Minnie Woolsey
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Minnie Woolsey
Minnie Woolsey (1880 – after 1960), billed as Koo-Koo the Bird Girl, was an American side show entertainer, best known for her only film appearance in Tod Browning's film ''Freaks'' in 1932. Biography Woolsey was born in 1880 in Rabun County, Georgia. Little is known about her early life, only that she was "rescued" from a mental asylum in Georgia by a travelling showman and was commonly billed as Minnie Ha Ha (a play on Minnehaha) in her sideshow entertainment career. She had a rare congenital growth skeletal disorder called Virchow-Seckel syndrome, which caused her to have a very short stature, a small head, a narrow bird-like face with a beak-like nose, large eyes, a receding jaw, large ears and mild intellectual disability. In addition, Woolsey was bald, toothless, and either completely blind or very short-sighted. She would appear in an American-Indian style bodysuit made of feathers with a single feather on top of her head as her costume and would dance and speak gibberi ...
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Rabun County, Georgia
Rabun County () is the north-easternmost county in the U.S. state of Georgia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 16,883, up from 16,276 in 2010. The county seat is Clayton. With an average annual rainfall of over , Rabun County has the title of the rainiest county in Georgia and is one of the rainiest counties east of the Cascades. The year 2018 was the wettest on record in the county's history. The National Weather Service cooperative observation station in northwest Rabun's Germany Valley measured 116.48 inches of rain during the year. During 2020, the Germany Valley NWS station reported a yearly precipitation total of 100.19 inches. History As early as 1760, explorers came to the area now known as Rabun County. In the 18th century, the population of Cherokee in the area was so heavy that this portion of the Appalachian Mountains was sometimes called the "Cherokee Mountains." The early explorers and settlers divided the Cherokee people into three divisions depending ...
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Billboard (magazine)
''Billboard'' (stylized as ''billboard'') is an American music and entertainment magazine published weekly by Penske Media Corporation. The magazine provides music charts, news, video, opinion, reviews, events, and style related to the music industry. Its music charts include the Hot 100, the 200, and the Global 200, tracking the most popular albums and songs in different genres of music. It also hosts events, owns a publishing firm, and operates several TV shows. ''Billboard'' was founded in 1894 by William Donaldson and James Hennegan as a trade publication for bill posters. Donaldson later acquired Hennegan's interest in 1900 for $500. In the early years of the 20th century, it covered the entertainment industry, such as circuses, fairs, and burlesque shows, and also created a mail service for travelling entertainers. ''Billboard'' began focusing more on the music industry as the jukebox, phonograph, and radio became commonplace. Many topics it covered were spun-off ...
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People From Rabun County, Georgia
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of property, or legal responsibility. The defining features of personhood and, consequently, what makes a person count as a person, differ widely among cultures and contexts. In addition to the question of personhood, of what makes a being count as a person to begin with, there are further questions about personal identity and self: both about what makes any particular person that particular person instead of another, and about what makes a person at one time the same person as they were or will be at another time despite any intervening changes. The plural form "people" is often used to refer to an entire nation or ethnic group (as in "a people"), and this was the original meaning of the word; it subsequently acquired its use as a plural form of per ...
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Sideshow Performers
In North America, a sideshow is an extra, secondary production associated with a circus, carnival, fair, or other such attraction. Types There are four main types of classic sideshow attractions: *The Ten-in-One offers a program of ten sequential acts under one tent for a single admission price. The ten-in-one might be partly a freak show exhibiting "human oddities" (including "born freaks" such as midgets, giants or persons with other deformities, or "made freaks" like tattooed people, fat people or "human skeletons"- extremely thin men often "married" to the fat lady, like Isaac W. Sprague). However, for variety's sake, the acts in a ten-in-one would also include "working acts" who would perform magic tricks or daredevil stunts. In addition, the freak show performers might also perform acts or stunts, and would often sell souvenirs like "giant's rings" or "pitch cards" with their photos and life stories. The ten-in-one would often end in a "blowoff" or "ding," an extra act ...
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1880 Births
Year 188 (CLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known in the Roman Empire as the Year of the Consulship of Fuscianus and Silanus (or, less frequently, year 941 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 188 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place Roman Empire * Publius Helvius Pertinax becomes pro-consul of Africa from 188 to 189. Japan * Queen Himiko (or Shingi Waō) begins her reign in Japan (until 248). Births * April 4 – Caracalla (or Antoninus), Roman emperor (d. 217) * Lu Ji (or Gongji), Chinese official and politician (d. 219) * Sun Shao, Chinese general of the Eastern Wu state (d. 241) Deaths * March 17 – Julian, pope and patriarch of Alexandria * Fa Zhen (or Gaoqing), Chinese scholar (b. AD 100) * Lucius Antistius Burrus, Roman politician (executed) * Ma Xiang, Chin ...
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The Black Rider (album)
''The Black Rider'' is the twelfth studio album by Tom Waits, released in 1993 on Island Records, featuring studio versions of songs Waits wrote for the play ''The Black Rider'', directed by Robert Wilson and co-written by William S. Burroughs. The play is based on the German folktale ''Der Freischütz'' by Johann August Apel, which had previously been made into an opera by Carl Maria von Weber. The play premiered on March 31, 1990, at the Thalia Theater in Hamburg, Germany. Its world English-language premiere occurred in 1998 at the Edmonton International Fringe Festival. Waits would later collaborate with Wilson on the plays ''Alice'' (1992) and ''Woyzeck'' (2000), the music to which were released on the albums '' Alice'' and ''Blood Money'', respectively. Track listing All songs written by Tom Waits, except where noted. Recorded in 1989 by Gerd Bessler at his Music Factory in Hamburg, Germany (2, 3, 6–9, 14–16, 19, 20), and in 1993 by Tchad Blake and assisted by Joe Ma ...
