Little Girls and Big Dogs: The Wonderful World of Frank Wendt Photographer

Five Cabinet Card photographs, Frank Wendt. C. 1895 Collection Jim Linderman

The Reverend Morrill and his brother The Reverend Morrill

The family that prays together....Reverend D.T. Morrill and his brother Reverend D.D. Morrill were natives of Newark, New Jersey. The twins have "retained the art of being bachelors" and their revival meetings are conducted with a fifty dollar Calcium Stereoptican outfit which throws a 20 foot image. As you can see here the brothers also had a "$275 dollar tandem bicycle which they use for exercise" and drove over 3,000 miles.

Two Cabinet Card Photographs by Wendt, c. 1880 -1900. Collection Jim Linderman

Frank Wendt Serpent Queens Snake Women Sideshow Carnival Freak Photographs Frank Wendt

Harlot Herpetologists of the Victorian era. I can not explain the popularity of snake women other than a mixture of revulsion tinged with eroticism. It started with Eve, I suppose, but carnival performers in the earliest days were nearly always male, a fake snake charmer "from the East" who would perform with a basket, a cobra and a flute. When promoters learned it would be easier to squeeze coins out of the local townsfolk if a dame was involved...presto, the Serpent Queen! Snakes were easy to transport, a small box did it, and there was certainly no shortage of mice for food. Any female member of the crew could put on a wig and lure rubes into the tent where a usually harmless snake would curl seductively around the performer's waist. Always popular, I am sure there are still plenty of strippers out there working with a snake. (Text overlay to prevent folks from swiping the images and selling them on Ebay, a more up-to-date and just as effective technique of separating coins from rubes)

See THE WONDROUS WORLD OF FRANK WENDT for more Photographs by this artist.

Original Cabinet Card Photographs, circa 1880-1900 Collection Jim Linderman