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Shellie
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Joined: 18 Feb 2009
Replies: 998
Location: Atlanta, GA

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Post Posted: Sat Jun 16, 2012 8:10 pm      Post subject: The Flying Wallendas
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Nik Wallenda just walked over Niagara Falls on a tightrope!
I read that the Wallendas trace their roots as far as 1780 in Austria-Hungary, when the Wallenda ancestors were part of a traveling show of acrobats, aerialists, jugglers, animal trainers and trapeze artists.

Maybe our Polish ancestors were entertained by Wallenda ancestors! Does anyone here have Wallendas in their tree?

If you have information about the Wallendas or about this kind of circus-type entertainments during our ancestors time, please share.
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All Polska



Joined: 05 Jul 2010
Replies: 48
Location: Florida, USA

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Post Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 5:19 am      Post subject:
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I may be wrong, but I thought they were from Italy. St. Armands Circle on an island off the coast of Sarasota, FL was developed by Ringling, the original owner of the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus. In the center of the circle of upscale shops is a park with large copper/brass circles embeded in the cement of the sidewalk. Each is info on a circus family or performer. That is where I believe I read they came from Italy as trapeze arttists.

All Polska


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Bill Rushin
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Joined: 14 Dec 2009
Replies: 311
Location: Virginia Beach, Va.

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Post Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:56 am      Post subject:
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I have Walenda in my tree, they were Polish and ended up in the Back of the Yards in Chicago. I was curious if I was related and checked a while back, however I found "The Great Wallenda's / "The Flying Wallenda's" were German. The founder Karl Wallenda, was born in Magdeburg, Germany, in 1905. (about 30 miles west of Berlin) They performed in Bohemia (which is Czechoslovakia), a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire then. I can not find any reference they performed over in Galicia where Poland was located. They were well known in Europe. They moved to the United States in 1928.
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Songbird1973



Joined: 30 Jun 2013
Replies: 1

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Post Posted: Sun Jun 30, 2013 3:47 am      Post subject: Wallenda family
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I have researched the Wallenda family for several years, although I don't have any Wallenda background. They were from Germany. However, Nik's grandmother, Jenny, married Alberto Zoppe, who WAS from Italy, and I suspect that is where the confusion was.

Karl Wallenda, the patriarch of the American Wallendas, and his father before him, didn't seem to have very many siblings. But the generations before that had large families, according to the few German records I could locate. A particular area could only support so many performing artists, so these descendants spread out across Europe. Some of them built their own Circus Halls.

I wouldn't be able to speculate where all the Wallendas performed, but I do think at least some of the Chicago area Wallendas were related to Carl Wallenda's family.
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