FEBRUARY/MARCH 2001
PIONEERS IN SPORTS AND THE FUN OF LEARNING
Howard Tibbals
Children who love the circus as much as Howard Tibbals of Oneida, Tenn., does will be very happy in Sarasota. And they might learn a lot.
Tibbals is giving the FSU - Ringling Center for the Cultural Arts two big gifts: a one-of-a-kind miniature circus collection, and $6.5 million for a learning center that will use the circus to teach students in grades K-12 almost any academic subject.
Suellen Field, who raises money for the center, gives examples.
"Why is the circus ring 42 feet wide?" she said the
students will be asked. The answer is that 42 feet produces the
necessary centrifugal force to keep the rider on the bare back
of a horse.
Who brought the first electric lights to town? The answer:
The Ringling circus, whose posters reassured the people who would
come to the circus that the lights would not blind them.
How many people work for a circus? The answer: 1,500, and they
live in a traveling city, with cooks, doctors, costume-makers
and all the trades needed.
"Learning can be fun, and when it's fun, you know how to do it," Field said.
Tibbals' miniature-circus collection - considered the world's pre-eminent model of the American circus - will be housed at the learning center.
FSU has raised another $1.3 million for building costs and will apply for state matching funds. - Lisa Cashulette
|
This IssueCharlie BarnesNews NotesCompressionIn MemoriamFavorite ProfHome
|
