Transcript of interview with Paul Bowerman by Frances Harelik, March 5, 1976

UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 1 Interview with Paul H. Bowerman An Oral History Conducted by Frances Harelik Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas Special Collections Oral History Research Center University Libraries University of Nevada, Las Vegas UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 2 The Oral History Research Center (OHRC) was formally established by the Board of Regents of the University of Nevada System in September 2003 as an entity of the UNLV University Libraries’ Special Collections Division. The OHRC conducts oral interviews with individuals who are selected for their ability to provide first-hand observations on a variety of historical topics in Las Vegas and Southern Nevada. The OHRC is also home to legacy oral history interviews conducted prior to its establishment including many conducted by UNLV History Professor Ralph Roske and his students. This legacy interview transcript received minimal editing, such as the elimination of fragments, false starts, and repetitions in order to enhance the reader's understanding of the material. All measures have been taken to preserve the style and language of the narrator. The interviewee/narrator was not involved in the editing process. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 3 Abstract Frances Harelik interviews IBM computer engineer Paul Bowerman in Las Vegas at Harelik’s home. Born in Wolforth, Texas in 1929, Mr. Bowerman relocated to Nevada in 1954. Other places Mr. Bowerman has lived include: California, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Illinois, New York, Minnesota, England, and Japan. From Mr. Bowerman’s perspective this interview provides insight into life in Las Vegas from 1954 to 1976. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 4 This is a Nevada History Oral Interview Project for Doctor Ralph Roske, done by Francis Harelik. Today’s date is March the 5th, 1976. My informant’s name is Paul Bowerman. Paul, how old are you? 46. 46. And where do you live? 4695 Gabriel Drive, in Las Vegas. --And your telephone number? 451-2426. Were you born in Southern Nevada? No. And it’s Nevada, not Navada. (Laughs) Right. When did you come here? December the 27th, 1954. Why did you and your family, or did you come alone? No. I came due to business reasons. Business reasons. Did you have any brothers or sisters who moved here? No. Okay. Were you, did you go to school at all in Southern Nevada? Nevada, excuse me! (Laughs) Not in the normal schools, here. We did have some training here, but it wasn’t of the scholastic type. Okay. What occupations? At the time that I moved here I was employed with IBM as an engineer of electronic equipment, the computers at the test site. Later on I went into pest control, ladybug pest control. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 5 Okay. Was it, okay, you had a job when you came here, so— Yes. Mm-hmm. No problem with finding a job, then. Do you have any children that were born here? I have two. They were born here, a daughter and a son. ‘Kay. How were the hospital facilities at the time? Small and inadequate. Sunrise wasn’t here at the time? Sunrise wasn’t here, Desert Springs wasn’t here. As a matter of fact I just broke a chair. Don’t worry about it. Had that been broken before? No. I probably in the move, that’s okay. Okay, so I’m sure your wife would have liked better hospitals? Yes. She would have liked better hospitals. Southern Nevada Memorial was here, and it was the only, it was the only hospital of any size here. Mm-hm. Have you lived at the same address? No. I lived at 1409 Eastwood Drive, when I first moved here. But always in Las Vegas? Yes. Okay. Okay, so you were married when you came here? Yes. Mm-hmm. Okay. Never avail myself of the divorce (unintelligible). (Laughs). Okay. When you came here was housing easily obtained? UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 6 Only if you had enough money. Hmm. So did you find an apartment? Or— It was a, no, I bought a house. But it was, I bought the house under rather peculiar circumstances. The man that lived in it before was requested to leave town. Oh. (Laughs). Rather peculiar. (Laughs) Was there any problem with water or heating or cooling at that time? Not in the house that I bought; however, in some of the outlying districts around town, telephones were at a premium. You might have to wait anywhere from three months to 18 months for a telephone. Wow. Okay. Course you saved a lot of money that way. Yes. (Laughs). Was there plenty of food available? Yes. There were big stores like there are now? Oh yes. Mm-hmm. Transportation into Las Vegas? Didn’t seem to be any shortage of transportation into Vegas or a way greatly improved now, but of course the influx of people has got a lot greater than it was then. Right. I assume gasoline was easily available at that time? Yes. No problem there. Okay. Is or was church activity an important part of your life? Yes. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 7 Which church? Church of Christ. Okay. Do you remember any visits of presidents, or any important people to the Las Vegas area, Or any, oh say, accidents, or just any news, big news items? I don’t recall any special trips that any of the big politicians made. I never was involved much in politics, and I figured that they’d do their thing, and I was gonna do mine, so I didn’t pay much attention to ‘em. They could come and go as they pleased. Okay. My next question was, were you or are you active in politics? Which you just answered. (Laughs). No. (Laughs). I’m not active in politics. Are you a member of a social club or other special interest group? Not of a social club. I am a member of the, of a business group, but it isn’t a social function, it’s for the promotion of business. Okay. Would you like to give the name of that? Or— Well, it’s the Las Vegas Executives Association. Okay. Is or was gambling an important recreational activity for you or your family? No. You save a lot of money. Ah, Yes. (Laughs). What other kinds of recreation do you seek? Either you alone, or your family? Oh, hunting and fishing, water sports. Okay. --Camping. