Word: barnumism
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...such American sailor, Captain Samuel Barrett Edes, started a "mermaid" on a fantastic voyage that would take it from Japan to London to the hands of P.T. Barnum to, some would argue, Harvard's own Peabody Museum...
...left for London, where he planned to exhibit his acquisition for pecuniary returns. His ploy failed and he returned to Boston to die, with no possessions save his mermaid, which he believed in until the end. His son sold the creature to Moses Kimball, who exhibited it to P.T. Barnum...
MARKETING FOR THE MASSES: P.T. BARNUM...
...Barnum is known to many as the founder of the Barnum & Bailey circus, or perhaps as the man behind tiny General Tom Thumb and Jumbo the Elephant (whose charred remains and untarnished tail can still be found at Tufts). Barnum was indeed a legend in his time with his constant attractions, frauds and hoaxes. He has become a central figure in any study of American popular culture, and is as much an American cultural icon as the Statue of Liberty or Marcia Brady...
...Greatest Show in the Galaxy," as the Barnum played by Crawford describes it. But it is the most Vegas-y show in town--a huge compendium of big shows from Broadway and Vegas. There are references to Crawford's earlier triumphs in Phantom and Barnum. As in Mystere, there are circus acts, liturgical and drum music, a giant climactic apparition. The Morlock battle is reminiscent of the pirate attack staged outside Treasure Island every evening. There's even a Siegfried & Roy joke, as well as the mandatory legerdemain and leggy chorines. See EFX and you've seen...