The Father of Modern Knife Throwing: Amazing Photos of Signor Arcaris in the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries

Signor Arcaris, whose real name was Gustavo Arcaris, is widely celebrated as the “Father of Modern Knife Throwing.” Operating during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, he became one of history’s greatest impalement artists, transforming knife throwing from a martial skill into a premier circus spectacle.

Hailing from Naples, Italy, Arcaris was an exceptionally skilled marksman with blades and battle-axes. In the late 1880s, his extraordinary precision caught the eye of legendary American showman P.T. Barnum, who discovered him in Italy and brought him to the United States. Arcaris was integrated into the Barnum & Bailey Circus, instantly captivating American audiences who had never seen an impalement act performed with such theatrical danger and surgical accuracy. He later headlined for other massive entertainment operations, including the Ringling Bros. Circus around the turn of the century.

Arcaris’s acts were heavily marketed on their sheer peril. Billed as “The Great Arcaris,” his performance consisted of throwing large, heavy knives and combat axes at a human target girl who stood perfectly still against a wooden backboard. The success of the act relied entirely on absolute trust and synchronization. For much of his prime career, his primary assistant was his sister, Kate Arcaris (frequently billed on show posters as Miss Rose Arcaris). As he grew older, his sister retired from the board, and he was joined by his nieces from Italy, Rosina (often called Rosie) and Kate, who took over the perilous role of standing amidst his flying blades.

Before Arcaris, throwing blades was largely viewed as a practical martial art or an obscure skill. Through decades of touring the variety theater and circus sideshow circuits of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, he standardized the aesthetics, pacing, and mechanics of the theatrical “impalement act.” He permanently retired from show business in the late 1920s, leaving behind a legacy that inspired generations of circus performers.

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Michelle Yeoh Photographed by Joe Mcnally Flying Over the Iconic Hollywood Sign, 1998

In 1998, Michelle Yeoh performed a daring stunt for a National Geographic photo shoot captured by photographer Joe McNally. The photograph was part of a feature story titled “The Globalization of Culture,” which examined the rapid international exchange of cultural icons via film, television, and the burgeoning internet.

“The idea sprang up as I was shooting a story for the National Geographic, conceived, edited and supervised by my dear friend Bill Douthitt...,” Mcnally said. “The story was termed ‘The Globalization of Culture,’ and it examined the rapid rate of the exchange of cultural items and icons, worldwide, via the hyper fast engines of TV, movies, fashion, cuisine and (at that point) the coming ubiquity of the internet. I needed an Asian star, capable of daring stunts, to do something with me to emphasize the growing global influence of movie personalities from Asia in big budget, mainstream Hollywood films.

“Michelle agreed, and I gave her the Hollywood treatment, flying her via helicopter to a dry lake bed considerably outside LA. I made lovely, fashion-driven photos. She’s magnetically beautiful in front of the lens, and I shot pictures like crazy, growing all the more pleased with myself during the course of the day.”

Yeoh did not climb out of the helicopter mid-flight; instead, she was rigged with cables and a harness while still in a hangar. She was then suspended beneath the helicopter and flown for approximately 20 to 25 minutes to reach the Hollywood sign. Despite wearing a “slinky” dress for the shot, Yeoh recalled in a 2022 interview with Jimmy Kimmel that the most challenging aspect was the intense cold at that altitude.

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California Magician Died Attempting a “Buried Alive” Stunt on Halloween Night in 1990

Joseph “The Amazing Joe” Burrus was a magician from Fresno, California, who dreamed of becoming as famous as Harry Houdini, his idol. Burrus specialized in escape acts, and he was determined to one day surpass Houdini’s legendary feats. In 1983, Burrus performed smaller escape shows around central California, but by 1990, he planned his most ambitious stunt yet — one he hoped would make him world-famous.

“I consider myself a master of illusion and escape artist. I believe I’m the next Houdini and greater,” Burrus told The Fresno Bee in 1990 before the stunt. “To me, that’s what an escape artist is: to put myself in an impossible situation and get out of it.”