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 8 Okay. Have you camped out at Mount Charleston at all? Yes. Yes. How is it? Well, it used to be real nice, but anymore of a, there’s almost too many people. Hm. They (unintelligible) the area for good camping facilities now, it’s too commercialized now, as compared to what, as compared to where we do camp. And I assume the weekends you can forget it, right? Yes. On the weekends, forget it. Right. I don’t even like to hunt on the weekends, because there’s too many people. How about Lake Mead? You said fishing. Every opportunity I get. On Lake Mead? On Lake Mead, Lake Mojave, Upper Colorado, Ruby Marshes upstate, up at Wild Horse Reservoir, a number of places that we utilize. ‘Kay. Do you or anybody in your family ski? Only water skiing, no snow skiing. So, Lee Canyon? Lee Canyon as a skiing resort doesn’t hold any interest for me. Mm-hmm. But it’s a nice place to camp, nice place to go for picnic, hiking, and this sort of thing. It’s real pretty up there, one of the prettiest places around. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 9 Mm-hmm. Yes, it is. It’s beautiful now, a lot of snow. Yes. Have you travelled much in Nevada? Quite a bit, quite a bit; from one end of it to the other, just about except for around Reno area. Have not gone there. Mm-hmm. Anything special in Southern Nevada you’ve seen that— Oh, nothing really special that I can think of, except it’s a state that you have to get used to. There’s not a lot of greenery here, so the barren hills and the rocks, and the ruggedness of the country sorta kinda has to grow on you. Right. But once you get away from it and you’re someplace where it’s real lush and green, enclosed in and tight, you long for the open spaces. Hmm. It’s a different feeling here than it is elsewhere. The atomic tests, do you remember anything about the early ones? Yes. I remember a number of things about the earlier ones. One of the most remarkable- memorable things to me is being out on the lake early in the morning and all of a sudden seeing the sky light up just as if it was daylight, for just an instant or two, like about 4 o’clock in the morning. It’s kind of a funny feeling. Frightening? Well, not frightening as much as it is that you wonder what’s going on and then you remember that its some test was scheduled and then you dismiss it. There’s been several the last couple months I believe. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 10 Oh, last couple of months there been several, but these were all underground tests, and of course, here you’re on the 9th floor, I imagine you feel ‘em pretty good. Yes. (Laughs) In my home we feel ‘em and you can see the chandelier shake and the plants in the house wiggle and the animals get excited and I think maybe I’m feeling a little sick in my stomach that morning and then I realize that it’s just a test that’s taking place. Have you had any damage to your home? No. Not due to that. Mm-hmm. ‘Course everything else gets blamed on those tests. True. True. (Laughs) You know, if the weather is bad it gets blamed on it. If it’s too hot it gets blamed on it, if it’s too cold it gets blamed on it. If you don’t make any money that month they blame that on it, and, so, it seems like a whipping boy for the general public, and it does. Well, it is interesting. Like you say, the 9th floor does shake. (Laughs) Everything gets blamed on the tests. Have you noticed a lot of economic changes since you came here, in Southern Nevada? There’s one thing that is stable about Southern Nevada, and that is change. Mm. True. Ever since I’ve been here, it is been a constant state of change and growth. If it wasn’t growing upward and outward, it was settling inward, in, from one stage of depression to a high stage of growth the next year, and so it’s rather remarkable that there is a constant change. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 11 How about the casinos when you came here, were all of these casinos here, or have some been built? When I moved here the last hotel on the Strip was the Flamingo, and the first one that was on the Strip was the El Rancho Vegas. That was the first one that was on the Strip. There was only about, shortly after we moved here they built the Sahara. It was just a very small place when we first moved here. Then it wasn’t too long after that until they began the Riviera. I think the Sands was here, then. But on the Strip itself, going toward Los Angeles, the last thing was the Flamingo. There was nothing past the Flamingo. Wow. So, there’s been a lot of building done since, then? Oh a tremendous amount of building. The, I heard a report before the Stardust opened that while they were in the construction stage, and before it opened that the first quarter’s gambling taxes on the Stardust Hotel was to be $637,000 for their first quarter’s estimated gambling taxes. Gee. This was, had to be put up before they ever opened the front doors. That would have to be before they were opened. Before they ever opened the doors. Were there any clubs, you know? Number of clubs Downtown, it hasn’t changed really. No. The tallest building in town was about four stories. There was no Fremont Hotel or Mint Hotel or anything of that sort, Downtown. It was small, small buildings. How about restaurants? UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 12 Well, even then, it was plenty of places to eat, and you could get reasonable food, here, at reasonable prices. Probably more