GLASGOW’S Lord Provost, John Stewart, met some notable circus acts in late 1935 when he opened the Christmas Carnival at the city’s Kelvin Hall. The circus’s attractions included the Medrano Sisters (pictured above) and Joscka, a Hungarian thoroughbred that took part in a daring trick-riding display. The carnival also had a new speedway track, upon which small, petrol-driven sports models careered around a steeply banked course, and Goliath, the world’s largest ox, which weighed in at one-and-a-half tons.
As for the Medrano Sisters... Circopedia, “The Free Encyclopedia of the International Circus”, notes: “The Swoboda sisters were all trained as circus artists, but three of them, Reserl, Wanda and Anita, became famous in the circus world for their remarkable equestrian act, known as The Medrano Sisters. They had created it under the guidance of their mother and the German circus director Adolph Fischer, and it premiered at [the leading Austrian circus] Circus Medrano-Swoboda in 1933. When the circus rested in its Viennese winter quarters, the Medrano Sisters found engagements in Europe’s most prestigious circuses and variety theaters—but tellingly, they never appeared at the Cirque Medrano in Paris... Arguably, the stellar reputation of the Medrano Sisters did much in Western Europe for that of the Medrano-Swoboda Circus, whose travels had confined it mostly in Central and Eastern Europe.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here