According to his mother, Bette Burrus, her son had been diagnosed with dyslexia and struggled with drug and alcohol abuse. He supported himself as a tree trimmer for years before deciding that he had grown too old for that work. Magic was his new life. When Burrus became interested in the art of illusion, he stopped drinking, his family said.

On Halloween night, 1990, at the Blackbeard’s Family Fun Center in Fresno, Burrus staged a performance he called his “ultimate escape.” The plan was to be buried alive in a transparent coffin, chained and handcuffed, and then covered first with dirt, and then with cement — all while he attempted to escape.

He told the crowd, estimated at around 150 people, that he had practiced this before — though in reality, he had only done the dirt portion, never with cement on top. Burrus was lowered into a plastic coffin, which was then placed into a 7-foot-deep grave. Workers began to shovel in dirt and then poured wet cement over the top. The audience watched as Burrus waved from the coffin before being completely covered.

Moments later, the unthinkable happened — the cement collapsed the thin plastic coffin. The weight was simply too great. The box caved in, burying Burrus alive under thousands of pounds of dirt and concrete. Rescue crews rushed to dig him out, but it took nearly 30 minutes to reach him. When they did, Burrus was dead — suffocated and crushed before he ever had a chance to escape. He was just 32 years old.

“He was on his way up when everything came crashing down on him,” his son, Joe Burrus, told TV station ABC 30 in 2018. “He actually made it out. He just didn’t have a chance to get out of the grave because he suffocated.”

The coroner found traces of marijuana in Burrus’ system but determined that the small amount of the drug probably was not enough to impair the magician’s judgment or affect his physical abilities during the trick.

“This was not a failure on the part of Joseph, ‘The Amazing Joe’ Burrus,“ his mother told The Bee in 1990. “It was an equipment failure.”

The death of “The Amazing Joe” Burrus became infamous both for its tragic timing — Halloween night — and for its haunting symbolism. Burrus had told friends he wanted to “outdo Houdini”, who also died on Halloween in 1926. But instead of surpassing his idol, Burrus met a similar fate on the same day — a fatal reminder of the dangers of pushing the limits of illusion and showmanship.

The Kolb Brothers Attempting to Get the Perfect Shots of the Grand Canyon in the Early 20th Century

In the Grand Canyon, brothers Emroy and Ellsworth Kolb rig a rope system to lower to a ledge 55 feet below. Should anything happen, the cameraman would fall 300 feet. The brothers spent their lives as Grand Canyon photographers, with their studio located on the rim of the canyon.

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The Hunter Brothers Checking the Engine During Their 23-Day Non-Stop Flight, 1930

In 1930, the Hunter brothers embarked on an incredible journey, flying nonstop for 23 days. During this epic flight, they meticulously examined their plane’s engine mid-air to ensure smooth operation. This daring feat showcased their exceptional skill and determination, setting an aviation milestone and inspiring future generations of pilots.

A significant turning point in aviation history occurred with Charles Lindbergh’s famous flight in 1927 when he became the first man to fly solo across the Atlantic. This event inspired many to pursue new records in the sky, including the challenge of the longest flight without landing. The Hunters, a family of six siblings born in Illinois, became key figures in this quest.

Albert, Mabel, Irene, John, Walter, and Kenneth Hunter grew up in Six Mile Prairie, Illinois. After the death of their father in an accident, the siblings had to adapt and work to support their family. Their aviation adventure began in 1924 when they purchased a J-1 Army plane and learned to fly. Soon, they became a popular airshow act known as “The Hunter Flying Circus,” performing stunts and giving exhibition flights at local fairs.

In 1929, the Hunter brothers attempted to set a record for non-stop flight. They took off in a Stinson SM-1 Detroiter called Chicago We Will and flew for 11 days (264 hours) before being forced to land due to adverse weather conditions. However, this setback did not discourage them; they were determined to try again.

