Phineas Taylor Barnum (July 5, 1810 – April 7, 1891) is an American showman, politician, and businessman remembered for promoting celebrated hoaxes and for founding the Barnum & Bailey Circus (1871–2017).
He is also an author, publisher, and philanthropist.
He is widely credited with coining the adage "There's a sucker born every minute", although no evidence can be found of him saying this.
Barnum becomes a small-business owner in his early twenties and founds a weekly newspaper before moving to New York City in 1834.
He embarks on an entertainment career, first with a variety troupe called "Barnum's Grand Scientific and Musical Theater", and soon after by purchasing Scudder's American Museum which he renames after himself.
He uses the museum as a platform to promote hoaxes and human curiosities such as the Fiji mermaid and General Tom Thumb.
In 1850, he promotes the American tour of singer Jenny Lind, paying her an unprecedented $1,000 a night for one hundred and fifty nights.
He suffers economic reversals in the 1850s due to bad investments, as well as years of litigation and public humiliation, but he uses a lecture tour as a temperance speaker to emerge from debt.
His museum adds America's first aquarium and expands the wax-figure department.\
Barnum serves two terms in the Connecticut legislature in 1865 as a Republican for Fairfield, Connecticut.
He is elected in 1875 as Mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut, where he worka to improve the water supply, bring gas lighting to streets, and enforce liquor and prostitution laws.
He is also instrumental in starting Bridgeport Hospital, founded in 1878, and is its first president.
Nevertheless, the circus business is the source of much of his enduring fame.
He establishea "P. T. Barnum's Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan & Hippodrome", a traveling circus, menagerie, and museum of "freaks" that adopts many names over the years.
Barnum dies of a stroke at his home residence in 1891 and is buried in Mountain Grove Cemetery, Bridgeport, which he has designed himself.
