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traffic detail on Barbour Street. He informed him that the matinee had been canceled because of a detour they had to make leaving Providence.
No one made arrangements with the Hartford Fire Department; neither did the department send anyone to inspect the grounds. Executive officers of the department would later say they could not recall nor produce any records to indicate ever providing protective measures at any circus showing in Hartford over the past thirty years.
Later, Herbert DuVal also met with Chief Hallissey, paying him $300 for a license (two days at $ 150 each). The form was not dated. It had spaces for whom the license was granted to and for what type of event, where and for what period, but the spaces were left blank. At the very bottom the form said: "Subject to the direction and control of the police department and to the laws and ordinances of the state and city covering such performances." The only ink on the entire thing was the signature of Chief Hallissey. DuVal gave him forty or fifty passes, which he distributed to his associates.
    Back on the lot, the ushers were fitting the stands together. Leonard Aylesworth's canvasmen fastened the sidewall around the edges of the top like a curtain. It was not treated with the paraffin mixture, and the upper part could be lowered to let in the breeze. John Brice walked around the outside, making sure the bottom was tied down tight to the stakes so no one could wriggle in for free. If some determined person did, there would be seatmen under the bleachers to catch them.
The tractor or cat drivers were spotting the menagerie wagons, getting them into position to the right of the main entrance. There wasn't room to raise the menagerie top, so they snaked the cages in along the back of the

sideshow tent and circled them with a sidewall. Deacon Blanchfield explained: "You can honeycomb the cages in but you couldn't line them up in their respective order under a top." They "did what's called corralling the menagerie."
    At the runs, the performer's section had arrived. They came up on the circus bus and made straight for the cookhouse. With no matinee to get ready for, they stayed in the backyard, writing letters or catching up on wash, hanging their wet clothes on guyropes. Chess was the rage in the dressing tent, and there was always checkers. Some of the "bally" girls from the aerial ballet were knitting. Jugglers and tumblers practiced in the grass. The Wallendas checked their rigging. May and Harry Kovar inspected their cats. The heat was awful and there was nothing to do.
People turned up expecting to be let in. Some had come in special from the outlying towns, driving in or sitting on hot buses, and now they had to tell their kids there was no show. The bosses said they were sorry. Come back tomorrow, they said.
The health inspector poked around the juice joints in the front yard,

making sure the orangeade was covered and that they were using paper cups. He'd been waiting all day to check the men's toilet, and finally it went up, a khaki tent just to the right of the main entrance, one wall butted up against the big top. There were three toilets to the right of the door, and a trough like a halved hot water heater for a urinal with solid disinfectants hung from wires. It passed.
Traffic on the lot had been heavy for hours now, the grass crushed and matted. The elephants tromped up dust, and a crew went around spreading wood shavings, followed by a water truck trailing thin, even streams from its sprinkler bar, darkening the ground. The layer of mud created was so thin it would stick to your shoe and leave a perfect footprint of dust behind.
    At 3:45 Charles Hayes the building inspector returned as promised and found work progressing on the big tent. He stayed for about an hour, walking the track around the rings, checking the bleacher sections at the ends. When he left, everything wasn't complete, but he was "satisfied that the erection of the tent, construction of