The Wild West on Main Street

The Wild West Show in Hobart on May 20, 1911, did not go off well. First of all, it rained heavily that day, so attendance was down. The ground was so soft and muddy that the horses couldn't perform well. One newspaper complained that "the only redeeming feature was the excellent music furnished by the Hobart band in the parade and at the tent during the performance."

Some Valpo "canvass men" — laborers with the show — had been swaggering around town during the afternoon pretending to be Western outlaws, displaying guns and acting tough. The mood in town was tense by the time the show started. After the disappointing performance, the showmen were parading up Main Street when the spark finally ignited. A showman made a remark that a Hobart man resented; someone threw a punch; and the next thing anyone knew Main Street became a battlefield as the showmen and the locals brawled it out. Outnumbered and outfought, the circus men broke and ran for their tent.

Broncho John Sullivan was not pleased. In an open letter printed in the Gazette, he assured the townspeople of Hobart that he had fired seven of the laborers involved in the incident. He also felt the need to mention that "all of the women with me are with their lawfully wedded husbands."

The News said, "Had Marshal Rose been in town it is a safe bet that the [fight] would never [have] occurred." It was an unlucky coincidence that Marshal Rose was in Chicago that day, hot on the trail of a pair of sinners whose story we'll get to soon.

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Starting with the spring of 1911, the library has two Hobart newspapers on microfilm — the Hobart News as well as the Hobart Gazette. Which means I'm having to read twice the amount of microfilm, which means that my research will henceforward be moving at a snail's pace.