Bert Nelson (Cardbert Nelson Snyder) learned how to train big cats at the Selig Zoo in Los Angeles before taking out his own wild animal act, both in vaudeville and circuses. He also appeared in early silent films and as a stunt double in Tarzan movies of the 1930s.
A regular with Mabel Stark on the Al G. Barnes Circus in the 1920 and early 1930s, Nelson moved to the Hagenbeck-Wallace Forepaugh-Sells Circus in 1935 when Clyde Beatty shifted to the new Cole Bros Railroad Circus. Beatty trained all new cats for the Cole Bros. Circus and Nelson performed with the same lions and tigers that Beatty had worked in the early 1930s. In 1937 and 1938, he was part of the Al G. Barnes Sells-Floto show.
Bert Nelson retired from performing about 1951 and died in Ventura California in June of 1975. He was 74 years old.