(lively music) It was called the Big One, Big Bertha, and The Greatest Show on Earth.

(lively music) It hired only the top performers.

It avoided grifters, con men, and fixed midway games.

(lively music) Performers on other shows might make fun of Ringling's squeaky clean, Sunday-School image.

But they would have accepted a job with Big Bertha in a heartbeat.

(lively music) The combined show dated to 1919.

By 1944, Ringling had become the biggest and most popular circus in the country.

(lively music) (lively music) During the second world war, Ringling and other circuses were struggling, as was everyone.

(lively music) It was hard to get gasoline, steel, rubber, rope, just about every item the circus needed to operate.

(lively music) Ringling Brothers still traveled by train during the war.

But only with strict government regulation and supervision.

(lively music) Military trains always took precedence on the nations railways.

The Ringling show often was forced to arrive late, or even miss a few shows.

(lively music) And, it was getting more difficult to find able-bodied men to do the multiple hard chores required in running a large circus.

(lively music) The Big Show had had other problems in the Forties, as well.

In August 1942, during a stay in Cleveland, a devastating fire had destroyed the tent housing the menagerie animals.

Forty-five animals died in the fire or had to be destroyed to end their suffering.

Many others were injured.

(gentle music) (lively music) Ringling's 1944 season had opened, as it always did, in April, at New York's Madison Square Garden.

After a number of successful weeks, it moved to Boston for 12 days.

(lively music) Then, on June 6th, as Allied troops were battling on the beaches of Normandy, Ringling opened its outdoor season under the big top in Philadelphia.

(lively music) After that, it spent two weeks zigzagging around New England.

On July 5th and 6th, it was scheduled for four shows in Hartford, Connecticut.

But, military railroad traffic took precedence.

The circus got to Hartford too late for the matinee on the 5th.

(lively music) Circus people hated missing a performance.

It was considered bad luck.

(lively music) No one, at that moment, could have guessed just how bad it would be.

(lively music) (lively music) Hartford was ready for the circus and the escape from reality it promised.

The city of 170,000 people, like towns throughout the country, was weary of the war, the casualty lists, the rationing, the absence of most of its young men.

The fighting in Europe and in the South Pacific seemed unrelenting, never ending.

(lively music) Diversions were needed and welcome.

Local movie houses were showing "Arsenic and Old Lace" with Cary Grant, "Cover Girl" with Rita Hayworth, and "Gaslight" with Ingrid Bergman.

(lively music) But they could never take the place of the circus for that pure fantasy and the escape it brought.

(lively music) Colorful posters were plastered on building walls and hung in store windows.

(lively music) Newspaper stories pumped the arrival of clown Emmett Kelly and the Flying Wallendas.

(lively music) Tickets were expensive in a time of sacrifice and rationing.

But for two hours of escape from work and war, it was worth it, or so everyone thought.

(lively music) (no audio) (lively music) The Ringling big top held just under ten thousand people.

The evening performance on Wednesday, July 5th, was close to a full house.

Newspapers reported an exciting and colorful show.

The matinee on Thursday, the 6th, was attended primarily by women, children, and grandparents.

Most of Hartford's young men were either serving in the military or working in one of the war factories.

(lively music) Estimates of attendance vary at that afternoon show.

But most agree it was somewhere around 7,000 customers.

(lively music) The show was supposed to start at 2:15 pm.

But it was running a little late.

(lively music) At 2:23, everyone rose to sing the national anthem.

(lively music) The first act, in the center ring, was a short warm-up skit, a wild animal parody.

(lively music) Then came the big guns.

(crowd cheering) First up, wild animal trainers in two rings.

Lions, tigers, and bears stared and growled at each other as the trainers put them through their paces.

(lively music) (lively music) Next, the incredible Flying Wallendas.

(lively music) (crowd clapping) High overhead, spotlights shining, they were just starting their thrilling high-wire act when someone shouted, "Fire!"

