The Dionne Quints

With the surge of reality shows about large families and multiple births, do you know there was a famous Canadian multiple in the 1930's?

The Dionne quintuplets born May 1934 outside Callander, Ontario, Canada are the only female identical set of five ever recorded.

The Living Channel was non existent yet, but that did not stop the world from observing how the girls grew.

After four months with their family, they were made wards of the King for the next nine years under the Dionne Quintuplets' Guardianship Act, 1935. The girls were placed in a house which allows people to observe them while they go their "not-so"ordinary life.

Approximately 6,000 people per day visited the observation gallery that surrounded an outdoor playground to view the Dionne sisters. The Quintuplets brought in about $1 million, and they attracted in total about $51 million of tourist revenue to Ontario. Quintland became Ontario's biggest tourist attraction of the era, at the time surpassing the Canadian side of Niagara Falls.

Cute though they may be but their story is not as cute. The Ontario government gained much from them ( in 1998, they received monetary settlement for their exploitation), there were allegations of abuse, un-normal lives, and so on.

Be it 1930's or the 2000's -- multiples fascinate us -- but making them entertainment is not fun at all.