Schlitzie
Schlitzie also slots Shlitze the Pinhead or Simon Metz called; die in a document recognized as Shlitze Surtees ( born September 10, 1901 in New York City; † September 24, 1971 in Los Angeles ) was an American mentally retarded performer who was presented because of a malformed head as so-called Sideshow Attraction or Zirkuskuriosität and in 1932 was known to a wider audience through the horror film freaks by Tod Browning.
Life
Origin and Youth
Schlitzie whose history is as unknown as his parents or accurate vital statistics, was born with microcephaly. He had a conically deformed skull, almond eyes, and dysmorphic facial features. The cause of his deformities is not yet known. Schlitzie remained all his life on the spiritual development of a three year old child, so he often had to rely on outside help for everyday items and up to an imitative - mimic talent no conversation was capable of. The audience kept him mostly for a woman because he is usually a simple, hawaiian " Muumuu " was called dress. Frequently Schlitzie was quite arbitrary as " He " or " you". According to the legends, he is said to be the child of a prominent family from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and have owned a similarly handicapped sister named Athelia, who was also a sideshow attraction. Probably Schlitzie was simply sold by their parents to traveling people and, according to the customs of his traveling circuses, simply "property" of showmen.
Career
Between 1924/25, Schlitzie first came up with the Congress Of Freaks in the program of PT Barnum Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus in New York's Madison Square Garden on. Other actors were the " Koo -Koo the Bird Girl" and the diminutive " Harry Doll " aka Harry Earles, who later also had roles in Browning's feature film.
1928 Schlitzie was passed on to the amusement park at Coney Iceland and to the Playland at the Beach in San Francisco and appeared in the silent film The Side Show by Erle C. Kenton. 1932 finally followed the produced by MGM Tod Browning film Freaks. Following Schlitzie was passed around at the film studios and appeared until the mid- 1930s as a creaturely accessories in short secondary roles: among other things, as an animal person in the Erle C. Kenton movie Iceland of Lost Souls (Island of Lost Souls ) with Charles Laughton and Bela Lugosi Paramount and 1934 as a " cameo " in Tomorrow 's Children, a state- subsidized " educational film " in science fiction style, the melodramatized the subject of eugenics.
From 1936 to 1937 appeared Schlitzie, now as " Schlitzie Metz " placarded in several sideshows of Tom Metz, which were presented in the supporting program of the Tom Mix Circus. In this show, there was again a chimpanzee dressage, which was demonstrated by the animal dealer and fair feeder George Surtees; allegedly " moved " Schlitzie at that time the carers, whereby the later, registered in the California death certificate surname of the now " officially legalized " guardian Surtees revealed. A Present time newspaper photographer identified him later as " Schlitzie Metz ," the origin of the name " Simon Metz " is, however, unclear.
In the following years Schlitzie appeared in various circuses and shows such as the Clyde Beatty Circus, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey, Cole Bros., Vanteen & Lee Circus Sideshow, the Dobrich International Circus, and the combined shows and West Coast shows of Foley & Burke.
In the arena were limited Schlitzies skills on public amusements and simple clowning with little singing and dancing, to "10 " or antics include race tearing and shaking hands with the audience. Otherwise, it was whether his grotesque appearance presented onlookers or marketed on photo cards including as Shlitze The Pinhead, Last Of The Aztecs, Last Of The Incas, Slitzy The Monkey Girl or Julius The Missing Link.
End and Responses
In the early 1960s George Surtees died and his wife Dolores. The daughter, who was not in the fairground amusements, did not want to take over the guardianship. They mediated Schlitzie to a friendly carnival couple who for years at fairs and Sideshow events marketed it as a local attraction and peddled with pictures and souvenirs from him. Schlitzie allegedly died at the age of 70 years of pneumonia and in an unmarked grave at the Queen Of Heaven Cemetery in Rowland Heights, California, buried.
Even years after the death of the character " Schlitzie " in many forms has been marketed: for example, as a Halloween mask, as a motif on t- shirts and many other Hollywood memorabilia, as well as a comic book character Zippy the Pinhead in an eponymous comic strip by the U.S. cartoonist Bill Griffith.