East Hampton’s Guild Hall has been serving the arts community on the South Fork for 90 years, hosting events big and small. It has held art exhibitions, theatrical productions, community meetings, and children’s educational programs.
This image, lent by Guild Hall for digitization purposes, shows visitors lining up outside to experience Joe Gangler’s Pink Lemonade Circus, performing on July 8, 1954, in the John Drew Theater. A large sign is visibly displayed out front advertising the event and ticket information, along with a life-size cutout of an elephant in the background.
The East Hampton Star described the circus a week before its arrival as featuring characters and animals including a llama, bears, monkeys, trained dogs, and a clown-magician ringmaster. The Guild Hall Drama Committee sponsored the program, and Miss Rhoda Dawson designed the “colorful circus stage setting.” The name, Pink Lemonade Circus, was probably a nod to how pink lemonade was said to have originated in circus culture.
In 1920, Joseph H. Gangler (1887-1973), a former Ringling Brothers Circus stagehand and veterinarian, traveled from Wisconsin to Canarsie, Brooklyn, where he started his own circus. His reputation grew after staging vaudeville shows in theaters in Brooklyn and Manhattan, leading his circus to begin touring.
In the 1950s, Joseph Gangler appeared on television shows including the variety show “Arthur Godfrey and His Friends,” CBS’s “The Garry Moore Show,” and “The Steve Allen Show” on NBC. Gangler frequently offered pro bono events for Long Island organizations and children’s programs. His generosity prompted Brooklyn Borough President John Cashmore to appoint him the honorary deputy mayor of Canarsie in 1954.
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Mayra Scanlon is a librarian and archivist in the East Hampton Library’s Long Island Collection.
