Before movies, television, and the internet, the circus entertained audiences and exposed people throughout the U.S. and the world to different cultures, countries, and acrobatic and aerial feats. For more than 80 years, from the 1870s until the 1950s, countless Bloomington men and women risked their lives performing aerial tricks high on the flying trapeze. Bloomington's first gymnasium featured a flying trapeze by the 1870s, and members of that gymnasium, the Green brothers, were said to be as good as professional circus athletes, leading to the creation of The Flying La Vans. As their fame grew, more acts followed, including The Fishers, The Aerial Smiths, and The Flying Wards. These performers, along with hundreds of other aerialists, trained in the barn the Wards built on Emerson Street and in the Y.M.C.A. building. By the time the Y.M.C.A. was built there in 1907, elite circus aerialists called Bloomington home. Dozens of young people, including Bert Doss, Wayne Larey, Eldred “Red” Sleeter, Art Concello, and Harold “Tuffy” Genders, took their first leap from the pedestal board there on their way to stardom. Antoinette Comeau Concello achieved the triple somersault, often called “the killer trick,” something many feared was impossible for a woman. Bloomington was once known as the trapeze capital of the world.