Jacksonville University confers doctorate on Nellie

Historic City News congratulates Nellie the Dolphin for another huge milestone in her half-century career entertaining visitors to Marineland of Florida — today, Nellie, who turned 60-years-old on February 27, received her honorary doctorate from Jacksonville University.

Nellie has been moonlighting as the official mascot of the Jacksonville University Dolphins athletics programs for more than three decades. Today, Derek Hall, the university’s Vice President of Marketing, joined Marineland Dolphin Adventure President, David Kimmel, and Vice President and General Manager, Kurt Allen, to present Nellie with her well-deserved diploma.

Former university president, Dr. Robert Spiro, and former JU Student Government Association President, Nancy Sanford, once made their own trip to the oceanarium park just south of St Augustine in the fall of 1970 — to officially “adopt” Nellie as the Jacksonville University mascot.

Nellie is the world’s oldest living Atlantic bottlenose dolphin in captivity. She was born at Marineland in 1953 and was one of the park’s featured entertainers for decades.

In 1995, Florida Leader magazine named Nellie as the state’s “Best Mascot” saying, “Jacksonville University athletes and sports fans don’t have to settle for seeing their school mascot just on T-shirts – they can visit the real thing.”