With renewed determination, on June 11, 1930, John and Kenneth Hunter took off from Sky Harbor Airport in Northbrook, Illinois, in a Stinson SM-1 Detroiter renamed City of Chicago. Their goal: to surpass the record set by Dale Jackson and Forrest O'Brine, which was 17 days and more than 12 hours in the air. The Hunters, along with their brothers Albert and Walter, who handled refueling, meticulously prepared for the attempt. They removed unnecessary seats to create space and reduce weight.

The logistics of refueling were crucial, as Albert and Walter flew the Big Ben to supply fuel and other essentials to their brothers in flight. Initially, refueling between the Big Ben and the record-attempting plane occurred every six hours, but after a week in the air, it was done every three hours due to a leak in one of the City of Chicago’s fuel tanks.

At various times, both John and Kenneth would leave the cockpit and slide along a support fixed to the fuselage, from the cabin to the nose of the plane, to change spark plugs, refill oil, or even adjust the engine bolts.

The Hunters’ flight became a media spectacle, attracting thousands of spectators to Sky Harbor Airport. Communication between the planes was done through written notes, and the Hunter family supported the brothers unconditionally in their feat. While John and Kenneth navigated the air, their mother and sister prepared meals and kept a steady supply of clean clothes. As they neared the record, tension and excitement grew. Mechanical issues began to arise, and refueling increased from every six hours to every three due to fuel leaks. However, the Hunter brothers' determination never wavered.

Finally, on June 29, 1930, the City of Chicago surpassed the endurance record. John, in command, made a low flyby over the airport while Kenneth waved to an enthusiastic crowd of 75,000 people. Four days later, on July 4, they landed after having been in the air for 553 hours, 41 minutes, and 30 seconds—23 full days—setting a new world record for non-stop flight.

(via Europair)

Pipeline Rider, ca. 1910s

This photo from the mid-1910s shows motorcyclist Johnny Hogg and his wife riding on an aqueduct pipeline with a Harley-Davidson sidecar rig. The pipeline ran about 15 miles through Los Angeles’ Mint Canyon. Mere days after this stunt was completed, another daring rider on a solo machine attempted the same stunt and found himself in the hospital.

Ethel Purtle Performing at the “Wall of Death” With Her Lion King by Her Side

Today, Motordrome, circular board racing tracks to put the popularity, speed, and power of motorcycles on the map, are nearly extinct. Already putting their lives on the line, some stunt riders in the 1930s upped the ante, adding an additional element of thrill with living, breathing, lions! They called it the “Race For Life,” as these lions were deliberately released to charge after speeding bikes, trying to tackle them and swat at them with their massive paws as if they were prey.

If that wasn’t enough, some riders trained lions to sit in specially built sidecars during their races. These guys were going about 80 miles per hour around an almost perpendicular wall with these big cats by their side! Here, along with her lion King, Ethel Purtle would race around a specially made track doing gravity-defying stunts like the “Wall of Death.”

Clem Sohn, Michigan’s Doomed Daredevil Jumped Out of Planes and Flew Like a Bird

Clements Joseph Sohn (December 7, 1910 – April 25, 1937) was an American airshow dare-devil in the 1930s from Fowler, Michigan. He perfected a way of gliding through the air with a home-made wingsuit. He had himself dropped from an airplane at a height of approximately 6000 meters, and would glide down until he was only 300 to 250 meters from the ground, at which point he would open his parachute for the final descent.

He made the wings from zephyr cloth mounted on steel tubes, forming a large web under each arm which was clasped to his hips. A feature of the wings was a device to prevent them from opening out too far and ripping his arms from their sockets. A loose cloth formed another web between his legs, which acted like a bird's tail. His large goggles gave him an appearance which led to his becoming known as “The Batman” or “The Batwing Jumper.”