(lively music) A small sliver of flame was spotted on a canvas sidewall of the big top.

(lively music) It shimmied up the sidewall quickly.

(lively music) Within a minute, it grew and leaped to the big top roof, the massive, 19-ton canvas that covered the entire three rings of the circus.

(lively music) The big top roof was waterproofed, not fire proofed.

Some eighteen hundred pounds of paraffin wax had been mixed with six thousand gallons of gasoline and brushed onto the canvas.

(lively music) In a fire, that combination was deadly.

(lively music) In less than 10 minutes after the fire reached the massive canvas roof, the big top was destroyed.

Consumed by a voracious inferno.

(fire crackling) (lively music) Thankfully, thousands were able to leave through the main entrance and some of the side exits.

(lively music) Hundreds escaped through or under sidewalls.

(lively music) But hundreds of others struggled to get to out.

Panic quickly set in.

Scores could not escape.

(people screaming) It was chaos.

It was a stampede.

It was a disaster.

(lively music) (no audio) Newspapers flashed the story around the country.

Headlines told of mounting death tolls.

(lively music) Experts still disagree on the final total, but at least 167 people died in, or as a result of the fire.

(lively music) Of that number, 67 were children.

About 70 percent of the dead and injured were women.

(lively music) Almost 500 people reported injuries.

Scores of others treated cuts, burns, or broken bones on their own.

Ringling's big top, bleachers, and most of its equipment destroyed.

(lively music) It had started out as a day for mothers and children, grandmothers and grandfathers, to enjoy a day of escape at the circus.

It had ended up as a day from hell.

The deadliest fire in circus history.

(gentle music) (no audio) The fire quickly burned itself out.

Then, events happened quickly.

(lively music) By 3 pm, the first victims were reaching area hospitals.

(lively music) By 4 pm, bodies were arriving at a temporary morgue.

(lively music) By 5 pm, an investigation into the fire already was underway.

(lively music) Circus officials and workers were questioned for 12 hours.

(lively music) By early the next morning, state and local authorities had heard enough.

Five circus employees were arrested and charged with manslaughter.

(lively music) That same morning, July 7th, only 18 hours after the fire the first of hundreds of lawsuits was filed against the circus.

(lively music) The local sheriff promptly served writs on circus staff at the show grounds and at the railroad yards where the Ringling trains sat.

No circus property could be moved.

No circus officers, crew, or performers could leave the area.

Hundreds of circus animals had to be given temporary homes in nearby fields and backyards.

(gentle music) Over the next few days, more investigations got under way.

And more suits were filed.

(gentle music) Speculation was rampant that the Ringling Brothers circus was in serious financial and legal trouble.

Many thought it might be months before it could be back on the road.

Some thought in fact, it might be finished.

- [Reporter] "The consensus among outdoor show people is that the circus will not get back on the road this season.

The litigation tying up circus property in Hartford, and the suits for damages, are viewed as making it impossible to get the show working again this year."

United Press wire service.

(lively music) - [Roland] "With the mammoth main tent and all its voluminous equipment reduced to ashes, many people, some of them circus folks, were certain that the Greatest Show on Earth was finished for the season, if not for all time."

Roland Butler, Ringling publicity man.

- [Narrator] Indeed, the circus was in a severe financial bind.

But so too, were the victims and their families.

(lively music) Ringling had postponed or canceled future performances for the year.

There was no money coming in.

The entire show was stranded in Hartford.

(lively music) Ringling's assets and insurance would not cover all the lawsuits.

If the circus was forced to file for bankruptcy, only a handful of the hundreds of victims would receive any money.

(lively music) It appeared to be a no-win situation for everyone.

Then, several Hartford attorneys stepped in.

(lively music) They had devised a complex receivership plan that would keep the circus in business and insure that all victims would receive financial awards.

The circus would agree to pay off all claims.

Eventually, they would total about four million dollars.

