Saturday, November 03, 2018

MIX #7


6 comments:

Chic Silber said...


Delicate artwork by Big Bobby

Roger Smith said...

Gene Garner on Circo Bell, a one-time partner of our own Duchess Rebecca Apponey.

Chic Silber said...


Is Circo Bell still in operation Roger

Roger Smith said...

If it is, someone in CHS may know. I just went around the internet and did not find Circo Bell anywhere.

While we're at it, what the hell happened to Circo Atayde?

Chic Silber said...


Very Sadly that great Mexican

family circus closed in 2014

I had a few opportunities to

work on their Christmas shows

in "DF" Distrito Federale

Roger Smith said...

If anyone comes back to this Circo Bell question, all I could find was this:

No mention of their operation, either ongoing or closed. But...

I did find Mexico's "Elephant Locations - Elephant Database", listing a total of 7 elephants owned by Circo Bell. One of these was "a" Modoc--I don't know how this one fits into the string of Modoc stories. Notes have her arriving there in 1963, and dying in 1966. Don "Okie" Carr came to Jungleland in '66 from Circo Bell, and told us then that Mexico had a rep for losing elephants. He didn't believe it was due to substandard care, but might be blamed on both a serious change of quality diet as grown there, and also to the widely-known contaminated water. Okie himself almost starved to death down there, and was grateful Jungleland took him in and gave him work until he returned to Carson & Barnes in '68.