Anecdotes from an article entitled Sideshows by William G. FitzGerald

Featured in the July 1897 to December 1897 anthology of The Strand magazine.

Nothing can be more certain than that parody and travesty will follow a big boom in the entertainment world. And provided that the parody is really funny and clever, there is money in it. When the “strong man” craze was at its height, a certain relatively humble comedian conceived a really delightful and original idea. His only child – a sweet little girl of four or five years – was one day found alone in her bedroom doubling up her chubby right arm, lifting her tattered doll high into the air with tremendous pomp and circumstance, and generally giving an irresistible “strong man” show before a full-length mirror, with preternatural, big-eyed gravity. The father thought that if his baby-girl could give a similar show in public it would prove a great attraction. It did. And yet there was, after all, absolutely nothing in the thing; the infant went through certain motions in imitation of the orthodox strong man; and the people literally howled with delight – particularly as the tiny mimic’s turn followed that of the real article…

-See The Strand, edited by George Newnes. July 1897 to December 1897; January to June 1906, and other volumes.