French, Hobby & Co in United States

French, Hobby & Co
Local name	Grand Caravan of Living Animals
Type	circus

Owner	1834-1835: J. E. M. Hobby
Founded	1830
Closed down	1834
Country	United States

Directors	1830-1835: Reuben French (director)

Key People

Veterinarians

Elephant department

Head keepers of elephants

Elephant keepers
Record history
History of updates	2022-04-10

Latest document update	2022-04-10 12:26:41
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Description

French, Hobby & Co, United States , was founded in 1830. French, Hobby & Co closed down in 1834.

Comments / pictures

Records about French, Hobby & Co from A History of the Traveling Menagerie at https://classic.circushistory.org/Thayer/Thayer2b.htm
Claiming to have twenty animals, this menagerie, the proprietors of which are unknown to us, was in Michigan and Ontario in 1830. They had an Asiatic lion, a jaguar, two dromedaries and a Dandy Jack, among others. In Detroit, the license was taken out by Reuben French, who was the manager of several menageries in the years to come.

In late 1831, they listed a “Siam ape,” two kangaroos, a hyena and two elephants in their ads, in addition to those we mentioned above.

The elephants would appear to be Columbus and Timour, one full-grown, the other two years old and three-feet high. With these, this 1831 caravan became the first to exhibit two elephants at the same time.

The presence of Timour may indicate that Zebedee Macomber was involved with this company. It was he who first exhibited the calf we believe was later given the name. However, the animal was said to be two years old when it was imported in December, 1828, and this menagerie advertised him as two years old in 1831. The reader might assume a deception in the notices, but we have not found such to be true as early as this.

Columbus went elsewhere for 1832 and Timour, “the youngest elephant ever imported,” was the only pachyderm on the show.

With him were: African lion, ichneumon, hyena, two kangaroos, dromedary, spotted tiger, macaw, armadillo and an “ogotaro from Java,” which might have been the previous season’s Siam ape.

The company advertised as Circus and Menagerie in 1833, though no circus names or descriptions were included. It may be that Dandy Jack’s antics were offered as a “circus.” The animals were unchanged. With the addition of a European badger (tavra barbara?) and the deletion of the ogotaro they were same in 1834 as well.

Solely because of their geographical movements, we suspect that this was the same menagerie that we call French, Hobby & Co. in 1834 (41). If that is true, it joined The Zoological Institute in 1835.

Stuart Thayer, A History of the Traveling Menagerie

References for records about French, Hobby & Co

Recommended Citation

Koehl, Dan (2024). French, Hobby & Co, Elephant Encyclopedia. Available online at https://www.elephant.se/location2.php?location_id=3611. (archived at the Wayback machine)

Sources used for this article is among others:

Stuart Thayers American Circus Anthology, A History of the Traveling Menagerie, online at https://classic.circushistory.org/Thayer/Thayer2b.htm

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About this documentThis document was updated: 2022-04-10 12:26:41 with valid HTML5