Belinda Murrell: Bringing Australian History To Life | Page 16

INSPIRATION CIRCUS RUNAWAY AUSTRALIANS LOVE A CIRCUS AND THE ROMANTIC NOTION OF RUNNING OFF TO JOIN ONE. IT TURNS OUT THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT ONE OF BELINDA’S RELATIVES DID. SHE ONLY UNCOVERED THE FACT WHEN SHE STARTED DOING SOME RESEARCH . . . I have always been fascinated by circuses. One of my earliest memories is visiting the Great Moscow Circus with my father and being entranced by the performing bears. (As a vet, Dad was called out to treat one of the Russian bears when the circus first came to Australia.) I remember as a teenager trying to teach myself bareback circus tricks on my pony – and getting thrown off multiple times. Over the years I managed to break several bones attempting fancy tricks on horseback. From memoirs to blogs This book was so much fun to research and write. I used multiple books, newspaper articles, memoirs, blogs, biographies and original film footage to research Australian circus life during the 1930s and the Great Depression. I would particularly like to acknowledge the work of Dr Mark St Leon, circus historian, including his biographies of famous Australian circus families such as the Wirths, St Leons, Ashtons and Bullens. Fascinating women I was particularly inspired by the stories of several fascinating young women who grew up performing in Australian circuses, including bareback riders May Belinda with he Wirth and Peggy St Leon, elephant trainer Eileen visiting circus r daughter Emily doing so me fun resear es. Wirth, and artists Dollie Lennon, La Belle Marie, ch! Belinda an d her family had a fabulous Dorothy Ashton and Lilian Bullen. time I am also very grateful to the cast and crew of Cavalia, who helped me with research for this book, particularly Eric Paquette and Mathieu Latourelle, and equestrian performers Katie Cox and Fairland Fergusson. As always, enormous thanks go to my first readers and Equilibrist’ research assistants – Emily Murrell and Rob Murrell. We had act for several years great fun exploring circus lots and meeting performers. until his family enticed him to come home The family connection One of the fascinating things we discovered during our circus research was that early last century, my husband’s great-uncle Max Murrell ran away from home when he was a teenager and joined a circus, performing under the name The Daredevil Balto, the man without nerve. He eloped with a beautiful girl called Gertrude and together they performed an ‘Aerial 16 randomhouse.com.au/teachers again. I loved examining the beautiful old photo album of Max and Gertrude’s circus travels all over the world, including South Africa, India, East Indies, Philippines, New Guinea and the USA. One of his acts involved amazing acrobatic feats balancing on a chair on a tightrope, just like my character Jem. A huge thank you to Ken Murrell and Tony Murrell for sharing family stories and photos of Max, The Daredevil Balto.