THE FALL FAIR FIRE
The Fat Lady to the Rescue
The Fat Lady to the Rescue
Typical farm exhibit in Georgia in the 1920s.
October 7, 1925: Dublin, GA - It was a typical early fall day at the 15th annual 12th Congressional District Fair. Then in an instant, a fire in the exhibition hall erupted about 5:00 in the afternoon. Sheer panic ensued. Hundreds of women began to faint as rescuers rushed into the conflagration, which spread like wildfire through the poorly constructed tinderbox buildings.
K.G. Barkoot organized his traveling carnival in the early 1900s. The Barkoot’s carnival traveled in a large train around the United States with great success for at least 40 years. Billed as the “oldest traveling carnival in the country,” Barkoot’s shows rolled into Dublin in 24-car train with 250 workers aboard. The show featured sixteen acts with five riding devices.
The crew and performers of Barkoot’s show ran like roaches in a dark room when the lights come on. Gates in the livestock pens were thrown fully open and as the animals dashed away. Handlers chased circus animals all over the grounds and rescued as many animals on exhibit as they could.
The source of the fire was the explosion of a volatile silent movie film. Ironically the film was a film made the previous day of the fair’s grand opening. Before a general alarm was sounded, the Women’s Exhibition Hall was completely engulfed in roaring flames. In seemingly an instant, the remaining closely adjoining nine buildings, constructed of dried wood, were also in flames. Thousands of dollars in sewing and needle work items along with dozens of student exhibits were scorched into ashes.
Damage to the exhibits was not limited to those of Laurens Countians. It being a district fair, exhibitors from Emanuel, Johnson, Twiggs, and Treutlen counties lost items which they had carefully crafted in hopes of winning a prize ribbon.
The whole tumultuousness was over in twenty minutes. Some 5500 fairgoers stood in sheer bewilderment not so much as to the scope of the damage, but the incredible swiftness in the speed of the devastation of the popular fair ground gathering places.
Some of the several hundred faint victims had to be dragged away from the flaming women’s building. Remarkably, not a single injury was reported.
As night fell, the citizens of Dublin opened their homes and other sleeping quarters to the employees of the Barkoot Company, whose traveling homes along with all of their possessions were consumed by the blaze.
The next day workers came into the remove the smoldering ruins. Frantic livestock and circus animals were found wandering all over the western end of the city. Nearby automobiles were consumed by the flames.
In the dark wake of the ravaged ruins of the exhibition buildings, fair manager W.H. Proctor attempted to find some positives in light of the tremendous financial loss. Monetarily, the fair was a better than hoped for success. The first two days in the middle of the week set an all time district fair attendance record. Proctor, dismissing the terrible tragedy as regrettable, vowed to continue the annual autumn tradition in 1926 with a bigger and better fair. Despite the destruction of the exhibition buildings, the fair continued until its scheduled termination. Remarkably, the last three days of the fair saw excellent attendance.
As manager Proctor proclaimed it would, the fair returned in 1926. Billie Clark’s Broadway Shows furnished the entertainment for the six-day 1926 fair.
Although no accounts of the true heroes of that fateful Wednesday were published by Georgia newspapers, The Reinlander Daily News of Oneida, Wisconsin and the Owensboro, Kentucky Messenger hailed the little known identities of a group of rescuers.
Collectively and cruely known as “circus freaks,” it was the human “oddities” who were the real heroes of that sad, yet miraculous day.
“Midget and giant, fat lady and human skeleton, snake charmer and barrel man all pitched and fought heroically to save the fairgrounds and the visitors,” wrote one reporter. And as they say, "the show must go on."
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