Such performances continued to be widespread through the middle part of the twentieth century, with Hermines Midgets brought from their performances in Paris to appear at the 1939 New York World's Fair, the same year that MGM released The Wizard of Oz, which featured 124 little people in its cast, most of whom were from the Singer's Midgets troupe.
There have been movements to remove the use of the word "midget" from age classification categories in youth sports, with Hockey Canada announcing that it would refer to the division as "U18" in 2020 as part of a wider renaming scheme.
As of 2025, at least four high schools in the United States continue to use midget as a school mascot.
In 2019, Hurley High School in Wisconsin changed its Mascot from midgets to the Northstars. In 2025, a Iowa State Senator Molly Donohue introduced a bill to prohibit schools receiving state aid , including Estherville Lincoln, from using "discriminary mascots" including midgets. Also in 2025, an advocacy filed a federal discrimination complaint with the U.S. Department of Education against the St. Clair County school district over the mascot at Freeburg High School. State Rep. Maurice West submitted a bill to the Illinois House of Representatives that would ban the mascot by 2028. The House passed the bill on April 8, 2025. A similar bill was introduced in the Missouri House of Representatives.
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"midget". Webster's II New Collegiate Dictionary (2nd expanded ed.). Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin Company. 1999. p. 693. ISBN 0395962145. 1. An extremely small person who is otherwise normally proportioned. 0395962145
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Merriam-Webster Dictionary Entry for midget: sometimes offensive: a very small person; specifically: a person of unusually small size who is physically well-proportioned.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/midget
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Merriam-Webster Dictionary Entry for midget: sometimes offensive: a very small person; specifically: a person of unusually small size who is physically well-proportioned.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/midget
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