The stories narrated within the show were mostly in line with other freak show performers, tales of exotic lands where they were either captured, reared as children or forced into slavery. The framing of the exotic within the narrative of the freak show can also be found with the tattooed performer whose body was covered in elaborate drawings and designs. The shows promoted by Carl Hagenback, were exhibited in his zoological garden in Berlin and included Eskimos, Laplanders, Africans, and Nubians. The displays in Germany for example were widespread and Hilke Thode-Arora's important work on Volkershauen reveals a widespread and extensive pattern of exhibition and exploitation from the 1870s onwards.

The staging of these shows within this arena created racial stereotypes that have arguably continued within the popular culture of Europe in the twentieth century. Although acts such as the Hottentot Venus appeared in London and Paris in the early 1800s, it was the exporting and positioning of native people within the context of the zoological garden and the evolutionary show, which became widespread during the later Victorian period. Barnum and International Expositions, native shows appeared in a wide range of venues. The alliance between education and entertainment, can also be demonstrated when one examines the exploitation of native people, by showman and anthropological associations in the guise of the ethnographic show. Travelling fairs and show booths were the mainstay of the side show attraction for many hundreds of years but enterprising showmen and their acts also appeared in museums of curiosities, drawing rooms, and royal palaces. A range of venues were utilised to present side show attractions and performers over its long and varied history. Everything and anything was exhibited under the banner of education and entertainment including, displays of the body beautiful or grotesque, painted panoramic scenes, fasting men and fat women and magic and illusion tricks.

Shows could be found on the fairground arena, within a travelling or fixed circus, in a show of optical and scientific wonder at permanent halls or on the high street.

Shows as the term showman implies were one of the main forms of attraction within the field of popular entertainment in the Victorian era. A Cabinet of Curiosities Presents - A History of Side Show Exhibitions and Acts

Waxworks lost in time