Phineas Taylor Barnum Research Paper

Phineas Taylor Barnum was Born on July 5, 1810, in Bethel, Connecticut and was a natural salesman, peddling lottery tickets and Cherry rum to Soldiers as a young boy around the age of 12. As a young man Barnum moved to New York City and got into a variety of businesses including newspaper publishing and running a boarding house and much more.. Barnum hated working with his hands so instead he made his fortune using his mind and using the gullibility of the public in his favor by almost tricking them in some ways. In 1835 Barnum first discovered his talent for promoting after he paid $1,000 for an elderly slave named Joice Heth, who claimed to be 161 years old and a former nurse for George Washington. Barnum displayed her throughout the northeast …show more content…
The truth about the slave was not known until after her death in February 1836. During a public autopsy it was revealed she was only around 80 years old but Barnum made tons of money with her and even charged 50 cents for admission for the autopsy. In 1841 Barnum bought an old museum in Manhattan and renamed it Barnum’s American Museum where he displayed 500,000-plus exhibits. Barnum was determined both in tracking down wacky and unusual humans and animals and in promoting his huge museum and didn’t have much competition at all because of how successful he was. He made his building appealing to the eye with powerful lights and giant waving banners atop his building. To get more people to go to his museum he would advertise free rooftop concerts and then hire the worst musicians he could find driving the people away from the noise and into his welcoming museum. A year after he opened his museum Barnum met a 4-year-old child named charles stratton who was only 25 inches tall and weighed 14 pounds. Knowing the kid had potential, Barnum trained the boy to sing and dance and eventually becoming a very popular exhibit called “General Tom