Some sixty-four million dollars today.

The show would be allowed to leave Connecticut and get back to performing as soon as possible.

Profits from future shows would go into a fund for the Hartford victims.

(lively music) Victims and their families would agree to drop their lawsuits.

All victims would receive settlements through a court-supervised arbitration plan.

(lively music) Early on July 15th, nine days after the devastating fire, Ringling's trains pulled out of Hartford, headed for winter quarters in Sarasota, Florida.

(metal clanking) (lively music) Crews there already had started the awesome rebuilding task.

(lively music) Equipment, props, apparatus, almost everything had to be repaired or re-created.

Some animals had been inactive so long they needed crash retraining programs.

(lively music) Top circus officials, meanwhile, were wrestling with basic issues.

How soon can we get back on the road?

How do we perform without a big top?

When and where do we start the comeback tour?

(lively music) The first decision had largely been made by the legal agreement.

The Ringling show would go back on the road as soon as possible.

It was just a matter of how quickly equipment could be replaced and how rapidly new venues could be found and rented.

It might take weeks, it might take months.

(lively music) That led to the second decision.

Without a big top, the circus was left with two choices as to where to perform.

It could seek out large indoor arenas or armories.

Those, however, might be available only in larger cities, and might already be booked.

Or, it could consider outdoor stadiums, baseball parks and fairgrounds.

Those tended to be more plentiful around the country.

Either way, it would be a dramatic change from the big top.

(lively music) Ringling chose the outdoor option.

(lively music) The next question, where to restart the 1944 tour, was more difficult.

It also was highly important for both financial and public relations reasons.

Ringling Brothers knew the world would be watching.

They needed lots of paying customers in seats.

They needed plenty of good publicity.

They needed a circus-friendly town.

(lively music) There was a performance schedule already in place from before the fire.

All those shows had been canceled because of the fire.

Springfield, Massachusetts, Syracuse and Buffalo, New York, Detroit, Chicago, Akron.

(lively music) All were logical candidates to be selected for the vital re-start of the tour.

(lively music) Where would the Ringling circus go first?

The answer came quickly, and somewhat surprisingly.

(lively music) It would start in the Rubber Capital of the World.

(lively music) Murray Powers was a newspaper man, and ardent circus fan.

(lively music) In 1944, he was Sunday editor of the Akron Beacon Journal.

But he wrote about circuses every chance he got.

He also visited circuses as often as he could.

He was a member of the Circus Fans of America.

He had even written a first-person feature story about his experience of dressing up as a Ringling clown and appearing in a skit.

(lively music) When Ringling Brothers announced it would perform only under open skies, competitors had derided it as the topless show.

(lively music) Powers gave it a much kinder nickname, the Blue Heaven circuit.

And, it stuck.

Other newspapers and the wire services picked it up.

So did Billboard magazine, the bible of show business back then.

(lively music) The idea, of course, was that without a big top the circus would be performing under the sun or stars.

So, why did the circus choose Akron's sun and stars?

There were several possible reasons.

(lively music) Akron was definitely a circus-friendly town.

It had been a regular stop on Ringling's tours as far back as 1900.

Attendance was always good.

(lively music) Akron's business leaders and prominent families had hosted circus officials and performers at posh outings whenever they were in the area.

(lively music) The influential Circus Fans of America had active chapters in northeast Ohio.

The national president was from Akron.

(lively music) But probably most important of all, Akron had a large and available municipal stadium, the Rubber Bowl.

(lively music) Two other Ohio cities considered for the re-start, Cincinnati and Columbus couldn't promise such a venue, or at least one that was available.

(lively music) It apparently was enough to persuade Ringling officials.

On July 19th, one day after the Big Show got back to Sarasota, Akron already was in Ringling's sites.

(lively music) A circus official contacted Akron's service director and asked about the municipal stadium.

Was it available?

How much would it cost for a three-day stand?