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Tom Waits
Thomas Alan Waits (born December 7, 1949) is an American musician, composer, songwriter, and actor. His lyrics often focus on the underbelly of society and are delivered in his trademark deep, gravelly voice. He worked primarily in jazz during the 1970s, but his music since the 1980s has reflected greater influence from blues, rock, vaudeville, and experimental genres. Waits was born and raised in a middle-class family in California. Inspired by the work of Bob Dylan and the Beat Generation, he began singing on the San Diego folk music circuit as a young man. He relocated to Los Angeles in 1972, where he worked as a songwriter before signing a recording contract with Asylum Records. His first albums were the jazz-oriented '' Closing Time'' (1973) and ''The Heart of Saturday Night'' (1974), which reflected his lyrical interest in nightlife, poverty, and criminality. He repeatedly toured the United States, Europe, and Japan, and attracted greater critical recognition and commerci ...
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Sarah Houbolt
Sarah Houbolt is an Australian Paralympic swimmer and a physical theatre performer. She is a strong advocate for disability rights and the arts. Personal Houbolt was born in 1983 in Townsville, Queensland. Houbolt was born with the rare Hallermann-Streiff syndrome which affects her bone structure and makes her stand at 144 centimetres (4.7 feet) tall. She also has partial sight and is legally blind. Houbolt has graduated with Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Social Work from the University of Queensland. She has worked in arts management. In 2017, she was working as an Equity and Diversity Officer (Disability) at University of Technology Sydney. Sporting career Houbolt classified as an S12 swimmer. She competed at the 1st IBSA World Championships and Games in Madrid, Spain. Her best results were fifth in the Women's 100 m Butterfly and sixth in the Women's 100 m Breaststroke. At the 1999 FESPIC Games in Bangkok, Thailand, she won three gold and one silver medal. At the ...
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Congress Of Freaks At Ringling Brothers, 1924
A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of adversaries) during battle, from the Latin '' congressus''. Political congresses International relations The following congresses were formal meetings of representatives of different nations: *The Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle (1668), which ended the War of Devolution *The Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748), which ended the War of the Austrian Succession *The Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle (1818) *The Congress of Berlin (1878), which settled the Eastern Question after the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878) *The Congress of Gniezno (1000) *The Congress of Laibach (1821) *The Congress of Panama, an 1826 meeting organized by Simón Bolívar *The Congress of Paris (1856), which ended the Crimean War *The Congress of Troppau (1820) *The Con ...
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Coney Island
Coney Island is a peninsular neighborhood and entertainment area in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Brighton Beach and Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, Manhattan Beach to its east, Lower New York Bay to the south and west, and Gravesend, Brooklyn, Gravesend to the north and includes the subsection of Sea Gate, Brooklyn, Sea Gate on its west. More broadly, Coney Island or sometimes for clarity the Coney Island peninsula consists of Coney Island proper, Brighton Beach, and Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, Manhattan Beach. This was formerly the westernmost of the Outer Barrier islands on the southern shore of Long Island, but in the early 20th century it became a peninsula, connected to the rest of Long Island by Land reclamation, land fill. The origin of Coney Island's name is disputed, but the area was originally part of the colonial town of Gravesend. By the mid-19th century it had become a seaside resort, and by the late ...
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Elizabeth Green The Stork Woman
Elizabeth Green, billed professionally as Elizabeth Green the Stork Woman, was an American sideshow performer who was presented to audiences as a human stork during the early 1900s. Her large, long nose and thin bone structure earned her the "Stork-Woman" title. A genetic condition was responsible for her unusual features, though she had no other known medical problems. Sideshow career Green was the actual "first" performer to be billed as Koo-Koo the Bird Girl and toured with Ringling Brothers Circus. Hers was mainly a comedy act, and it involved her dancing around in a feathered body suit with large bird feet and a long feather on her head. Some claim Green was used at the entrance of the circus, being one of the "less weird-looking" freaks, to catch the attention of passers by. She has also been referred to as Molina the Pinhead; however, this was probably only to differentiate between her and Minnie Woolsey who was also billed as Koo-Koo the Bird Girl. Some claim she appea ...
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Freaks (1932 Film)
''Freaks'' (also re-released as ''The Monster Story'', ''Forbidden Love'', and ''Nature's Mistakes'') is a 1932 American pre-Code horror film produced and directed by Tod Browning, starring Wallace Ford, Leila Hyams, Olga Baclanova, and Roscoe Ates. ''Freaks'', originally intended as a vehicle for Lon Chaney, is set amongst the backdrop of a travelling French circus and follows a conniving trapeze artist who joins a group of carnival sideshow performers with a plan to seduce and murder a dwarf in the troupe to gain his inheritance. However, her plot proves to have dangerous consequences. The film is based on elements from the short story " Spurs" by Tod Robbins, first published in ''Munsey's Magazine'' in February 1923, with the rights being purchased by the studio, responsible by MGM art department chief Cedric Gibbons. Filmed in Los Angeles in the fall of 1931, some employees at MGM were discomfited by the presence of the actors portraying the "freaks" on set, and, other tha ...
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