IN THE BALANCE

In our next portrait, we finally look at someone who didn't deserve to perish so gruesomely like our previous subjects. It just happened to be that this woman's life-long dream profession would be the cause of her death. This is the lovely Miss Lily Equipoes: a bright, young woman, here elegantly outfitted in her summer dress and holding a parasol. She certainly is a radiant, beautiful woman, with the warm demure expression on her face. However, there seems to be something very peculiar in this portrait - she's standing on a tightrope. Unfortunately, this tightrope would lead to her demise, for you see, under this rope was a...Well, maybe I should let you read it for yourselves. The story of Lily Equipoes: The Tightrope Walker.

Lily Equipoes:

The Tightrope Walker

(1887-1911)

Miss Lily Equipoes grew up in the Georgia countryside in the late 1880s to 1890s. Her parents were wealthy farmers, who owned a vast amount of land and made their fortune from prosperous crop growing. Like all young Southern women in society, she was raised to be a "prim and proper lady." However, young Lily silently detested the ways her parents tried to enforce their "ladylike" teachings on her, and she became a proper yet outspoken woman.

Besides her outspoken behavior, her parents were also annoyed with her dreams of wanting to become a tightrope walker at a circus. When Lily was seven years old, the Kepple Bros. Circus had come to their town, and her parents decided to take her to see the show one night. Little Lily enjoyed the show immensely, but the one thing that intrigued her the most was the tightrope act. She watched in amazement as the pretty young performer gracefully balanced herself on the rope. She couldn't believe the sight; that the only thing that stood between the woman and gravity was the rope.

After having seen the show, Lily's ambition was to become a tightrope walker at a circus. She wanted to perform the same gravity-defying feats before amazed audiences. Every day, the young girl practiced her balance, improving as the months and years went on. However, her parents were strongly opposed to the whole thing. In their eyes, their young daughter was to become a proper lady, not a "low-level performer," especially not at a place as "vulgar" as the circus. Lily refused to discuss the matter with her parents any further, but always continued thinking about her dream.

As the years went by, Lily blossomed into a gorgeous, bright young lady. Soon, her parents were intent on marrying her off to another wealthy and socialite family. Lily was terribly bored by the young suitors her parents brought to her, and she was disgusted by their arrogant and greedy attitudes. Feeling under the pressure about the whole issue of marriage from her parents, she slipped out of her room in the middle of the night and ran off to pursue her childhood dream of fame at the circus.

She wandered across the Southern countryside for a few days, before discovering the Crump Bros.'s Circus in Florida. After watching her audition, Mr. Crump the ringmaster hired her on the spot as the show's tightrope walker. Every night, her act consisted of walking across a rope that was a little less wider than a human thumb, suspended high up in the air over the audience. Lily loved her new profession and quickly fit in with the rest of the circus performers and workers. She felt more comfortable with the common people than she ever did when she was living with her parents.

At the circus, Lily also developed a romance with Philip the animal trainer. The two soon fell head-over-heels in love with each other. Sadly though, this romance only lasted a few months: during one of his performances, Philip was killed after an elephant broke free and went mad, trampling upon the poor young man. Miss Lily was devastated and heart-broken after hearing of the incident.

Although, the biggest shock to Lily was still to come. At one of her performances, a little more than a year after she joined the circus, her parents showed up. They had been searching all around for her, and found Lily after one of Mrs. Equipoes's friends noticed a poster while walking past the circus that stated: "See, Miss Lily! The Beauty Of The Highwire!" They were intent on bringing her back home to marry a man that they arranged for her to wed. But the young Lily insistently told them that she wanted to stay at the circus, arguing that she had been happier here than at home. Even though they were greatly opposed to Lily's decision, her parents eventually allowed her to stay after seeing how much she loved performing at the circus. A few days later they returned to Georgia, and, unknowingly, would never see their daughter alive again.

Lily blissfully continued her act at the circus for another year; and then one day she received a letter. It was from William Gracey (whose parents had been close friends with the Equipoeses) inviting Lily to his wedding in southern Louisiana. Deciding to attend the event, she took the train, and at the station rented a carriage to take her the rest of the way to William's mansion. While traveling down a small road in the carriage, the horse was suddenly spooked and galloped off the path, taking the coachman and Lily into the thick brush. The horse eventually broke free, and the carriage went careening around the trees, until it finally rolled over and landed in the thick mud of the swamps. Lily survived and managed to climb out of the carriage; although the driver was not as fortunate - Lily discovered him lying dead near a tree.

Now hopelessly lost, she wandered though the thick bogs of the swamp hoping to find the main road again. She eventually ended up along the banks of a murky river, where she could see a small town back in the trees on the other side. The only problem was she could find no way to cross. The river was certainly too deep to walk across, so she strolled along the banks, hoping to find some way to reach the other side.

Miss Lily then finally discovered something that could be of help: an old rope suspended over the river tied to two poles, each on the opposite riverbanks. Seeing no other way to cross, she climbed the rope and began to slowly walk across. Having mastered her talent at the circus, she found it very simple to gracefully walk across; unfortunately she hadn't planned on one thing. The old rope (worn through the years of just hanging above the river) started to unravel as Lily was halfway across the rope. Oblivious to this, she continued across the rope, but noticed that it began to sway more and more. Soon, the last thread unraveled, and Lily plummeted into the waters below.

Resurfacing, she tried to swim across the river, yet then noticed near the surface of the water were crocodiles quickly speeding towards her. She screamed in fright, and began to yell for help as she continued swimming closer to the shore. Some people from the riverside town ran outside to see what was all the commotion, and witnessed the young woman struggling to out-swim the crocodiles. Unfortunately, the large reptiles were too fast, and pulled poor Lily under the water; where they proceeded to swarm the poor young woman in the murky depths below.

Such a tragic tale, isn't it? It seems most unfair that the young Lily Equipoes was taken to regions beyond in such a gruesome manner. Such a lovely young woman; she enjoyed performing her act so much. But, I guess it's certainly true what they say: there's no business like show business, like no business I know.

Note: the names Kepple and Crump are my little tributes to Kepple Disney (Walt Disney's grandfather) and Rolly Crump (a Disney Imagineer who helped design the Haunted Mansion).

Next chapter: the story of the politician, the lawyer, and the accountant who met their end in the jungle