The Ringling official was assured that they could work out a satisfactory arrangement.

(lively music) Charlie Burns was the very pro-active manager of the Rubber Bowl.

Shortly after the Hartford fire, he had written to Robert Ringling, president of the circus, expressing his condolences.

And, suggesting that, if the circus ever got started again, Akron's stadium might be a good place to launch the new tour.

(lively music) A few days later, Ringling called Burns.

The circus was indeed, going back on the road in 1944.

And, it would like to start at the Rubber Bowl.

As for when, how about soon?

Circus crews in Florida had done an outstanding job of repairing, rebuilding, or replacing equipment.

Ringling and Burns agreed on August 4th, 5th, and 6th.

Remarkably, that was barely a month after the fire.

Rent would be fifteen hundred dollars a day.

(lively music) A few days later, Ringling Brothers formally announced it would start its comeback tour in Akron.

Followed by visits to Detroit, Chicago, and other cities in the Midwest and south.

But its new, tentless format would be tried out first in Akron.

(lively music) (lively music) Rubber Bowl was the semi-official title given to Akron's Municipal Stadium.

(lively music) The name paid tribute to the massive economic presence of the rubber industry in the city.

Goodyear, Goodrich, and other rubber companies called Akron home in the Forties.

They annually produced tens of thousands of tires and other consumer products, and employed thousands of local men and women.

During the war, those companies also were churning out products for use by the military.

(lively music) The Rubber Bowl had opened in 1940, built into the side of a hill overlooking a busy municipal airport.

(lively music) There was lots of air traffic, private single engine planes, commercial airliners, and cargo flights.

The airport also was the site of the massive Goodyear Air Dock where dirigibles were produced and housed.

It also had a large Goodyear plant that produced inflatable rafts and Corsair airplanes during the war.

The city of 250,000 people was bustling.

(lively music) The municipal stadium was literally right next door to Derby Downs, home of the annual All-American Soap Box Derby.

The multi-purpose Rubber Bowl seated more than 35,000 people.

In the 1940s, it hosted high school and college football games, the Harry James orchestra, mini-auto races, religious services, and horse shows.

There was an ice follies show.

Even a performance of Verdi's opera, Aida.

(singing in Italian) Now, it would host one of the most important events in the history of the Ringling Brother circus, the beginning of the newly reconfigured Blue Heaven circuit.

(singing in Italian) (no audio) On Wednesday, August 2nd, Ringling trains hauled into South Akron on the Pennsylvania tracks near the Firestone plant.

(lively music) As if a harbinger of things to come, circus officials discovered that the flat cars carrying the circus wagons were pointed in the wrong direction for unloading.

(lively music) The train had to travel another 15 miles north to the Hudson yards to get the trains turned around before heading back to Akron.

(lively music) The Rubber Bowl was located about five miles east of the rail siding at south Main street and Wilbeth Road.

The circus had to travel east by truck, along busy Waterloo Road, Route 224, to get to the Rubber Bowl-Derby Downs complex.

The stadium was not exactly centrally located.

(lively music) The open air Rubber Bowl site presented a new and strange configuration for the circus.

(lively music) On Wednesday afternoon, three rings and two stages were installed inside the stadium.

Poles for high-wire acts stretched high into the air.

(lively music) The audience would sit on only one side of the Rubber Bowl.

The circus would not be theater in the round.

(lively music) Almost all seating was uncomfortable permanent wood benches with no backs.

Limited premium seating with metal folding chairs was available down front.

(lively music) Everything not related to performing was set up outside the stadium in as organized a fashion as circumstances would allow.

(lively music) The ticket booth would be a busy place, with parents and grandparents buying tickets for youngsters.

(lively music) Off to the left were sideshows and barkers, with sword swallowers, snake charmers, and assorted human oddities.

(lively music) You could buy hotdogs, candy, or a soft drink nearby.

Other concession stands offered pennants, balloons, and assorted souvenirs of the Big Show.

