Come one, come all! For high-wire entertainment, dramatic feats, original acts, and the most magnificent exhibitions from around the world, take a seat and enjoy the Victorian era’s dazzling sideshows and spectacles. (Performances daily—rain or shine.)
Magic shows, séances, pantomimes, and circus acts were popular forms of entertainment during the Victorian era, when interest in spiritualism and curiosities from faraway lands was at a peak. The industrial revolution wrought huge changes in society, and people found themselves with more time and money for leisure activities. From
Modern Witchery to
The Fakirs of Benares, these spectacles were advertised on colorful posters, attracting crowds to stages and fairground tents throughout Britain.
Images
- Poole’s New Mammoth Diorama, 1882
- Sanger’s Lord Mayors Show, 1882
- Sanger’s Amphitheatre, 1886
- Babil and Bijou, the Giant Amazon Queen, 1882
- Modern Witchery, 1894
- Chas W. Poole’s New Myriorama and Trips Abroad, n.d.
- Myers’ Elephants Bathing, c. 1880
- Mr. Charles Du Val, 1883
- Buffalo Bill, 1887
- Professor Pepper’s Ghosts, c. 1885
- Walter Cole’s Refined Comic Concert Party, 1890
- Poole’s Grand Pictorial Tours, 1885
- Ella Zuila, 1885
- Mr. Fleming Norton at Egyptian Hall, 1873
- World’s Fair, 1874
- Evil Spirit of the Plains, c. 1880
- Beauty and the Beast, 1890
- Hands Across the Sea, 1888
- Crimes of Paris, c. 1883
- Manhood, c. 1890
- Contrabandista, c. 1868
- Herr Winkelmeier, 1887
- The Cocoon Illusion, 1887
- Mrs. Daffodil Downey’s Séance, c. 1885
- The Fakirs of Benares, 1884
- Temptations of Good St. Anthony, 1881
- Circus and Menagerie, c. 1881
- Comic Illusory Sketch, Elixir Vitæ, 1878
- Henry & Walter Wardroper, the Twin-Like Mimics, 1873
- Lenton Family, c. 1886