Strolling across a nineteenth-century fairground, we would be greeted by a variety of attractions: illusionists mesmerizing the public with their visual deceptions or animal tamers displaying their courage and control over exotic animals. Others tried to capture people’s attention by displaying wax figures with curious diseases in their travelling museums, and panorama owners transported people to faraway places. But who were these showpeople really? What happened outside of the public’s eye? Because behind these staged personae were people who tried to earn their living and for whom this…