Struggles and Triumphs by P.T. Barnum — Read

Renewing the Lease of the Museum Building -- Tom Thumb in America -- Tour Through the Country -- Journey to Cuba -- Barnum a Curiosity -- Raising Turkeys -- Ceasing to Be a Travelling Showman -- Return to Bridgeport -- Advantages and Capabilities of That City -- Search for a Home -- The Finding -- Building and Completion of Iranistan -- Grand Housewarming -- Buying the Baltimore Museum -- Opening the Philadelphia Museum -- Catering for Quakers -- The Temperance Pledge at the Theater -- Purchasing Peale's Philadelphia Collection -- My Agricultural and Arboricultural Doings -- "Gersy Blew" Chickens -- How I Sold My Potatoes -- How I Bought Other People's Potatoes -- Cutting Off Grafts -- My Deer Park -- My Gamekeeper -- Frank Leslie -- Pleasures of Home.

One of my main objects in returning home at this time, was to obtain a longer lease of the premises occupied by the American Museum. My lease had still three years to run, but Mr. Olmsted, the proprietor of the building, was dead, and I was anxious to make provision in time for the perpetuity of my establishment, for I meant to make the Museum a permanent institution in the city, and if I could not renew my lease, I intended to build an appropriate edifice on Broadway. I finally succeeded, however, in getting the lease of the entire building, covering fifty-six feet by one hundred, for twenty-five years, at an annual rent of $10,000 and the ordinary taxes and assessments. I had already hired in addition the upper stories of three adjoining buildings. My Museum receipts were more in one day, than they formerly were in an entire week, and the establishment had become so popular that it was thronged at all hours from early morning to closing time at night.