Clem was badly injured during the opening ceremony of Gatwick Aerodrome, in London, England, when his primary parachute tangled in his wings. He broke and mangled his shoulder on landing, after opening his emergency parachute at an altitude of only 60 meters and crashing into a taxi.

“There is no sound but the wind. If I lose speed the wind dies away, and there is no sound at all.”

Sohn’s career came to an end on April 25, 1937, in Vincennes, France. Before taking off, Clem had remarked, “I feel as safe as you would in your grandmother’s kitchen.” During his descent on that day, his parachute did not open. A crowd of 100,000 watched him frantically tug on the ripcord of his emergency chute, but that failed too, and Sohn, 26 years old, plunged to his death.

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Amazing Vintage Photographs of the 13 Flying Black Cats From the 1920s

The 13 Flying Black Cats was a professional aerial exhibition team that started around 1925, advertising they would do ANYTHING for a price. They performed primarily at air shows around Los Angeles and the Southwest but found their niche doing movie newsreels.

13 Black Cats business card with Art Goebel, Bon MacDougall, Heard McClellan, Cross Aerial Photo Service.

The group was based at the Burdett Airport located at Western Avenue and 104th Street in Los Angeles (present-day Inglewood), where many worked as pilots and mechanics. Burdett Fuller was a former Naval Reserve flyer and started a flying school and passenger air service in 1919. Among his multitude of students – he soloed about 400 – he taught Jack Frye how to fly, who in turn taught Ronald “Bon” MacDougall.

The Burdett Airport – home of the famous 13 Flying Black Cats, ca. 1924.

In 1923, Burdett, Frye, and MacDougall teamed up and established the Burdett Air Port and School of Aviation. In August 1925, flying students William E. Matlock and Paul E. Richter graduated from there. These young men – MacDougall, Frye, Matlock, and Richter – along with their friend, Ken Nichols, who would do “anything in aerial stunts,” formed the core of the famous 13 Flying Black Cats and dazzled weekend crowds at the airport with their breath-taking aerial performances. On July 5, 1925, thousands showed up for the “Burdett Field Air Meet” to watch the air races and stunt flying exhibitions, which also included Frank Clarke, Art Goebel, Jack Frye, Frank Tomick, and Dick Grace.

The 13 Black Cats were an evolving group with many members including women, who were never official members. With so many coming and going, many of the participants never received their credit due.

The 13 Black Cats charged one hundred dollars for an ordinary plane-change. It cost five hundred dollars to make a change made from an upside-down aircraft to one flying right side up. A crowd thrilling addition was a faked accident with the apparent victim falling off the aircraft and tumbling about four hundred feet before a thin cable (invisible to the audience) suddenly opened a hidden parachute, to the gasped relief of the audience. The Black Cats were the first to develop a set scale wage for aerial stunts, which provided a model for the first movie stunt pilots’ union, founded by aviatrix Florence Lowe “Pancho” Barnes (1901-1975) in 1931.

Standing in front of the Burdett Air Port office and wearing their “Black Cat” sweaters, from left to right are William E. “Spider” Matlock (1902-1926), Paul E. Richter, Jr. (1898-1949), Ronald Griffith "Bon" MacDougall (1901-1970), and Kenneth "Fronty" Nichols (1902-1974), circa 1925.

The 13 Flying Black Cats, standing left to right: Al Johnson, Bon MacDougall, Art Goebel, Ken “Fronty” Nichols, and Paul Richter; kneeling left to right: Heard McClellan, Sam Greenwald, and Spider Matlock. Other members not pictured are Reginald Denny, Ivan Unger, Gladys Ingle, Freddy Osborne, George “Slim” Maves, Jerry Phillips, “Loot” Barber, Howard Batt, and cameramen Jerry Tabnac and Bill Stapp.

Wing walker, Gladys Roy (1896-1927) was an accomplished parachute jumper and movie stunt actress. She died on August 15, 1927 by accidently walking into a spinning propeller after posing for publicity shots with “Miss Ohio,” Evelyn Wilgus at Watson Field, Youngstown, Ohio.

