William Hanford Curtis

William Hanford Curtis (December 10, 1873 – April 9, 1955), nicknamed "Cap", was an American circus superintendent and inventor. Curtis was inducted into the Circus Hall of Fame in 1961.

Early life William Hanford "Cap" Curtis was born on a farm near Hazlehurst, Mississippi, on December 10, 1873.

Career William H. Curtis first encountered circuses at the Welch Show in Hazlehurst. He left Copiah County, Mississippi, around 1889-90 to join the Charles Andress Circus in New Orleans, where he worked with Shetland ponies. After moving from W. H. Harris' Nickel-Plate Shows to Sells Brothers Circus in 1891, he became boss hostler for a six-horse team. His career in circus canvas began as an assistant "boss canvasman," where he learned the workings of many shows and commanded the crews who handled the tents. When the tour in New York State faced days of rain near Binghamton, New York, Curtis folded canvas in knee-deep mud. He developed several safety devices and invented time-and-money-saving equipment for circus use. While working with John Robinson, Curtis introduced trussed seats that improved the safety of the audience, a design later adopted by other traveling shows.

W. H. Curtis, general superintendent at Hagenbeck until 1929, introduced a system for raising all big top center poles at once and a guying method to prevent them from falling. He built various circus wagons at Peru and West Baden, Indiana. His seat wagons were last used in 1926, and plans for their return ended after the Wall Street crash of 1929 ended Ringling's expansion ideas.

He had bought a 200-acre pecan grove, producing the most desired pecans in the state. His innovations in grafting and pollination made his crops and seedlings the most valued. He cultivated 400 prize pecan trees, using buds and grafts from a $5,000 specimen on native saplings. Both hobby and business, his grafting produced curiosities like a tree with eight different varieties. He also invented special equipment for his ranch. He returned to Ringling in 1948, left the road in 1949, returned in 1950 for a brief Cole Bros. tour, and worked the pecan ranch in 1951.

He spent weeks with Mills Bros. Circus and later, in September 1953, worked his last big top job as "boss canvasman" when Hershey, Pennsylvania borrowed a Ringling Brothers' tent for President Eisenhower's birthday.

He was inducted into the Circus Hall of Fame's "Maintenance" category in 1961 and the Circus Ring of Fame in 1984.