The Giant that Rose Again

Failure haunts me like a generational curse. And it seems that every time I glimpse a retirement from the traveling show, my fortunes go up in flames. Every time I imagine putting away my soap box and signing over my many promotions and wonders into capable hands, the world forces me back into servitude.

In the days of my first traveling menagerie, my giants were all phonies, but my little people were legitimate. By the time I returned from Europe to present General Tom Thumb at the American Museum on Broadway and Ann Street, more than ten years ago now, the name Barnum had already become as well-known as that of Lincoln. But, as I have always said, fame is of little consolation where fortune doesn’t follow from it.

If my detractors claim I mistreated the little fellow with my merciless touring schedule, I must remind them that Tom has profited more from my efforts than myself. While he is happily married in his Connecticut home off the coast among the quiet majesty of the Thimble Islands, I am the one forced back on the road as I near my sixtieth year.

As my carriage bumps through the idyllic and monotonous Mohawk valleys, I wonder whether the world will ever allow me to retire to a natural life, or if I will always be compelled to travel between cities and audiences, haunted by my many reversals of fortune.

All I had wanted was to retire to my native Connecticut. But just as I had announced my intentions to the world, my museum burnt to the ground. I managed to rebuild it, only to see it consumed in flames within a year’s time.

I have always had the benefit of resourceful friends willing to bet on my ingenuity – but, this time, none of them will lend a penny until they see I have started paying my past debts. Yet again, in this strange life of mine, to escape financial ruin, I must bring to the world such a colossal monstrosity that its notoriety will spread across the land.

Accordingly, and perhaps appropriately, this most recent episode in my affairs began several days ago when opening the East Bridgeport paper – as I was compelled by a Subpoena to that town to meet my creditors in bankruptcy – and read an article reporting that an artifact was unearthed on Newell’s farm in the Hamlett of Cardiff purporting to be the petrified remains of a Giant some ten feet and four inches in height.

I leave the creditors' meeting with my apologies, as there is no use in talking about getting them their money.

I will go off and start it at once.

* * *

It is a cold October morning in 1869 and I am traveling through upstate New York in great haste. I know something my creditors seem to be ignorant about: to appease them I will have to first appease the masses, and the curiosity of the masses tires quickly.

As my imagination begins to automatically plot my next hoax, the landscape begins to announce the desired theme. This land belongs to the geography of an unremembered time. Its lakes gleam in the distance like enormous jewels dropped from the sky—tears of the gods.

In the quiet, one feels the sense of the ancient. The words of Genesis ring with eerie promise, “There were giants in the earth in those days.” I almost want to believe they are here now, underneath the sand and loam of this untouched soil, sleeping, and waiting to be awakened.

The roads from Syracuse to Cooperstown are crowded with buggies and carriages and even lumber wagons filled with villagers bound for Newell farm. These little frozen hamlets at the foot of the Adirondacks are as timeless as their surroundings.

It is strange to see these simple civic-minded people, farmers, salt miners, and merchants, deserting their work and their affairs to travel in processions like subjects in a medieval kingdom driven by duty to attend the funeral of a great king.

* * *

The Squaw's child awakens in terror and takes his wooden tomahawk off the cab bench, jumping with unusual dexterity for a six-year-old from one side of the compartment to the other.

It is as if he has awakened to an intruder, and as he pounces onto the seat next to me, he levels me right in the temple with the blunt tip of the weapon, saying in nearly perfect English, “Take that, Paleface.”

I grab the child’s hand and wrestle free the weapon. “That’s enough, Johnny John. You remember. I am the showman from the Carriage House. You said you wanted to come to New York with me to be a drummer boy in my show. Do you remember?”

It is commonly said a child’s character is evident at the age of five. In choosing my troop these many years, I have bet frequently on this logic. Johnny John immediately demonstrates his personality and confirms my wisdom in taking him on.

He takes my Hamburg Hat from the seat next to me, springs down to the center of the carriage into a cross-legged squat and places the Hamburg in front of him like a drum.

Then he begins a hollow drum beat on the middle of the M-shaped lid of the hat, in the style I had taught him at the Carriage House when his mother approached me – da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da.

Where a boy his age should be threatened, he is battle-ready. Where a boy his age should be anxious about strangers, he endears them with his performance. Where a boy his age should feel displaced, he is excited to see the world.

“You will be quite a sensation, little Chief. What will your stage name be? Have you thought about that?” I ask.

“A big name,” he says.

“It will be,” I assure him.

* * *

When we pull into the Newell farm, I feel like a general entering an opposing camp. The place has the feeling of a circus, of someone else’s circus.