Just as you went into the stadium, you could visit a small, open-air menagerie with giraffes, camels, and other interesting animals.

(lively music) (no audio) Akron had been experiencing a hot spell.

The weather for the Wednesday set up was warm and muggy, 88 degrees.

(lively music) Hundreds of perspiring Akron residents pushed against a fence to watch the operation.

(lively music) Landing and departing aircraft at the airport next door droned almost directly overhead.

(engine revving) (lively music) It took until midnight for the weary crew to get everything in place.

(lively music) The next day, Thursday the 3rd, was too warm again.

The thermometer hit 95.

(lively music) Robert Ringling put performers through two full-length rehearsals.

One during the day and one under the stars.

It was informal.

Some performers wore costumes, most opted not to.

Women were in shorts and bathing suits, men in slacks and t-shirts.

Some clowns wore makeup, others didn't.

(lively music) The second rehearsal did not end until midnight, again.

It had been another long, hot, stressful day.

(lively music) Without a big top, the noise from the airplanes was loud, distracting, and continuous.

Without a big top, the band's music tended to evaporate into the atmosphere.

(lively music) And without a big top, there certainly wasn't much close contact between performers and the audience.

(lively music) Circus folks were finding out that performing outdoors was quite different from performing under a big closely-confined canvas roof.

Still, Emmett Kelley, one of America's favorite clowns, was optimistic.

- [Emmett] We must entertain.

In wartime, it's more important than ever.

It's going to be great in the open air.

(lively music) (no audio) - [Narrator] Emmett Kelley was a fabulous clown.

But, he was a poor prognosticator.

(lively music) It was not great in the open air.

(lively music) The oppressive heat continued.

On opening day, Friday, August 4th, the thermometer hit 95 again.

(lively music) It was humid, rain was in the forecast.

The sun beat down on the stadium floor and the open air seats.

In a 35,000-seat stadium, the first matinee drew barely 2,000 souls.

Some folks said the number was even lower.

(lively music) The show, according to reports, though, was wonderful.

Clowns cavorted, horses pranced, (lively music) aerialists performed at heights not possible before.

There was no big top roof to confine them.

(lively music) Evening attendance on Friday was better.

More than 4,000 people bought tickets and enjoyed the Wallendas at night.

(lively music) But the rain that had threatened the matinee finally showed up.

Downpours stopped the performance twice.

Performers ran inside the rubber bowl.

Customers huddled under cardboard or soggy programs.

(lively music) The weather pattern for the Akron performance was set.

(lively music) Saturday matinee customers, again, were drenched by downpours.

(rain pattering) The stadium had good drainage, but the field and track still grew soggy.

Puddles of water spattered performers shoes and costumes.

(lively music) The temperature shot into the 90s once more.

(lively music) Saturday night's performance had more customers, and another threat of rain.

(lively music) Robert Ringling told reporters, only half jokingly, that he would follow baseball rules.

If the circus hadn't completed half its 22 acts before the rains came, he would issue rain checks.

By Sunday, the final day of the Akron stop, the temperature had dropped to 86 and the rain was largely gone.

Some ten thousand Akronites turned out for the last two shows.

(lively music) Still, overall turnout was disappointing, even though newspapers reported that the circus' performances in the open air were polished, colorful and exciting.

Indeed, there were some folks who thought the outdoor performances were just as good as those under the big top.

- [Tom] "The performances were amazingly effective in the new setup.

The night lighting effects were more striking, and much of the performance was even more appealing than under the conventional big top."

Tom Gregory, president of the Circus Fans of America.

(lively music) - [Narrator] Initially, total attendance for all six Akron shows was announced at a paltry 30,000.

The crowds from those six shows even placed together in the Rubber Bowl all at one time would not have filled the place.

Shortly after the circus left town, officials did revise the attendance figures, downward.

Only 21,000 people attended the six shows, officials said.

