Elephants parade in to benefit Bella Vista Historical Museum

As far as anyone knows, elephants never made their home in Bella Vista — even clear back when it was founded as a summer resort in 1917. But a whole herd of them has arrived at the Bella Vista Historical Museum, a donation to raise funds for the nonprofit.

According to Xyta Lucas, co-president of the Bella Vista Historical Society, which operates the historical museum in Bella Vista, her brother made the gift.

“Max Norton has lived in the Kansas City area for about 60 years, and for almost two thirds of that time he has been collecting elephants of all sizes and shapes made out of a variety of materials,” Lucas says. “Between buying them himself and receiving them as gifts, his collection had gotten so large — his last count took place over 20 years ago when, in preparing for a move, he boxed up 2,000 elephants — that at one point he decided to focus on just ‘functional’ elephants.

“However, that didn’t really slow down the growth of the collection,” Lucas adds, “since there are salt and pepper elephants, watering pitcher elephants, teapot elephants, elephants made to hold earrings, and more… You get the picture! He lined the walls of the basement with shelves to hold his collection and also hung shelves from the ceiling to hold more.

“As Max has gotten older, he had begun to wonder what to do with his collection since his children and grandchildren don’t have the same interest in collecting elephants, so I suggested they begin moving the collection to Bella Vista to be sold as a fundraiser for the museum.”

Now every few months Lucas makes a trip to visit her brother and brings back a couple more boxes of elephants for the museum gift shop shelves. On her most recent trip, he asked her if she would be interested in some of his other collections so eventually, she says, there will be more than just elephants on their way from Kansas City to the Bella Vista Historical Museum.

The museum is open from 1 to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday at 1885 Bella Vista Way. For more information, call (479) 855-2335.

(Courtesy Photos) When your brother wants to start reducing his collection of elephants, if you’re Xyta Lucas, you know just where they need to be — the Bella Vista Historical Museum gift shop.