If you go to the circus today, you’ll see elephants, clowns and cotton candy – not much of a freak show. Circus acts focusing on physical abnormalities might be a thing of the past, but that doesn’t make them any less interesting. Below we present the 10 most bizarre circus performers who used their abnormalities to their advantage.
Number Ten: Myrtle Corbin. Myrtle Corbin was born a dipygus, which means her pelvis and legs were duplicated.
Number Nine: Prince Randian. Prince Randian, also known as the snake man, was born without limbs.
Number Eight: Annie Jones. Here we have Annie Jones, otherwise known as the bearded woman. It is unknown whether she suffered from hirsutism, excessive female hairiness in unexpected places, or an unknown hormonal condition.
Number Seven: Minnie Woolsey. Minnie Woolsey was also known as Koo Koo the Bird Girl, for obvious reasons. She was born with an enlarged nose, a narrow face, and she suffered from an intellectual disability.
Number Six: Man With Two Heads. Here we have a special case of conjoined twins, in which there are two heads, but the rest of the body appears normal. Most animals born with this condition do not live very long.
Number Five: Man With Electrodactyly. Electrodactyly is also known as cleft hand syndrome. Hands and feet of people with electrodactyly can often be described as claw-like in appearance.
Number Four: Woman With Giant Feet. This photo by Charles Eisenmann features a woman who appears slender in the torso, but her feet are monstrous.
Number Three: Lucia Zarate. Lucia Zarate was also known as the puppet woman and was the first person to be identified as having Majewski osteodysplastic primordial dwarfism type II. She weighed less than five pounds.
Number Two: Isaac Sprague. Stage right, Isaac Sprague was known as the skeleton man. By the age of 44, he weighed just 43 pounds.
Number One: Alice Doherty. By far the most famous of the freaks, Alice Doherty suffered from hypertrichosis, otherwise known as Werewolf Syndrome. Her entire face was covered in hair.