Portrait of Gladys Roy (1896-1927).

Bon MacDougall pilots while three Black Cats, from left to right, “Spider” Matlock, Al Johnson, and “Fronty” Nichols, balance on the upper wing. A smoke generator is under the nose of the airplane.

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Watch Wing Walker Gladys Ingle Changing a Wheel in Mid-Air, 1926

In 1926, Gladys Ingle was filmed changing planes in mid-air to replace a lost wheel on Art Goebel’s aircraft (Jan 1926). The aircraft are Curtiss JN-4 biplanes. Ingle is seen with a tire strapped to her back going up on Bon McDougall’s airplane to switch to Art Goebel’s airplane to install a tire.

Gladys Ingle (March 28, 1899 – October 27, 1981) was an American pilot, a wing walker and a member of the aerial stunt team the 13 Black Cats. She was the fourth woman to earn a pilot license. In 1921, she and her sister Ann both performed as members of the C.P.O. Aerial Circus, parachuting out of balloons. In 1922, she performed her first stunt involving an airplane when she and her sister performed an airplane parachute race jumping from separate planes.

Gladys Ingle became the only female member of the 13 Black Cats. She performed in aerial stunts during the 1920s and 1930s. She was renowned for her stunts and wing walking. Some of her stunts included moving from plane to plane in mid-air, and flying on the wing of a plane while it passed under a bridge. One of Ingle’s stunts involved replacing a wheel in mid-air. A wheel would conveniently fall off an airplane. Ingle would strap a spare wheel on her back and rendezvous with the “stricken” plane. In mid-air, she would climb to the top of the upper wing of the second plane and transfer to the bottom wing of the plane in distress. She would then climb down to the landing gear and install the wheel. This was filmed on at least one occasion.

Gladys Ingle is preparing to move from Bon MacDougall’s Jenny to Art Goebel’s aircraft mid-air, January 1926.

In another stunt, she would shoot arrows at targets while wing walking. When asked if she ever got scared, she said, “Nothing to it at all, nothing to it.” She claimed to have been involved in several forced landings and plane crashes. One of her most daring stunts was to stand on the wing of an aircraft while it looped the loop.

In 1928, The San Bernardino County Sun reported that Ingle doubled for movie stars and appeared in films. In her career, she successfully transferred from the wing of one aircraft to the wing of another in mid-air more than 300 times.

The Crash at Crush: A Crazy Publicity Stunt Turned Deadly in 1896

The Crash at Crush was a one-day publicity stunt in the U.S. state of Texas that took place on September 15, 1896, in which two uncrewed locomotives were crashed into each other head-on at high speed. William George Crush, general passenger agent of the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad, conceived the idea in order to demonstrate a staged train wreck as a public spectacle. As a result, an estimated 40,000 people attended the event. Unexpectedly, the impact caused both engine boilers to explode, resulting in a shower of flying debris that killed two people and caused numerous injuries among the spectators.

Locomotives and crews pose for photos prior to their staged wreck near Waco, Texas, in 1896.

The Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad (popularly known as the “Katy”, from its “M-K-T” initials) had first reached the Crush area in the 1880s, during the construction of a route between Dallas and Houston. As the railroad expanded, the Katy replaced its 30-ton steam engines with newer, more powerful 60-ton engines, and subsequently a stockpile of the older units, for which the railroad now had no use, began to accumulate.

In 1896, Katy agent William Crush proposed a publicity stunt that could make use of the obsolete Katy trains to be held along the Dallas–Houston route at a site 14 miles (23 km) north of Waco and 3 miles (4.8 km) south of the town of West, in McLennan County.

A locomotive crash staged by the Columbus and Hocking Valley Railroad at Buckeye Park near Lancaster, Ohio on May 30, 1896 had been a huge success. Buckeye Park was established and owned by the railroad to entice residents of nearby Columbus to take weekend excursions. The locomotive crash was planned for the park’s annual opening day and drew approximately 20,000 spectators. While no admission was charged, money was made on the railroad passenger traffic to and from the park.

