Struggles and Triumphs

_To the Public_:--Although the large octavo edition of STRUGGLES AND TRIUMPHS, upon fine paper, has enjoyed an unprecedented large sale at $3.50…

Copies of the cheap edition can be had on application to the American News Company, New York, Warren, Johnson & Co., Buffalo, and elsewhere.

This book is my Recollections of Forty Busy Years. Few men in civil life have had a career more crowded with incident, enterprise, and various…

Various leading publishers have solicited me to place at their disposal my Recollections of what I have been, and seen, and done. These proposals,…

Fifteen years since, for the purpose, principally, of advancing my interests as proprietor of the American Museum, I gave to the press some…

And above and beyond this personal satisfaction, I have thought that the review of a life, with the wide contrasts of humble origin and high and…

All autobiographies are necessarily egotistical. If my pages are as plentifully sprinkled with “I’s” as was the chief ornament of Hood’s peacock,…

There is an almost universal, and not unworthy curiosity to learn the methods and measures, the ups and downs, the strifes and victories, the…

That my narrative is interspersed with amusing incidents, and even the recital of some very practical jokes, is simply because my natural disposition…

I was six years old when I began to go to school, and the first date I remember inscribing upon my writing-book was 1818. The ferule, in those days,…

My organ of “acquisitiveness” was manifest at an early age. Before I was five years of age, I began to accumulate pennies and “four-pences,” and when…

Nor did my dollar long remain alone. As I grew older I earned ten cents a day for riding the horse which led the ox team in ploughing, and on…

We put up at the Bull’s Head Tavern, where we were to stay a week while the drover was disposing of his cattle, and we were then to return home in…

The following morning found me again at the fascinating toy shop, where I saw a beautiful knife with two blades, a gimlet, and a corkscrew,--a…

All the forenoon I turned grass as fast as two men could cut it, and after a hasty repast at noon, one of our hired men, a good natured Irishman,…

make a merchant of me. He erected a building in Bethel, and with Mr. Hiram Weed as a partner, purchased a stock of dry goods, hardware, groceries,…

Of course I “felt my oats.” It was condescension on my part to talk with boys who did out-door work. I stood behind the counter with a pen over my…

Like most people in Connecticut in those days, I was brought up to attend church regularly on Sunday, and long before I could read I was a…

There was but one church or “meeting-house” in Bethel, which all attended, sinking all differences of creed in the Presbyterian faith. The old…

My father, for his time and locality, was a man of much enterprise. He could, and actually did, “keep a hotel”; he had a livery stable and ran, in…

On the 7th of September, 1825, my father, who had been sick since the month of March, died at the age of forty-eight years. My mother was left with…

Leaving Mr. Weed, I went to Grassy Plain, a mile northwest of Bethel, and secured a situation as clerk in the store of James S. Keeler & Lewis…

I made a very remarkable trade at one time for my employers by purchasing, in their absence, a whole wagon load of green glass bottles of various…

As my mother continued to keep the village tavern at Bethel, I usually went home on Saturday night and stayed till Monday morning, going to church…

My first impressions of this girl as I saw her at the house were exceedingly favorable. As soon as we started I began a conversation with her and…

Among our customers were three or four old Revolutionary pensioners, who traded out the amounts of their pensions before they were due, leaving their…

Mr. Oliver Taylor removed from Danbury to Brooklyn, Long Island, where he kept a grocery store and also had a large comb factory and a comb store…

Situated as I was, and well treated as I was by my employer, who manifested great interest in me, still I was dissatisfied. A salary was not…

In February, 1828, I returned to Bethel and opened a retail fruit and confectionery store in a part of my grandfather’s carriage-house, which was…

It was a “red letter” day for me. The village was crowded with people from the surrounding region and the novelty of my little shop attracted…

My grandfather, who was much interested in my success, advised me to take an agency for the sale of lottery tickets, on commission. In those days,…

I used to have some curious customers. On one occasion a young man called on me and selected a pocket-book which pleased him, asking me to give him…

My store had much to do in giving shape to my future character as well as career, in that it became a favorite resort; the theatre of village talk,…

The following scene makes a chapter in the history of Connecticut, as the State was when “blue-laws” were something more than a dead letter. To swear…

It was my turn to drop, which I did amid a shout of laughter from every corner of the court-room. Newton, who had been very downcast, looked up…

While my business in Bethel continued to increase beyond my expectations, I was also happy in believing that my suit with the fair tailoress, Charity…

Of course, he meant to deny me by making what he thought to be an impossible condition, to wit: that I should hire the team, at a good round price,…

The effect of this letter upon Lucretia, I regret to say, was not as favorable as could have been desired or expected. She declined to remove her…

During this season I made arrangements with Mr. Samuel Sherwood, of Bridgeport, to go on an exploring expedition to Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, where we…

During our stay in New York, I derived considerable information from the city managers with regard to the lottery business, and thereafter I bought…

During this time I kept a close eye upon the attractive tailoress, Charity Hallett, and in the summer of 1829 I asked her hand in marriage. My suit…

I do not approve or recommend early marriages. The minds of men and women taking so important a step in life should be somewhat matured, and hasty…

My business occupations amply employed nearly all my time, yet so strong was my love of fun that when the opportunity for a practical joke…

The court was just as “real” as the attorney,--no more,--and consisted of three judges, one a mason, the second a butcher, and the third an old…

In the winter of 1829-30, my lottery business had so extended that I had branch offices in Danbury, Norwalk, Stamford and Middletown, as well as…

So I tried my hand as an auctioneer in the book trade. I bought books at the auctions and from dealers and publishers in New York, and took them into…

In July, 1831, my uncle, Alanson Taylor, and myself opened a country store, in a building, which I had put up in Bethel in the previous spring, and…

About this time, circumstances partly religious and partly political in their character led me into still another field of enterprise which honorably…

In a period of strong political excitement, I wrote several communications for the Danbury weekly paper, setting forth what I conceived to be the…

“P. T. BARNUM and the band of music took their seats in a coach drawn by six horses, which had been prepared for the occasion. The coach was preceded…

Meanwhile, I had taken Horace Fairchild into partnership in my mercantile business, in 1831, and I had sold out to him and to a Mr. Toucey, in 1833,…

There was nothing more for me to do in Bethel; and in the winter of 1834-5, I removed my family to New York, where I hired a house in Hudson Street.…

Every morning I used to look at the “wants” in the _Sun_ for something that would suit me; and I had many a wildgoose chase in following up those…

The advertisement in the _Sun_, of Mr. William Niblo, of Niblo’s Garden, for a barkeeper first brought me in contact with that gentlemanly and justly…

Nor did all my efforts secure a situation for me during the whole winter; but, in the spring, I received several hundred dollars from my agent in…

By this time it was clear to my mind that my proper position in this busy world was not yet reached. I had displayed the faculty of getting money, as…

The show business has all phases and grades of dignity, from the exhibition of a monkey to the exposition of that highest art in music or the drama,…

Whether I may claim a pre-eminence of grandeur in my career as a dispenser of entertainment for mankind, I may not say. I have sometimes been weak…

But I shall by no means claim entire faultlessness in my history as a showman. I confess that I have not always been strong enough to rise out of the…

The least deserving of all my efforts in the show line was the one which introduced me to the business; a scheme in no sense of my own devising;…