Education: Lesson Details

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Objectives

1. To examine the life and successful career of P.T. Barnum.

2. To explore how P.T. Barnum used human difference to promote his enterprises and why audiences were fascinated by them.

3. The analyze the role of the dime museum in American urban life.

4. To explore the meanings of disability in American culture in the nineteenth century.

5. To examine the experiences of people with disabilities who were active in an emerging world of urban amusements.

Materials

    Background Essays

    1. Public Amusements In An Era Of An Emerging Middle Class
    2. What Was A Museum In Antebellum America?

    Annotated & Abridged Documents

    1. An Illustrated Catalogue And Guide Book To Barnum's American Museum
    2. Mrs. Tom Thumb's Autobiography
    3. Our Trip Around The World: Another Chapter From My Autobiography
    4. Sketch Of The Life, Personal Appearance, Character And Manners Of Charles S. Stratton, The Man In Miniature, Known As General Tom Thumb, And His Wife, Lavinia Warren Stratton; Including The History Of Their Courtship And Marriage, With Some Account Of Remarkable Dwarfs, Giants, & Other Human Phenomena, Of Ancient And Modern Times, And Songs Given At Their Public Levees
    5. Some Recollections: The Story Of My Marriage And Honeymoon
    6. The Life Of P.T. Barnum

    Artifacts

    1. Tom Thumb's Residence
    2. General Tom Thumb And P.T. Barnum
    3. Fight Between Gen. Tom Thumb And the Queen's Poodle
    4. Wedding Scene
    5. The Promenade
    6. The Reception
    7. At Home
    8. Mr. And Mrs. Gen. Tom Thumb With P.T. Barnum, Commodore Nutt, And Minnie Warren