Bertha

Description

A few words about the artwork by the artist, Jaxon Northon. “Bertha, an Indian elephant at John Ascuaga’s nugget, was the longest-running casino act in Nevada history, running from 1962 to her death in 1999 at the age of 48. She was born in 1951 in the wild in India and captured in 1956. Bertha performed circus tricks and lived in the Elephant Palace at The Nugget for 37 years. Throughout her life, She met the likes of The Beatles and Liberace. Which to her probably didn’t mean much. During her life at the casino, she was joined by Tina, who arrived in 1979 and was transferred out in 1989. Then Angel from 1989 to 1999, when she was sent to the Fort Worth zoo. I remember feeding peanuts to Bertha as a young child and though it was a life-changing experience for a boy to come into such close contact with such an amazing and powerful animal from the other side of the world, I choose to picture her not having died in a parking lot in Sparks, Nevada, but still running rampant and free through the desert.”