Closing of famed circus inspires tribute to professor

In a reflection occasioned by the planned closing of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus, David Lauderdale, a 1975 graduate of Erskine College, has written movingly in the Island Packet about his uncle, Dr. Jack Heinsohn, a circus performer who became a minister and taught at Erskine Theological Seminary for many years. Heinsohn, who died in 2009, was known for his “clown sermon,” in which he applied clown makeup to his own face while speaking about the human propensity for disguise.

Read the entire tribute here.