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Ward
Hall said
"Sylvia Portis was the correct spelling but most people
called her Porter.
She was a fine woman. I believe she is deceased. Her
home was Pritchar AL. a suburb of Mobile. Also the
winter quarters of the big railroad show "Cavalcade Of
Amusements" I knew Sylvia, but only worked with her
for a few days at Huberts in N Y . Her first husband
George Jackson, was the porter in my railroad car when I
work on the circus, when I was a kid. He always looked
out for my well being."
It was
George who discovered Sylvia in Mobile, Alabama. The two
were later married and George became her manager.
(That's why sometimes you'll see her name as 'Sylvia
Jackson'.)
Later they divorced and George married fat lady Baby Flo
Johnson (Jackson). Ward shared a story with me about
George and Baby Flo, George was working very hard out
front of the show on the ticket box. He went inside to
talk with his wife (Baby Flo) and she told him he should
get out there and get to work. George told his wife I
have been working very hard on the front. She said NO,
that's Ward Hall out there on the front. I have been
listening to him out there for the last few weeks. Ward
said that he had made a bally tape that they had been
using on the show. Ward also relates how Charlie
Lucas, manager of Hubert's Museum, had tried for years
to get Sylvia as one of his attractions. It was during
the winter of 1960-61 when Sylvia agreed to show there,
her only concern was the cold as it was impossible for
her to wear shoes and thus was afraid of snow. Charlie
assured her there would be no snow and even if there was
it would not be a problem in Manhattan due to the
subways and underground steam pipes. Well, what do you
know, there
was a blizzard that winter that left several inches of
snow, whereupon Sylvia took the first train back to
Mobile!
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Little
is known about Sylvia's origins, other than that she
came from a very poor family who had a farm in Mobile,
Alabama. Like Fanny Mills, she was a very pretty,
otherwise normal woman with enormous feet and legs due
to lymphedema (fluid build-up). Though her feet never
grew to quite the same dimensions as Fanny's, they were
still 24 inches long apiece. She was discovered in her
hometown by a circus train porter, George Jackson. Ward
Hall, in My Very Unusual Friends, recalls living
on George's train car: "...[he] was not only an
excellent housekeeper, he was like a housemaster. He was
interested in the wellbeing of the people." He would go
on to become not only Sylvia's manager but her husband
as well, although he later left her to marry Flora Mae
"Baby Flo" Johnson, a professional fat lady.
Sylvia
was somewhat limited by the fact that she could not wear
shoes. Charlie Lucas, the manager of Hubert's Museum in
New York City, was able to book Sylvia at his museum in
1961 only by promising there would be no snow. Yet when
a blizzard came, the barefoot Elephant Girl took a train
back to Mobile and never returned to New York.
An
established performer well into the 1970s, Sylvia was
outspoken against politically correct reformers' efforts
to shut down the freak show. She was quoted as saying,
"Where are they gonna send me? Back to the farm? No
thanks, I'd rather be dead."
Elizabeth Anderson's
Phreeque Show
Courtesy of Neil Davis |
