On her 100th birthday, Lennon Bros circus matriarch Dollie Lennon looks back on a life in the ring

Lennon Bros Circus is the oldest touring circus in Australia. Its matriarch DOLLIE LENNON, turns 100 today. Here she recalls how love introduced her to a life on the road

Dollie and Mick in 1989.

I was born Caroline Maude Troy on May 20, 1916. My father was rushing my mother by horse and cart to a hospital to give birth but they had to stop and I was born under the cart.

I grew up in Weemelah, near Mungindai in northern NSW, where my father worked on a farm. He worked very hard, chopping down trees, digging holes for posts and putting up fences.

When I was about six I went to see my first circus, little realising that I would later become part of a circus family. My family later moved to Angeldool (north of Lightning Ridge) where I taught local children, including my brothers, how to read.

In 1934, I saw my second circus. It was named Colto’s and among the performers was a handsome young man named Mick Lennon. His real name was William but he got that nickname because somebody once thought he was Irish.

Mick was a multi-talented performer. He was a buckjump rider, performed an act on the Roman rings, did trick riding and a slack wire routine — he never stopped learning new skills.

Dollie Lennon in 1941 with her husband Mick in Sydney.

Mick and his father Bill had originally been part of Lennon Bros Circus, which was started by Mick’s grandmother Mary Lennon in 1893, but somewhere along the line they had become part of Colto’s.

When Colto’s left Angeldool, Mick and Bill were left to wait for parts to come from Dubbo to repair a broken down truck. My father invited the stranded circus performers over for tea and Mick became a frequent visitor. When the truck was repaired he left town but we corresponded. About six months later he came back to town and we started going out together.

Mick earned money breaking horses, repairing shoes and cutting down trees and working on farms but eventually we decided that there was no future for us in Angeldool. In 1936 we got married and I became part of the Lennon circus clan. At the show I was nicknamed Dot or Dollie because I was so small.

Caroline “Dollie” Lennon on the trapeze in 1938.

While on the road, my first child Ronnie was born at Lismore. Travelling with a baby was interesting — when he was 10 months old I left him for a moment in a baby bath and looked back to find a big male monkey sitting on the edge of the bath.

I was soon encouraged to add to my duties as circus wife and become part of the circus program, performing a ladder balancing act with my husband — Mick would lie back on a table, balancing a ladder on his feet while I climbed the ladder.

Later I also learned trapeze to fill a hole in the program. But it wasn’t easy for a 20-year-old not raised in a circus to learn acts. I was achy and covered in blisters and bruises.

I later left the performing to Mick and our sons Lindsay (born in 1938) and Phillip (born in 1941). Ron and our daughter Jan (born in 1944) travelled with the show as children but later made lives for themselves outside the show.

Dollie Lennon in the ring at age 79.

With some gaps in between including time off during World War II, when he worked Mick performed until he was 78 (he died in 1994). Phillip was an accomplished performer from an early age, becoming famous in Australian circus for his whip cracking, rope spinning and clowning but he was also a lion tamer and high wire walker.

He had left the circus for a time when he died in a car accident in 1980.

Lindsay was also a high wire walker and ringmaster but later focused on running the circus.

He ran a show called Burtons in the 1960s and 70s but we later reclaimed the family heritage renaming the show Lennon Brothers in 1976.

Lindsay is still running Stardust circus, while his sons run Lennons and Hudsons circuses. My great and great-great grandchildren are now ready to follow in their footsteps.

As told to Troy Lennon (Dollie’s grandson and The Daily Telegraph’s history editor)