Photograph: Portrait of Jo'Jo' the Russian Dog-faced Boy, 1880s

From Barnum Museum

Eisenmann Photography (created by)

1880 – 1888 (Date manufactured/created)

6 1/2" H X 4 1/4" W

Cabinet card portrait photograph titled Jo'Jo' the Russian Dog-faced Boy.  This souvenir photograph is undated but is certainly from the 1880s.  Jo-Jo appears to be about ten years old, and has silky looking, collar-length hair growing from his head and covering much of his forehead, cheeks and chin.  He is wearing a dark suit with matching knee-length pants; the suit is made of cut and uncut patterned velvet, a fashionable fabric in the 1880s.  The collar, jacket hem, and bottom of the pants legs are trimmed with fringe.  He is holding a long gun, the butt resting on the floor.  The fringed outfit and the gun, in conjunction with the fur pelt he is sitting on, suggest a kind of "wild west"  Buffalo Bill look which would have been popular at the time.  There is no inscription on the back, but there is the imprint of the Charles Eisenmann photography studio, located in the Bowery, New York City.
This cabinet card is part of a large group of photos exchanged by fellow performers Edwin Fritz Smith and his wife Kitty Sharpe Smith, who were circus and vaudeville performers.  

Gift of Susan Crozier Fairchild

Accession/ID Number MS-0027-505-003