Our carnival theme was supported with items from Oriental Trading Company, an excellent source for themed tableware as well as Halloween decorations. We used red and white table skirts reminiscent of tent sidewalls.
One of our most popular exhibits is the Bonerama, featuring over a dozen 16 inch tall skeletons in sexual positions.
There are other carnival sideshow exhibits.
The two headed doll above is said to have belonged to the Hilton Sisters, conjoined twins who became international stars. Violet and Daisy toured the world in their youth in sideshows and vaudeville in the 1920s and 30s, and even formed an act with Bob Hope called The Dancemedians with the Hilton Sisters. They also appeared in the classic 1932 horror film Freaks. Unfortunately, they were brutalized throughout their childhoods by their mother and a guardian who sought only to profit from them. Late at night, some have claimed to hear two simultaneous and identical moans coming from the doll. All of that is true, except, of course, the part about the doll. She was made by buying two identical dolls, cutting off the head of one, and putting it on the shoulder of the other.
Freak babies, usually in jars of formaldehyde, were a staple of sideshows. Devil babies were often displayed in small coffins to make them look mummified. They were fakes. Two headed babies were also popular, and also usually fakes. They were called “bouncers” by the carnies because they were made of latex. Outraged townspeople would often alert authorities, and these babies, also called “pickled punks” by the carnies, would be seized and given Christian burials. There are rubber and latex babies buried all over the country.