Born John Eckhardt, Jr.
August 27, 1911
Baltimore, Maryland, USA
Died January 5, 1991 (79 years)
Baltimore, Maryland, USA
Years active 1932-1941
Johnny Eck, born John Eckhardt, Jr. (August 27, 1911, Baltimore, Maryland – January 5, 1991, Baltimore, Maryland) was an American artist born monster show with the appearance that he was missing the lower half of his torso. Eck is best known today for his role in the cult film of 1932 Tod Browning classic Freaks. It was often presented as the amazing “Half-Boy” and “King of the Freaks”.
In addition to being a sideshow artist and actor, Johnny Eck was also an artist, photographer, magician, owner Penny Arcade, Punch and Judy operator, expert and model maker.
Early Life

Robert Eckhardt and John Eckhardt, Jr. was born August 27, 1911 in Amelia and John Eckhardt, Sr. in Baltimore, Maryland. Eck was born with a truncated torso due to sacral agenesis. Although Eck is sometimes described as “broken at the waist,” he was unusable, legs and feet underdeveloped that are hidden under clothing tailor. At birth, Eck weighed two pounds and was less than eight inches in length. It would eventually reach a total of eighteen inches high. Although Eck capitalized on the resemblance between him and Robert, were fraternal twins. Apart from the sacral agenesis, Eck was otherwise healthy.
Eck was walking on his hands before his brother was standing when he was one year. The twins Eckhardt could read at age four years. The twins had a sister, Carolyn, who instructs Eck at home until he and his brother enrolled in public school at the age of seven years. He reminded students that great “fight each other for the” honor “or” privilege “of lifting [him] the stone steps” to school, and school windows were blackened to discourage crowds of onlookers peering in less Eck during his studies. Despite the review, Eck was consistently optimistic about his birth defect. When asked if he wished he had legs, he joked, “Why would I want those? Can I have a pair of pants to the press.” He challenged those who had the legs by asking, “What you can do what I can not do, except to tread water?”
Amelia Eckhardt Eck expected to go into the ministry, and the young Eck was often asked to perform impromptu sermons for customers. “I would climb onto the roof of a small box and preach against drinking beer and damning sin and the devil,” Eck recalled in an autobiographical fragment. These sermons quickly came to an end when Eck began passing around a saucer for donations ..
At an early age, Eck has developed an interest in painting and carpentry, and spent hours with his brother sculpture and painting elaborate, fully articulated circuses.
PROFESSIONAL CAREER
In late 1923, Eck and his brother attended a magic show scene in a local church by John McAslan. McAslan When asked for volunteers for his act, 12 years, Eck bounded on stage on his hands, to the surprise of the magician. McAslan Eck convinced to join the sideshow with him as manager; Eck agreed, but only if his brother was also employed. Robert was charged with the care of his brother by their mother. His parents signed a one year contract, which Eck claimed the magician changed later to a ten-year contract by adding a zero. In 1924, Eck McAslan left and signed with a carny named Captain John Sheesley.
Eck was presented as a simple o (solo sideshow act), but he traveled with Robert and Robert used to emphasize the normality own physical abnormal. His performance included sleight of hand and acrobatic feats, including his famous one-armed ATRs. Eck often made in a smoking jacket while perched on a stool with tassels. Eck performed for Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey and others.
Eck went to Canada Exhibition in the summer of 1931. Eck was performing in Montreal when he was approached by a talent scout for MGM Studios to vote his first feature film as “Half-Boy” in Freaks by Tod Browning film of 1932.
Eck got along very well with Tod Browning and was often at his side during the shooting. Eck would later say that “Browning wanted me to stay as close to him as possible. He told me whenever I have an empty seat or a chair you are sitting next to me while we take above. ” Although he sometimes tried to socialize, he did not feel comfortable mixing with his castmates, he describes as a “happy, noisy crowd” and “childish, ridiculous and in a world of their own. “At one point, he complained that they had gone” Hollywood “because of the movie:” Wear sunglasses [ing] and acting funny. ” When Pete Robinson had difficulty lying on a blanket in a scene, Eck commented that if he had legs, he would have slept on a bed of nails, fakir. Olga Baclanova would reminisce fondly of his costar (she describes as “beautiful”), “When we finished the picture, he came and gave me a gift. He had made a circus ring made from matches. He said he had made in my honor. ”