Crush imagined a similar spectacle for which Katy could advertise to thousands of potential passengers. Crush’s superiors agreed to his proposal and put him in charge of the project. As with the crash at Buckeye Park, the event would be free of charge, instead profiting from the sale of tickets on special excursion trains that would run to and from the site. The price was US$ 3.50 in 1896 (equivalent to $125.35 in 2023) per round-trip ticket from anywhere in the state.

Two water wells were drilled at the site and a circus tent from Ringling Brothers was erected, as well as a grandstand, three speakers’ stands, a platform for reporters, two telegraph offices, and a special train depot, over which a giant sign proclaimed the new town as “Crush, Texas”. Events from the Midway Plaisance, including lemonade stands, carnival games, medicine shows, cigar vendors and other sideshows were highly anticipated, with a construction foreman saying that “This feature alone will be worth going to Crush to see.”

A separate four-mile segment of track was built for the event alongside the Katy railroad so that there was no chance a runaway train could end up on the main line; each end of the track was situated atop a low hill on opposite sides of a bowl-shaped valley in which the trains would meet. The locomotives to be used were two 35-short-ton (32 t) decommissioned Baldwin engines, No. 999 and No. 1001.

Photograph by Jervis C. Deane of two locomotives at the moment of their head-on collision as part of a publicity stunt in 1896 at Crush, Texas. Deane lost an eye from the boilers exploding.

The locomotive boilers explode during impact.

The crowd explores the wreckage.

The crowd, estimated at 40,000, for the staged wreck.

Two were killed when the locomotive boilers exploded.

On the day before the exhibition, railroad officials staged a speed test of the engines to help predict the precise point of collision. Katy engineers assured Crush that his grand idea was safe, specifically that the boilers on the steam engines had been designed to resist ruptures and that, even in a very high-speed crash, they were unlikely to explode. Each engine would pull six boxcars behind it; because the couplers used to link the cars were considered unreliable, the cars were chained together to prevent them from coming apart during the impact.

Crush insisted on restricting the general public to a minimum of 200 yards (180 m) away from the track, but allowed members of the press to be within 100 yards. Katy officials expected a crowd of between 20,000 and 25,000 people to attend, but the clever marketing ploy was an overwhelming success and the railroad sold out more than 30 special excursion trains to the event.

The crash was delayed for an hour because the crowd resisted being pressed back by the police to what was supposedly a safe distance. At about 5 pm, the two trains, pulling cars loaded with railroad ties, slowly met in the middle of the track to be photographed. They were then rolled to their starting points at the opposite ends of the track. Crush, riding a white charger, signaled the start of the main event. The engineers and crew aboard each train opened the steam to a prearranged setting, rode for exactly four turns of the driving wheels, and then jumped from the trains.

Each train reached a speed of about 45 miles per hour (72 km/h) by the time they met near the anticipated spot, though some observers believed they were traveling much faster.

Debris was blown hundreds of feet into the air. Panic quickly broke out as the crowd turned and ran. Some of the debris came down among the spectators, killing two and seriously injuring at least six others. A photographer, Jarvis “Joe” Deane of Waco, lost one eye to a flying bolt.

Impresario Crush, a disciple of P.T. Barnum, was “fired” the evening of the crash, but rehired the following day. Rumor even had it he got a bonus for all the attention he brought the railroad, which curiously saw a surge in business afterwards. He worked for the company for 57 years until his retirement.

The combustion, carnage and carnival atmosphere of the proceedings were immortalized by ragtime composer and Texas native Scott Joplin, in his “Great Crush Collision” march.

Despite the catastrophe of the Crash at Crush, the Katy Railroad Company prospered into the first half of the 20th century. Staged locomotive collisions also became an element of mass public amusement on into the twentieth century.