Flipping Out

Perhaps a handful of kids at Harvard have juggled before an audience. Fewer have broken their noses doing a back flip into a metal equipment box. And it’s safe to assume that there’s only one whose mom has beef with the Ringling Brothers.

Quincy House resident Jack M. Marsh ’06 could probably tell you a lot about concentrating in economics, growing up in New York City—and starring under the big top as a bona fide circus performer. Since the age of two, Marsh has trained as an acrobat and juggler in Circus Flora, a one-ring circus production operating out of St. Louis.

Now, at 19, Marsh is a seasoned performer, and a member of what he calls the “inner world” of circus performance (and no, that doesn’t mean he hangs out with bearded ladies and ape boys).

Marsh’s mother, Circus Flora’s co-founder and artistic director, immediately immersed her son in the “totally different lifestyle” of circus performance, says Marsh. By 7, he regularly starred in his own juggling and tumbling act. And, adds Marsh’s mom, “by the time he was 11, he was juggling fire and under the mentorship of Hovey, the juggling master.”

“When I was little, I had nothing to do but practice,” Marsh says. Apparently, idle children make for great circus sideshows.

Marsh did his best to turn in papers and finish assignments in high school, but minor technicalities like calculus homework couldn’t stifle his blossoming circus career.

“I wasn’t gonna let my teachers not let me go to performances,” Marsh says. Despite his truancy, he graduated as salutatorian of his class and he flipped off the stage at the conclusion of his speech. Unconventional, to say the least.

Economics problem sets consume his time at Harvard, but Marsh continues to do shows during the summertime—sometimes up to twelve performances a week. Ms. Marsh adds, “Last year he took his final exams and that night flew down to South Carolina where we were opening, arrived in our muddy lot, and performed the next day.”

He has been able to squeeze in juggling time with Harvard’s premiere juggling club, but says he only tumbles when he is out to “impress girls.” FM asked for a sample back tuck, but Marsh concluded that such a feat might be a little inappropriate in the Quincy dining hall. FM regrettably concurred.

Most of Marsh’s friends and blockmates know about his forays into the “oftentimes embarrassing” world of the circus, but he’s not one to gloat. Modesty kept him from telling his freshman year roommate, who only discovered Jack’s talents after Googling him. “That was kind of weird,” says Marsh.

But Jack is rightly proud of his circus career, though he’s a tad embarrassed by some of his costumes. “I do a tumbling and juggling act with kids from the inner-city,” says Jack. As part of this act, Jack sports a leotard and a sequined do-rag. “It looks good on the kids,” he says, “but I just look ridiculous.”