The Return of Uncle Felbish

Prince Paul started it all in clown alley during our run in Des Moines.

He came into the Ringling Blue Unit alley with the New York Times tucked under one arm and a bottle of Dr. Brown’s Celery Tonic under the other, cleared his throat until I thought his tonsils would come flying out, and proclaimed:

“It’s official, meyn brider. Word has come down that Uncle Felbish is returning!”

Swede Johnson blasphemed softly but intensely into his battered plug clown hat before asking:

“When is that devil going to get here?”

“Tomorrow, or Saturday at the latest.”

Lotsi, Lazlo Donnert’s son, began asking “Who is dis . . . “ but got no further; his father yanked him aside and slobbered all over him in Hungarian. Lotsi shivered, then nodded his head in agreement.

Dougie Ashton shot up like a bottle rocket and shouted defiantly “Buck ‘em all, is what I say! And that includes Uncle Felbish!”

And Don Washburn, whose Sparky the Clown character sported the largest pair of clown shoes in circus history, lowered his head into his hands and began to moan while he rocked back and forth.

We First of Mays were frankly puzzled. Who in the Sam Hill was this alarming Uncle Felbish? We hadn’t heard about him in Clown College, or read about him in any circus history books, or heard even a rumor about him from the roustabouts or showgirls.

“Are you talking about Irvin Feld, is that your ‘Felbish’?” asked Tim Holst.

No! Not the circus owner.  The veteran clowns were adamant. Uncle Felbish was . . . he was . . . and he came . . . and when he got here . . .

None of them could finish a coherent sentence. They turned silently to their trunks and began getting ready for the afternoon come in.

Murray Horowitz, who was called ‘Raccoon Face’ behind his back because of the black band of makeup he incorporated around his eyes, soberly told us newbies, “You only get to see Uncle Felbish once, baby, and then you’re either in . . . or you’re OUT.”

“What do you think we should we do to get ready for him, guys?” I nervously asked Holst and Chico and Roofus T. Goofus.

“Throw away that ratty old hat you been wearing, pinhead” advised Swede Johnson, ambling over to our worried kaffee klatch. “And you” pointing to Holst. “Stop trying to make clown shoes with papier mache.” Holst had indeed been experimenting with papier mache to extend the length of a pair of work boots to comical proportions. He didn’t relish spending two hundred dollars on a pair of professionally made clown shoes because he was trying to pay off his student loan in that first season. So far his experiments had resulted in nothing but a lot of spilled flour paste and soggy newspaper.

“Uncle Felbish is murder; he’s poison” Swede said ominously. “He can’t be bs’ed, no matter how smooth you are!” He looked at us under his beetling brows, resembling for all the world Snoopy doing his vulture impression in ‘Peanuts.’ “Just keep your nose clean, that’s all.”

After the matinee performance I started asking around about Uncle Felbish. Stancho and the Bulgarians didn’t know about him. Backdoor Jack said there was no such thing, and told me to get the hell away from his card table if I was going to waste his time with such crap. LeVoi Hipps, who was boss clown and also served as head electrician, was less than helpful. I found him wrapping black electrical tape around a thick orange extension cord.

“Well, Torkil-twinkle” he started slowly (he never bothered to pronounce my name correctly), “this-a hyear Uncle Felbish is quite theeee character, yessiree bob! I don’t rightly think I orter tell yew anything about him. I reckon yew just gotta find out fer yerself!” He was sounding like Mr. Haney from ‘Green Acres’ by this time, so I told him thanks for nothing. I finally summoned up the courage to ask Rhubarb Bob, the assistant Performance Director. He looked very grave. But he always looked that way, like he had just come from one funeral and was going immediately to another.

“Let me check with Mr. Baumann on that” he finally said.

Sheesh maneesh, I thought to myself, this Felbish guy must be worse than Dracula!

I reported my findings to Holst and Chico and Roofus, and since I really hadn’t found anything out, I started to make things up.

“He’s from the federal government” I extemporized. “Department of Circus Safety and Welfare.”

“What's he want?” asked Chico.

“He can shut down the show and put us all out of work if he don’t like the way clown alley is running” I said importantly, by now totally sucked into my own fantasy. “Not even Mr. Feld can overrule him!”

