Martin Joe Laurello went by various names, including The Human Owl and The Man with the Spinning Head.
What makes Martin special is that he has turned his head 180 degrees which is given to very few people. The reason was congenital scoliosis.
Like many other people with notable birth defects, Martin imagined performing in circuses, including Ripley’s Believe it or Not, Ringling Brothers and the famous Barnum & Bailey Circus.
He has also performed in museums and amusement parks and has always attracted large audiences. Martin was also particularly good at training dogs to perform various circus acts, but he also trained cats for the same purpose.
There isn’t much about Martin Laurello’s childhood and formative years, or his adult life until he was over thirty.
He hasn’t always had the ability to be able to turn his head around that too.
However, he always had more agile neck muscles than most, but it took three years of uninterrupted training before he reached the 180 degrees he was looking for.
For this, among other things, he had to practice loosening several vertebrae, which can hardly have been very healthy.
He could not eat with his head turned away but drank and smoked. And ku have done a lot of both.
He married twice, his first wife was Laura (Precht) Emmertling and they had one son, Alexander, born in 1905. They divorced.
In 1921, a group of people from the European continent came together and went to the United States in search of fame and fortune in the circus world, when Europe lay in ruins after World War I.
All had in common ailments or very particular physical particularities.
How this group of people from several European countries managed to come together and plan such a trip is probably hidden from most people, since almost 70 years have passed since the internet brought people together.
Circus owners were immediately charmed by Martin, who was able to claim big payouts to turn heads for a hefty fee.
He remarried a year after his arrival in the United States, a woman named Emilie (Wittl) Emmerling. They had two sons, Albert, born in 1922, and Walter, born in 1926.
Martin’s colleagues didn’t have much good to say about him. Later, Martin said that he had been a staunch supporter of the Nazis since their coup began and that he hated the United States with all his heart, even though he had moved there as a matter of course. willingly and enriched by curiosity. people there.
In 1931, while Martin was performing to a packed house, or rather a tent, the police stormed the stage and arrested him for abandoning his wife and two sons. Emilie then sued her husband who had cut off the family unexpectedly.
It seemed a pretty serious accusation in those years.
Martin deftly managed to escape this trap and watched closely during the war years, knowing that the authorities were watching him because of his ties to, or at least support for, the Nazi cause.
According to most people he met, Martin Joe Laurello was not a particularly decent or amiable man who was willing to get rid of friends or family members if necessary.
He was to earn a fabulous sum of money during his career in the United States despite his declared hatred of the country and is known to have even spat on the country’s flag.
Martin died in 1955, a rich man, but lonely and, it is said, bitter.