Eck said that Browning wished to make a picture with him and Robert followed, where he would play the creation of a mad scientist. However, Browning’s career has been irreparably injured by Freaks, and he had no weight with the studios to do many projects he wanted to do. Eck was also disappointed by how much of his part was cut from the film in about thirty minutes that were cut by the censors.
After Freaks, Eck was presented as a creature or bird “Gooney Bird” in the Tarzan movies: Tarzan three, the Ape Man (1932), Tarzan Escapes (1936) and Tarzan’s Secret Treasure (1941). To create the costume of bird used by Eck for the Tarzan movies, footage that was filmed during the production of Freaks in 1931, a full body cast was taken from him.
When the house was Eckhardt facing foreclosure because of the oncoming Depression Great, Eck made to the Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Odditorium at the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair. This is where Eck was introduced as “the most remarkable man Alive”.
In 1937, Eck and Robert were recruited by an illusionist and hypnotist, Raboid Rajah for his “Miracles of 1937” show. Robert Eckhardt would heckle the magician at a saw-a-man-in-half illusion and be called on stage to be sawed in itself. During the illusion, Robert would be switched with Eck and a dwarf, playing respectively the upper and lower halves of the body, as Eck would chase his “legs” across the stage . Machinists Eck tore up, put it on top of the dwarf, and the spin-off scene, replacing them with Robert, who would then threaten to sue Raboid and storm the theater. Although the act met with applause and laughter, Eck later tell stories of audience members fainting, screaming, or fleeing in terror from the theater.
In addition to film, and stage sideshow, Eck has also been pursuing other interests in this period. He and his brother were musicians, having their own twelve piece orchestra in Baltimore. Eck conducted while Robert played the piano. Eck continued his love of drawing and painting early on the choice of subjects such as the pretty girls, ships and himself. He was also an avid race car driver and his race car custom built, which was street-legal in Baltimore, “Johnny Eck Special”. In 1938, Eck climbed the Washington Monument on his hands.
LATER LIFE

When sideshows lost popular appeal, the Eckhardt brothers settled in Baltimore. There they bought a penny arcade and headed up a business tax them going bankrupt. In the 1950s, the brothers bought and ran a train used for children in a local park; Eck acting as a conductor. Eck also became a painter screen, having learned the trade of William Oktavec, a grocer and local folk artist who invented the art form in 1913.
Eck would sit on the steps of his porch with his Chihuahua, Major, telling stories about his life. He and his brother often performed Punch and Judy shows for children who come to visit. However, the district Eckhardts “was increasingly less and less secure with drugs and crime. The 1980s brought more customers than the release of the video Freaks attracted a new generation of fans with whom Eck was not entirely at ease, a friend said, “You’d be surprised to see these ‘avid fans. I say they are crazy. “It also regretted not having the money to provide these visitors with a small sandwich or a Coca-Cola as it was plagued by money worries. Eck also had a longstanding feud with his neighbor.
In January 1987, the then 76-year-Eckhardt brothers were stolen from a trial that lasted several hours. One of the two robbers laughed and sat on Eck while the other took his business. Subsequently, Eck came into isolation and the brothers are no longer invited visitors into their home. Eck would go to say, “If I want to see freaks, all I have to do is look out the window.”
On January 5, 1991, Eck suffered a heart attack in his sleep, die at the age of 79 at home in North Milton Avenue, where he was born. Robert followed him on February 25, 1995, aged 83. They are buried under a headstone in the cemetery at Green Mount, Baltimore.
BIOGRAPHICAL FILM

A Hollywood feature film about the life of Johnny Eck was conducted since the 1990s by Leonardo DiCaprio. A script was written by Caroline Thompson, acclaimed screenwriter of Edward Scissorhands. Production will Pelagius Films by Joseph Fries and then produce Leonardo DiCaprio and Joseph Rappa executive producer of the film. Production Notes: James Franco as a possible replacement to play the twins Eckhardt.
The scenario was described as “amazing” and includes a scene where the actor swims against Eck Tarzan, Johnny Weissmuller.
In popular culture

Joe’s song table, which describes a man with no lower body becomes a famous artist, Tom Waits is based loosely on the life of Johnny Eck. It is also mentioned in the opening song Lucky Day Waits album, The Black Rider.

source–wikipedia