In the distance, on an empty parcel is a tent, about eight yards by eight yards in length. Around it, spectators await entrance in a formidable line, bunched up by the opening in the canopy. The first person to greet me is an old friend from my legislative days in Hartford and a man I had relied upon frequently to vouch for the authenticity of artifacts I had collected in Europe.

Dr. James Hall, the New York State Geologist, is a man who seems cut from stone himself, wearing a pot belly that protrudes like an egg from the square shoulders and block frame of his body.

“Phineas! Did they get going over in Bridgeport then, despite the hang-ups?”

“You must not be reading the papers. The press has made my misfortunes front-page news – and the worst of it is they’ve said my losses are the just reward for my “ill-gotten” fortunes as if seeing my life’s work burnt to the ground wasn’t enough, they’ve taken it as a moral triumph that my “humbugging” of the public is surely at an end.”

“If I know you, Phineas. That’s doubtful. Doubtful indeed,” Dr. Hall says.

“They are taking joy in announcing my defeat. But I’ll show them that their forecasts are premature and have them begging for an inside scoop by Independence Day. They’ve resorted to caricatures Jim, pasting my head on the body of an insect,” I say.

“The hell you say! Well, I am sure they’ve gotten what they can for it,” Dr. Hall says.

“I’ve done this to myself. I gave that robber a blank note and he routed me for a half-million dollars, and then when the contracts finally fell through on the East Bridgeport factory, the company discounted my loans. Five years from now I’ll see fifteen percent, if a dollar. Meanwhile, I’d assured my creditors of the American Museum they’d be repaid out of my profits on the clock business. Here I am between two packs of wolves, and I haven’t any meat for them,” I say.

“So, I suppose you are here to see the Giant that everyone is talking about,” Dr. Hall says.

“Tell me, Jim, is it the genuine thing,” I ask.

“I can tell you this, it is a petrified man alright. It’s not from biblical times, as billed. More than likely, Iroquois,” Dr. Hall says.

Johnny John comes running from the coach and crinkles his brow and holds up the tomahawk, and says, “Back off, Paleface.”

Doc Hall steps back and says, “Well, Phineas, if it is alright with the young Chief, I think we should take you to see the grave. Nothing I can say will move you so much as seeing it for yourself.”

* * *

The Cardiff Giant lies in its earthen grave in a contorted pose of angst, his arms curled spasmodically about his torso in the “pugilist's pose,” his legs slightly bent into a fetal posture.

One side of the body is chafed as if some subterranean current had eroded the silt molded over centuries.

Johnny John looks at the body, steps around the roped-off edges of the grave site, observes it from different angles, and comes back by my side. “Paleface,” he says, pointing into the pit, “Here is a totem.” I am pleased to see the Doctor turn his head to the boy in shock.

“No, little Chief, it’s a man,” I say.

“No man, Paleface, totem,” he says.

While the learned doctor at the highest post of the geological profession attempts to convince my young protégé of the authenticity of the hoax, I am called away by an aggravating man in an extravagant suit.

Mr. Boynton agreed to accompany us to the Cooperstown Tavern, where we head off to presently.

* * *

I am shocked and delighted to see the sign outside of the Cooperstown Tavern, which reads, “Goliath House, Warm Meals, Oysters and Oats, and Enough Ale to Calm a Giant.” I am more than delighted to find a myriad of carriages, more horses, and throngs of people nearly bursting from the doors. Not people like Boynton, but people who work the land and the mines. People with the sense to enjoy being mesmerized while they vacation a while from their troubles.

The problem with the locals in the tavern is twofold: first, they are drinkers one and all; second, they are God-fearing folk to such a degree that they could neither enjoy the ironies of blasphemy nor puzzle at the Darwinian theories of late which have so consumed the Boyntons and Halls of the world. I hear a man at the bar shout out to his companions, “This is surely one of the biblical giants, which confirms the text is literal – it is a warning not to trust these Brits with their ape-man heresy.”

But there are others sitting around the table talking about more interesting things. “Ten feet tall, you say. Why, there must have been giant cows in those days too.” Another joins in, “And chickens the size of rhinos.” Yet another farmer asks,” How did they all vanish without a trace all these years?”

“What are you drinking, Barnum?” Dr. Boynton asks.

“No thanks doctor, I don’t touch the stuff,” I say.

“You, Barnum?”

“That’s right, I’ve taken the pledge.”

“What a disappointment,” he said and ordered some homegrown whiskey. “You see a man over there in the corner who everyone is crowding about, that’s the famous John A. Clarke, esquire. He’s camped out here two days ranting about the Giant.”

I am thumbing through the pages of a discarded Syracuse Courier and stumble upon an editorial by J.P. Foster, a State Agent and teacher of the Onondaga tribe. His letter tells of a local legend that an ancient Indian Chieftain, Ana, of incredible stature, foretold of the coming of the palefaces before the European settlers had reached Upstate New York.

