“There is a sucker born every minute.” Although there is no evidence that the great showman and circus legend actually said this famous quote, P.T. Barnum has always been closely associated with it. There are many stories behind the quote, including many sources that suggest it arose from the great Cardiff Giant hoax, in which a Syracuse banker named David Hannum exhibited a fake petrified man in 1869. But my favorite story is that of the cherry-colored cat.
Barnum was always on the lookout for strange and sensational attractions for his American Museum on the corner of Broadway and Ann Street. As one version of the cat story goes (there are several versions of the tale), the owner of the cherry-colored cat used the phrase to describe P.T. Barnum.
According to this tale, one day Barnum received a letter from a Connecticut farmer who claimed to possess a genuine cherry-colored cat. The farmer asked Barnum if he would be interested in purchasing the cat, explaining that his cat would beat any of the other odd critters Barnum had on display at his museum.
Barnum contacted the farmer and said he’d gladly purchase the cat for his museum if the cat were truly cherry-colored. The farm agreed to ship the cat to Barnum for $300 (other articles say Barnum paid $25, $50, or $200.)
A few days later a crate arrived at the museum. When Barnum opened it, he found a an ordinary-looking jet-black cat inside. In response to Barnum’s angry letter, the farmer responded with a note: Dear Mr. Barnum, did you never see a black cherry? We have loads of them born in Connecticut. There’s a sucker born every minute.”
Another version told by a Yale professor by the name of William Lyon Phelps suggests that Barnum may have borrowed local cats whenever he took his circus on the road.
According to Phelps, who shared his story with a reporter for the Tampa Times in 1939, he once knew a black cat that belonged to a Mrs. Sanford at York and Chapel Streets in New Haven, Connecticut. The day before Barnum’s circus reached town, the cat disappeared. Three days after the circus left, the cat was returned to his house with a card that read, “With Mr. Barnum’s compliments.”
And one more version of this tale, by Henry Collins Brown, suggests that as soon as Barnum saw that he had been fooled, he uttered the phrase, “There is a sucker born every minute.”
Whichever story is correct, there is a chance that the cat had something to do with the famous sucker quote.
In his book “From Alley Pond to Rockefeller Center,” Brown notes that Barnum rightly concluded that he wasn’t the only sucker in New York; there must be many of them. So, he promptly covered every vacant fence, wall, and window he could find with large posters proclaiming the amazing discovery he had made: a genuine, cherry-colored cat from Connecticut.
Customers got a kick out of the hoax; they knew Barnum had pulled a prank on them, but they kept it a secret and encouraged friends and family to go see the cherry-colored cat. Now, the problem was getting all these crowds of people out of the museum to make room for new paying customers.
According to Brown, Barnum instructed one of his carpenters to turn an unused door exiting onto Ann Street into an exit door for customers. He then put up a sign with a hand leading to the door that said, “This Way to the Egress.”
No one had ever heard of an egress before, so they thought it was just another strange exhibit. As they opened the door and stepped onto Ann Street, they realized they had been suckered once again.
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