“Holy *%@&!” blurted out Rufus T. Goofus. “I’m gonna make a new cotton candy outfit!” Roofus had a wonderful walkaround sight gag wherein he dressed as one of the cotton candy vendors and swathed himself in pink cotton, giving the appearance of having fallen into the cotton spinning machine and then barely escaping with his life. But the pink stained cotton had gotten pretty dirty from rough handling, so that now it was hard to tell if he had fallen into a cotton candy machine or a manure pile.

I started to believe my own hooey, running in place as if my bladder were full and saying to myself in a frightened girly voice “I knew I shoulda got that wig from Zauder’s! Ew, I’m in so much trouble!”  

Clown alley became a hive of frantic activity the rest of that day and into the next. Holst borrowed a pair of surplus clown shoes from boss clown Hipps and took them to a shoe repair shop to have them quickly refurbished so the horsehair stuffing didn’t show; Chico removed the Playboy centerfold he had pasted onto the outside of his clown trunk.

Even Swede Johnson, whose costume purposely matched his collapsing face by appearing ready to fall apart at the seams, fixed up his clown shoes. He wore white nursing shoes, so he got out a bottle of white shoe polish and applied the little fluffy ball at the end of the stick vigorously to them until they were as bright and clean as the driven snow.

The word had spread throughout the show that Uncle Felbish was on his way. We got sympathy calls from some of the showgirls, who brought us cupcakes to buck us up. Joe Hodgini, a holdover from the old John Ringling North days, who oversaw the roustabouts while sitting in his golf cart, offered to detail a half dozen of them to clown alley when the fiend showed up, armed with tent stakes, to watch our backs. LeVoi Hipps decided that would only inflame the situation, and reluctantly refused his offer.

Normally the hard physical demands of clowning on the Ringling show put me to sleep like a log each night; but the night of that awful announcement I couldn’t grab a wink. What if I lost my job and had to go back home in disgrace? I hadn’t saved up nearly enough money to do any of the things I’d dreamed about. My career would be over before it started. I tossed and turned until my sheets were pretzels.

The next day clown alley went on Red Alert.

Prince Paul stationed himself at the entrance to give warning of Uncle Felbish’s approach. Swede, the most impious old sinner since Emperor Nero, suggested that some of us might like to pray for deliverance if we felt so inclined. Even Dougie, who normally put up a bold front when faced with a threat, kept a low profile by refraining from playing Tiger Rag on his trumpet while we got made up -- a recital he never missed once he found out how much we detested his playing.

Only Otto, grand old Otto, remained unaffected by the panic. Voiceless due to throat cancer, he calmly surveyed our scurrying hither and thither with amused contempt. But we First of Mays were in a growing cold sweat, and paid no attention to him.

The matinee came and went without any Uncle Felbish. Clown alley remained a brooding encampment of fear. Sparky appeared to be the first one to crack.

“I can’t take it anymore!” he shouted out, beginning to giggle wildly. Then he became unintelligible. “Tell them already, tell them!”

“Here he comes!” screamed Prince Paul. I held my breath as into clown alley walked . . .

Schwartzy! That miserable crossed-eyed drunk who brought us clean sheets each week on the train. Schwartzy? He was Uncle Felbish? He blinked unevenly at us, like a hungover owl, and then asked if anyone had seen his other pair of pants.

The light slowly dawned as I looked around at the veteran clowns, who had all collapsed in hysterics. We First of Mays had been conned, duped, hoodwinked by a practical joke of massive, even classical, proportions.

“There’s no Uncle Felbish, you old goat!” I said to Swede, who was shaking with laughter. “And the whole show was in on it, weren’t they?”

“Pretty much” replied Swede. “I never saw such a bunch of appleknockers as you greaseballs in my life! Hook, line, and sinker!”

Some of the First of Mays finally joined in on the merriment, and got Prince to explain that for years past it had been a cherished scheme on the show to create a boogeyman named Uncle Felbish to keep the new clowns on their toes when the summer doldrums began to take over in the Midwest. It always got them worried sick.

I kept myself aloof from the childish glee, considering the whole thing a meaningless piece of flummery.

But next season, with a new crop of First of Mays just begging for it, I told Prince Paul I thought it was time for a visit from Uncle Felbish when we played Milwaukee . . .