I could only imagine it was under the tutelage of a curiosity bringer like myself, that the young Chief had wandered far enough to know the palefaces firsthand, just as my young Chief would learn many things about the world to bring back to his tribe.

As I read on, I learn that the Onondaga prophet had forewarned his tribe of the white man’s appetite for land and of a corrupting poisonous drink he would provide that would destroy them. At a hundred and eight years of age, near his end, the Prophet had allegedly told the Onondaga that he would travel to a special gravesite. Before leaving, he had prophesied his descendants would see him again. The tale, surely a loose fabrication, catches my attention and my imagination is ignited.

“Tell me something. How many visited the site today?” I ask.

“It was over three thousand,” Dr. Boynton says.

“That’s fifteen hundred dollars for a single day. Marvelous!” I say.

“What are you about, Phineas?” Dr. Boynton asks.

“Did you hear if Newell has accepted my offer of sixty thousand for the specimen,” I ask.

“The rumor is that he shrugged it off,” Dr. Boynton says.

Boynton then started in again on how I should pay for his endorsement of the authenticity of the specimen, but my mind is elsewhere.

I pay it with a check that will surely bounce and depart.

* * *

Out in the night, a cold wind shakes down out of the Finger Lakes and chills the valley. Along the roads, the carriages are scurrying the spectators back to their hamlets. Somewhere in the distance, I hear the sound of tribal drums beating from a campsite not far from Newell’s Farm. This had once been the hunting ground of the Iroquois Nation and the Onondaga Indians.

The bump of the carriage along the frozen ground jolts me back in time. I wonder how the sculptors back in New York City are coming along with my replica of the Cardiff Giant which I sent them by wire to begin at once. Will it be ready in time for the grand opening at the rental hall where I will relaunch my museum next week?

I remember the day of July 13, 1865, when my fortunes went up in smoke. I stood before the hundreds of freaks, animal handlers, acrobats, singers, dancers, and security men who were in my employ and told them I would rebuild and that they would prosper and always have a home on Broadway and Ann Street in Lower Manhattan.

But these thoughts turn to the present and to the Indian Camp not far from Newell’s Farm.

When Boynton returns me to my carriage, Johnny John is waiting for me, standing guard outside the wagon where his mother sleeps inside.

“Are you ready for your first adventure, my young Chief?” I ask.

“Ready Paleface,” he tells me and nods.

The carriage carries us swiftly to the campsite. The drums are beating and the tarp of the tent glows yellow from the embers of a warming fire inside. Johnny John and I walk to the tent and an old Onondaga Chief comes out to greet us. I tell him I have come to talk about Newell’s Giant.

Inside we sit around the fire and watch the old men with grooved faces pass a pipe back and forth among them. I relax, light a pipe, and listen to the sound of the valley with the Indian men.

The Chief asks me, “What do you call your young friend?”

“His name is Johnny John, but it won’t do,” I say.

“Hmm,” he says and takes a deep drought of the pipe, spiraling eddies of smoke into the conical roof where the smoke collects and slowly drifts out into the darkening night. “You are the circus man, the man of many wonders – we have heard of you.”

“I hope that I do not disappoint,” I say.

“What do you think of the Giant, young Chief,” he asks, for he can see as plainly as I that the boy is extraordinary.

“It is a big tree. Totem,” he says. And that is how he comes to be called for the rest of his days, Chief John Big Tree. He will also become a real chief of the Iroquois Nation, but that is still many years to come.

“Do you plan to tell the legend of this Giant, circus man?” the Chief asks me.

“Old friend, the Great Spirit has stripped me of my fortunes more than three times already. But I will tell it. And it will be the start of a new museum. One where all may come. One that travels abroad to the hamlets and even to every Indian preserve,” I say, and add, “For I have learned that you bring the show to the people.”

“How will you tell it?” the Chief asks me.

“I will say it was a great Onondaga Chieftain, after the legend of your tribe. That he was a warrior. That he prophesied the coming of my kind. Of the palefaces. And he foretold that he would become known to his descendants. And that he would rise again. And if you listen closely, you can hear a rattling in his grave dressings. And any day he will rise up. For he is The Giant that Rises Again,” I say.

“Good story. But the farmer will not give the Giant over to you,” the Chief says.

“I have made my own from plaster,” I say.

“They will say it is a fake,” the Chief says, blowing some smoke in my direction. “But if you fool them, maybe it is you that is The Giant that Rises Again,” and the Chief laughs the deep laugh of one well with years.

“Let them say it,” I say, putting my arm around Chief John Big Tree, and I smile at the younger and elder chiefs. “We know the truth.”