(lively music) Some thought even that figure might be inflated.

(lively music) (no audio) - [Roland] "The Big Show staged a magnificent comeback.

It gave colorful proof that it was still very much in business.

The rehabilitated circus gave spectacularly beautiful and highly sensational outdoor performances in Akron's sky-canopied Rubber Bowl."

Roland Butler, Ringling publicity man.

(lively music) Butler had at least one thing right.

The performances were entertaining and thrilling, when it wasn't raining or threatening to rain, or when the scorching sun wasn't beating down.

(lively music) Audiences were enthusiastic, but embarrassingly small.

Two or three thousand customers would be a poor turnout in a 9,000-seat big top.

In a large outdoor stadium, it was woeful.

One news report even suggested the 3-day engagement lost $25,000.

(lively music) There were just so many things working against the circus in Akron.

Things that would be repeated in many of the cities on the comeback tour.

First was the weather.

Even for August, it was hot and steamy.

(lively music) It had been a backyard pool kind of summer.

Temperatures were in the 90s almost the entire time the circus was in Akron and the upper Midwest.

For matinees, the sun beat down without mercy.

There was no shade at the Rubber Bowl.

(lively music) And when the sun wasn't wilting everyone, rain was soaking them, day or night didn't matter.

(lively music) (rain pattering) Tom Gregory, the Akron man who headed up the Circus Fans of America, pretty much summed it up.

- [Tom] Amid intense heat and humidity, the Big Show started the comeback trail, and then it rained.

(lively music) - [Narrator] Second, while the open air stadium seemed to be an ideal environment for a circus performance, it wasn't.

(engine revving) Planes taking off and landing at the airport next door were distracting, at a minimum.

(lively music) (engine revving) The roars of their engines fought voice and music.

They set animals to howling and roaring.

(lion roaring) (lively music) Third, the Rubber Bowl was not centrally located.

(lively music) It was seven miles from downtown Akron.

(lively music) Public buses ran near the stadium.

But factory workers at the Goodyear Airdock already packed them going to and from their jobs.

(lively music) Mix in the gas rationing in place during the war, and transportation to the Rubber Bowl was not one of the strong points during the appearance.

Finally, Akron and much of the Midwest were in the middle of a polio outbreak.

Health departments were advising parents to keep their children away from crowds and that included circuses.

Unhappily, the rest of the restarted, Blue Heaven tour was not much better.

After the Ringling trains pulled out of Akron, the Big Show set up for 13 days at the University of Detroit's football stadium.

Weather that was too hot and too wet repeated itself in the motor city.

The circus had one sell-out performance at the 25,000-seat stadium.

But, only thirty-five-hundred people showed up the next night.

(lively music) From Detroit, the show headed to Chicago for a long run at the huge Soldier Field.

One evening with threatening weather, only fourteen hundred customers showed up.

Raincoats and skimpy crowds again were too common.

As in Akron and Detroit, some crowds were bigger than others depending on the weather.

Still, after a month on the restarted tour, Ringling officials were having second thoughts.

Dan Judge, one of Ringling's lawyers, was blunt in his assessment.

- [Dan] We started out under adverse circumstances.

We had had terrifically high temperatures.

When we came to Chicago, we felt it was hopeless.

We were losing money, people weren't coming to the show.

We felt we should fold it up and send it back to Sarasota.

- [Narrator] But they resisted that temptation.

They were determined to stay on the road until November to make as much money as they could to pay off claims.

The circus slogged on through open-air stadiums and ball parks in Indiana, Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Texas and Louisiana.

(lively music) Some stops were better than others.

Weather improved, crowds got larger.

But overall, it was a disappointing tour.

(lively music) Finally, with three weeks still on the schedule, circus officials called it quits.

In early October, Ringling wrapped up the Blue Heaven tour in a rainy and muddy Pelican Stadium in New Orleans.

The show had been on the comeback road for nine weeks.

After expenses, the circus had actually turned a profit.

