About
In the mid-1800s, Delavan was something few places in America could claim: the beating heart of the traveling circus industry. Between 1847 and 1894, more than two dozen circuses wintered here, including the massive Mabie Brothers U.S. Olympic Circus. Out of that era emerged one of the most feared animals in circus history, a towering Asian elephant named Romeo. Standing over 10 feet tall and weighing roughly 10,500 pounds, Romeo was not just a spectacle. He became infamous for a violent streak that left at least five handlers dead over the course of his career, along with widespread destruction during multiple escapes that leveled barns, orchards, and even threatened a Chicago theater.
Romeo’s story only grows darker the deeper you dig. Born around 1848 in what is now Sri Lanka, he was brought to the United States and eventually paired with another elephant, Juliet, in a circus act. After Juliet’s death in Delavan in the 1860s, circus promoters pushed a convenient narrative that grief drove Romeo’s violence, though historians widely consider that explanation exaggerated or fabricated. What is documented is his pattern of uncontrollable aggression, repeated rampages through towns, and a reputation so notorious that newspapers followed his every incident. Despite this, Romeo was never executed like many “rogue” circus animals of the era. He continued performing until his death in Chicago on June 7, 1872, reportedly from an infected foot, and was then mounted and displayed at the Chicago Medical College Museum.
Today, Romeo’s legacy looms over downtown Delavan in the form of a striking, life-size statue in Tower Park dedicated to the history of Delavan’s circus colony. The sculpture does not soften his story. It captures him rearing up, tense and dangerous, a visual reminder that Delavan’s circus history was not all spectacle and wonder. The statue exists not to celebrate violence, but to anchor the town’s identity as the “Circus Capital of the World” and to memorialize one of its most infamous figures. In a city where elephants once walked the streets, Romeo stands frozen in time, a relic of an era when entertainment often came with real risk, and sometimes, deadly consequences.
Find more of Delavan’s haunted circus history in Spring Grove Cemetery →
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