In 1949, LIFE magazine sent famed photographer Nina Leen to document the daily life of a sassy troupe of young women who had run off and joined the famous Barnum & Bailey Circus in Sarasota, Fla. What developed was a portrait of a sisterhood formed over acrobatics that mixed high-flying wire acts with fashionable high-waisted shorts. Sarasota was once considered “the home of the American circus”. Here: an aerialist smoking while rehearsing for the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus in Sarasota, FL in 1949. (Photo By Nina Leen/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Ethnic San Chi women dressed in traditional costumes play a friendly football match as part of the Soong Co festival celebrations in northern Vietnam's Quang Ninh province on April 24, 2021. (Photo by Nhac Nguyen/AFP Photo)

American actresses and singers Rachel Zegler and Maya Hawke at the Time100 Next Gala held at Second on October 24, 2023 in New York, New York. (Photo by Nina Westervelt/WWD via Getty Images)

Australia's Nina Kennedy competes in the women's pole vault final at a Diamond League event in Florence, Italy on June 2, 2023. (Photo by Remo Casilli/Reuters)

Wang Shang-chi, 75, a mobile hats vender, rides his bike on a parking lot next to the Taipei City Zoo on July 9, 2020. (Photo by Sam Yeh/AFP Photo)

A couple poses for wedding photos in front of the Saigon Opera House in Ho Chi Minh City on December 7, 2023. (Photo by Nhac Nguyen/AFP Photo)

Canadian actress Nina Dobrev needs an umbrella whilst leaving her hotel in Paris, France on March 4, 2019. (Photo by Splash News and Pictures)

Vietnamese military personnel in traditional dress take part in a parade celebrating the 40th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War which is also remembered as the fall of Saigon, in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Thursday, April 30, 2015. (Photo by Dita Alangkara/AP Photo)