But only a hundred thousand dollars.

Which was promptly earmarked for the victims fund in Hartford.

(lively music) Murray Powers summed it up.

- [Murray] "The tentless stadium route was a brave and grand idea.

The show had to get back on the road.

It had to keep its personnel, keep its name, and try to make as much money as possible to meet the huge losses.

Unfortunately, the Blue Heaven Circuit tour was not successful."

(lively music) - [Narrator] By the middle of October 1944, the Ringling Brothers circus was back in winter quarters in Sarasota.

(lively music) After the dreary season, everyone's eyes already were squarely on spring still six months away and the 1945 tour.

(lively music) The '44 season had been exhausting and stressful.

Performers and circus brass hoped that by the time the '45 season rolled around, things would be better.

And they were.

The circus started out, as usual, indoors at Madison Square Garden with packed houses.

Then it was crunch time, time for the show to go back on the road under canvas.

The new fire-resistant canvas.

(lively music) In early June, the circus set up the big top in Washington, D.C. for the first time since the Hartford fire.

There was considerable concern about how customers would feel being inside a large, closed tent again.

Ringling took nothing for granted.

The circus invited General George C. Marshall, victorious chief of staff in the European theater, to be its guest of honor.

As World War II was winding down, Marshall was highly respected and popular.

He was a future U.S. Secretary of State and Nobel prize winner.

Marshall showed up at the big top in full dress uniform with his 3-year-old grandson.

(lively music) If General Marshall was not afraid to bring his grandson to the show, it must be safe.

At least that was the message Ringling's front office was trying to send, and it worked.

The circus had a highly successful 1945 season.

Another large payment went to Hartford victims.

It took the circus six years, but all 670 claims that eventually were filed were paid off.

Those claims totaled just under $4 million.

About $64 million today.

(lively music) 1945 was an important year across the board.

In Hartford, victims were remembered on the first anniversary of the fire.

Five Ringling officials got ready to spend time in prison.

They had been convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 1-3 years.

Most of the sentences were reduced on appeal.

(lively music) In cities across the country, stringent new laws were in place requiring circuses to use fire-retardant canvas and to provide escape routes.

Ringling even installed movable metal staircases leading down from the top of the grandstands and out the back of the tent.

(lively music) Injured victims of the fire were still recovering.

In April 1945, the last hospitalized child went home for good.

Investigations into the fire wrapped up.

They all found the circus at fault.

None blamed the city of Hartford or its officials.

None could pinpoint the cause of the fire.

(lively music) The circus did not appear in Hartford in 1945.

And it would not for the next 30 years.

(lively music) The Hartford fire was the opening act in the demise of the large, big top circus.

The dramatic development of television in the early 1950s helped assure its passing.

Ringling moved on from the fire, but attendance was down markedly over the next few years.

(lively music) Finally, on July 16th, 1956, after another sparsely attended show, this one near Pittsburgh, Ringling officials had had enough.

Tired of losing money, they shut down the big top and went back to winter quarters.

(lively music) John Ringling North proclaimed, "The tented circus is a thing of the past."

(lively music) (lively music) Ringling's closing came, interestingly, just three days after its last appearance under canvas in Akron.

Ringling had spent one day there on July 13th.

This time the circus set up not in, but near, the Rubber Bowl, in a field on the grounds of the airport.

The same airport that, 12 years earlier, had been one of the thorns in the side of the greatest show on earth.

(lively music) In 1956, though, the show was standing room only, literally.

Some 10,000 customers packed the big top.

Customers spilled out of the stands.

Some acts didn't have room to perform.

Elephants couldn't get into the tent.

(lively music) There was a certain symmetry to the Akron show being one of Ringling's final performances under canvas.

It was, after all, where the circus had re-launched its 1944 tour after the Hartford fire.

(lively music) It had been the start of the highly anticipated albeit disappointing Blue Heaven circuit.

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