Heth, Joice | P.T. Barnum's first humbug

Heth, Joice 

Great Attraction Just Arrived at Concert Hall ... Joice Heth, Nurse to Gen. George Washington ... Age of 161 Years. [Boston: 1835]

Broadside playbill (209 x 137 mm). Printed on both sides in an assortment of types. Not examined out of frame, folds, light spotting. Matted, framed, and glazed with Plexiglas. 

"Joice Heth was born ... in the year 1674 and has consequently now arrived at the astonishing age of 161 years!"  The present handbill proclaims, but in fact Heth never reached the age of eighty—one of many falsehoods on the present document. The man responsible for the humbug was the then twenty-five-year-old Phineas Taylor Barnum. It was his first foray into the business that would eventually make him one of the most famous figures in America.

An exponent of contradictions, he embodied an odd but compelling combination of showmanship and public service, hubris and humbug, entertainment and edification. Over the course of his career, Barnum evolved from an unsympathetic exploiter—perhaps even slave owner in the present case—to staunch abolitionist in time. His legacy remains deeply linked to the birth of modern American popular culture. 

REFERENCE:

Exemplars, p. 130; EE, pp. 102-103