Koo-Koo the Bird Girl

Woolsey was born in 1880[3] in Rabun County, Georgia. Little is known about her early life, only that she was "rescued" from a mental asylum in Georgia by a travelling showman and was commonly billed as Minnie Ha Ha (a play on Minnehaha) in her sideshow entertainment career. She had a rare congenital growth skeletal disorder called Virchow-Seckel syndrome, which caused her to have a very short stature, a small head, a narrow bird-like face with a beak-like nose, large eyes, a receding jaw, large ears and mild intellectual disability.[2][4] In addition, Woolsey was bald, toothless, and either completely blind or very short-sighted. She would appear in an American-Indian style bodysuit made of feathers with a single feather on top of her head as her costume and would dance and speak gibberish.

She appeared in the 1932 film Freaks, alongside a cast of other sideshow performers from the time, billed as Koo Koo, the Bird Girl. She was not the original Koo Koo however; the billing was previously used by another performer in the film, a "Stork" or "Bird" woman named Elizabeth Green. Woolsey is seen in many scenes, particularly at the wedding ceremony, where she is seen dancing on the dining table in a feathery costume. In 1942, a news brief in Billboard reported that Woolsey was recovering in Coney Island Hospital after breaking her arm while descending stairs.[5] She was hit by a car in the 1960s. When and how she died is unknown.

Koo Koo in 1924 (picture top, fourth from Left), was well known for her sideshow career with Ringling Brothers

• The Manchester-based Gypsy folk band Naymedici released a single titled "Koo Koo the Bird Girl" in memory of the entertainer, with a video featuring scenes from Freaks.[6]
• Australian performer Sarah Houbolt created a performance called Kookoo the Bird Girl. Speaking to Disability Arts Online, Houbolt said “My full length show, KooKoo the Birdgirl, is about Minnie Woolsey, a historical performer with disability, who starred in Freaks (1932). This is an art history piece, and a female perspective on the side show. My passion to uncover her story is as a result of the importance of telling our history from a disability perspective. Minnie lived in a time of compulsory sterilisation and anti-marriage laws for disabled women, which not many people know about.”[7]
• She is mentioned in Tom Waits's song Lucky Day (Overture) from his album The Black Rider, about sideshow performers.[8]

• Elizabeth Green the Stork Woman

• Biography at Phreeque.com