I hang my head in shame and eat a whole humble pie. Chinko Knox, will your spirit forgive me? Due to long lag time in communication between Europe and Davidson, and my own laziness as a researcher, I badly misinterpreted the meaning of the great, deceased British juggler's nickname cited in the title of the recent European IJA Convention.

I brashly assumed tha the word "Chinko" in "The 3rd Annual Chinko Meeting for Jugglers" was British slang describing certain unknown attributes of jugglers in that country The headline over the story in the last Newsletter read "Large Group of Chinkos Meets In London."

What a meeting that would have been! If 50 Chinko Knox clones had met in one place they could have kept 400 balls aloft simultaneously!

Hermann Sagemuller of Baldigen, W. Germany, who researched Chinko's amazing feats, compiled a short biography of him for the convention report. Sagemuller wrote:

Since early childhood he (Chlnko) derived great plessure from juggling wlth oranges, and by the age of 12 he could Juggle 8 billiard balls by throwing them into the air 2 at a time. In 1904 he presented this trick with 10 balls!

His stage costume as the uniform of an Eton schoolboy, and in the early years he opened his act by juggling a little desk, a billiard queue and a pair of gloves. He also juggled an open umbrella, a travelling trunk and a plate. Then he would do some marvelous tricks with clubs, 5 plates, lamps and burning torches. In later years he could throw up and keep In the air a grammophone key, a grammophone horn and the grammophone itself (actually playing a tune!)

 

Another trlcle he did was to balance on his forehead a figure of a woman whilst throwing a full wine bottle Into the air, which would thus empty Its contents into a glass held In his hand.

Chinko was born In 1884 and married Minnie Kaufmann of the famous Kaufmann Bicycle Troupe. At some point In his career Chinko moved to the U.S.A. for we know that he owned an apartment in Long Island, NY where he died in the 1930's.