Ruthie (Engford) and Frank Clark

Ruthie Clark travels a road that her father and grandfather journeyed before her.

It is a long, winding road, but wherever Clark finds herself on it in her motor home, she sees a rainbow just ahead.

She is one of the vagabonds of the circus - the third generation of a family from the tiny Wisconsin community of Plover to choose the calling.

‘Born with sawdust in blood’

"I was born with sawdust in my blood, I guess," says the green-eyed daredevil. "When I was a little girl, my friends talked about one day becoming nurses, teachers and housewives. I already knew in my heart then that I was going to carry on in the tradition of my family and stay with the circus."

Clark has been performing as a professional since she was 8.

She moves to a different city every few days, but the place where she reports to work never changes. Its a tiny perch 50 feet in the air from which she, along with her husband Frank, dangles by her heels and toes and scares the bejabbers out of circus audiences.

The Clarke, who bill themselves as "Francarro & Estreleta, America’s premier aerialists," performed here recently during the run of the Tripoli Shrine Circus at the Arena.

Traveled state in 1920's and 1930's

Her grandfather, Robert Engford of Plover, was the operator of the Engford Family Shows - a one-ring circus of a half-dozen or so performers that made the rounds to tiny Wisconsin towns in the 1920s and 1930s In a small caravan of splashily decorated trucks.

Then, early in the 1930’s, her father, Harry Engford, decided he, too, wanted to be a Big Top Impresario. Plover became the home base for a second Engford circus - this one employing the family name of Harry’s wife and titled the Forges Bros. Circus.

Her grandfather’s truck circus began sputtering during the Depression years and finally ran out of gas in 1938. Then, after the 1939 season, her father’s circus returned to its winter quarters in Plover and never again went out on the road.

"I always felt kind of cheated," Clark said. "Both my grandfather and father owned circuses, but I never had a chance to appear in either one of them."

After the demise of the circuses, though, her parents kept trouping, appearing as an acrobatic duo at such events as county fairs. When she was 8, she became part of the act.

Met Clark on the Road

It was out on the road where she met Clark, who was also a performer. They fell in love.

As professional daredevils, the couple decided they should do something a little different to get their marriage off the ground.

Friends and relatives of the bride and groom were gathered in a field in London, Ontario. The calm was suddenly disturbed by a helicopter that appeared overhead. In a moment, Ruthie and Frank opened the door of the chopper and lowered a rope ladder. Then, as a minister inside the helicopter addressed them over a radio, the couple said their "I do’s" while hanging, upside down from a trapeze ladder, several hundred feet up in the air.

For several years after, the Clarks performed their helicopter trapeze feats at fairs and rock concerts. Then their pilot was killed in a helicopter crash that did not involve their act. The Clarks decided to discontinue the stunt.

"We have been very lucky ourselves," said Ruthie. "In all the years we have been performing, we have never had an accident."

The Clarks perform without a safety net.

The old circus winter quarters for the shows her grandfather and father operated a half-century ago still stands in Plover, Ruthie said.