Business & brands / Theatre & dance
James Anthony Bailey
1847–1906 · circus owner and manager
Detroit-born orphan who ran away to the circus from a Pontiac hotel and became the Bailey of Barnum & Bailey, 'The Greatest Show on Earth'.
- Born
Detroit, Michigan- Died
Mount Vernon, New York
aged 58- Birth name
- James Anthony McGinnis
- Also known as
- James A. Bailey
- Detroit years
- 1847–1860
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
James McGinnis was born in Detroit in 1847. His father died of cholera two years later and his mother in 1855, leaving him with an older sister whose harsh treatment drove him away around 1859. He worked on a farm near Pontiac and then, at thirteen, at the Hodges House hotel in Pontiac, where Frederick Harrison Bailey, advance man for a traveling circus, hired him as an assistant. The boy took his mentor's surname and never left the business. By 22 he was managing the Cooper and Bailey circus, and in 1880 he joined forces with P. T. Barnum; he secured Jumbo the elephant and ran the combined show while Barnum played its public face. After Barnum's death in 1891 he managed the Barnum & Bailey circus alone and also Buffalo Bill's Wild West. He died in 1906 in Mount Vernon, New York.
Highlights
- Born in Detroit; orphaned by 1855
- Discovered at 13 while working at the Hodges House hotel in Pontiac
- Partner of P. T. Barnum from 1880 in Barnum & Bailey's Circus
- Brought Jumbo the elephant to the show
- Also managed Buffalo Bill's Wild West from 1894