so than now. Well, even now, it’s, I think, even now, the prices here, for what you get-- Are quite reasonable. Are more reasonable then they are in a lot of other places. Right. Shopping? Grocery shopping? You said there were plenty of grocery stores. How about clothing and— There were plenty of stores in that, from that point. The town was about 30,000, then. The growth at that time there was probably 6- to 8000 people employed at the test site. Quite a lot of people. And, yes, it was a lot of people employed out there, and one of the biggest changes they made was when they widened up the “widow-maker” and made four lanes out of it instead of two. The “widow-maker” is the highway that opened to the test site from Las Vegas. Mm-hmm. Is that the one that goes toward (unintelligible) right now? Well, it goes up toward Tonopah. Right, right, right. Raleigh, I suppose is out that area, yes. Is toward that, right, okay, have you noticed any environmental changes? Like have the summers gotten hotter, winters? No. I don’t think the summers have gotten any warmer or hotter. The only change that I’ve noticed over the years is the humidity in July and August has risen considerably in the summertime. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 13 Do you think that’s because they built more swimming pools, and more fountains, and there’s more— I think it’s because of more people and more houses and more watering of the yards and things like that. Right, right. I don’t think swimming pools have anything to do with it, very small part. So, just more water being used? I think it’s more water being used, more plants, and plant, and yards, and this type of thing. Right. How about pollution? Oh yes. Big change in that. Big change in pollution, we used to never have any smog in Nevada. Even now the smog level is not really terrible. But some days. But it’s a lot worse than it was. Now then, only a few days out of the year, you’ll see, a yellowish haze over the town. But you used to never see this. Never, it was always clear. Okay. Couple years ago, I believe it snowed down in the valley? Oh yes. As a matter of fact it was a— Has that happened more than once? We moved here in ’54, and in February of ’55, we had about six or eight inches of snow, it lasted for about four or five days, and then the next big snow that we had that lasted for any length of time was about two years ago, and it lasted or about two weeks, about eight or 10 inches, pretty then, real pretty, yes. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 14 Mm-hmm. Yes. Okay, how about flash floods? Nearly every year, nearly every year. Some small, some large? Some small, some large, a flash flood is peculiar, it doesn’t seem to make any difference where it wants to hit. It goes. (Laughs) It may rain extremely hard in a very small area, maybe only a few thousand acres, or it may rain generally over the whole valley. But I’ve seen some areas that were struck by flash floods; about two years ago Nelson was washed away by a flash flood (unintelligible). That’s south of here? Yes. It’s down on the river. A very sudden flash flood hit, and I was there the day that it hit. I left about an hour before it struck. Fishing? And it wasn’t, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky when I left at 12 o’clock and it hit about 1:15, 1:30, and everything was gone, restaurant, cars, people, boats, trailers, trucks. Were you fishing? I had been, I been there and spent the day. You left in time. Just in time. How about strong winds? Now, what was that last week, week before last, we had some 73 miles an hour— Yes, uh-huh. Is that an oddity? UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 15 Well, we’ve had some that hit close to 100 at times, but they’re unusual. They’re not a common thing. How about dust storms, sand storms? Well, sand storms, pretty common in the valley because of the amount of building, construction. Right. A lot of dirt’s being turned up, and it’s loose whenever you get any kind of a wind, well, you get sand whipped around. Mm-hmm, right, okay. Let’s see, how about social changes since you’ve come here? Las Vegas has always been a big town with little town ways. It’s, when I first moved here I was dealing with the public, a lot of the secretaries of attorneys and what have you, and everybody knew everybody else. Even though the town was about 30,000, it’s still a great deal that way at the business community of Las Vegas is a very close knit group. It isn’t like a lot of other big cities of say 100,000. It’s still a big town with little town ways, and sooner or later they’re gonna have to grow up. Mm-hmm, right, okay. Is there any, oh, about special events or anything. Celebration in this state, the statehood was October the 31st, 1864, do you know if they’ve had any special celebrations? Well they, the only special celebration I can recall, it was Helldorado that year, was somewhat larger than normal. Do they have that every year? But they have the Helldorado every year. Generally it’s in May, and it’s very much like the bicentennial, except they celebrate it every year for about 10 days. Any special time during the year? UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 16 Well, Helldorado generally occurs in May, about the middle of May. But so far as actually having a particular birthday celebration, I don’t recall. Okay. Okay, your occupation now? Pest control operator. Right, have you seen any great changes in the rodents and the insects? Varmints that I deal with? Yes. As more people move into the area different types and kinds of insects move right in along in with the people. We’re more concerned with household type insects, and naturally as people move here from all over the United States, and even from overseas, we run into different problems that weren’t present before. None of these household insects are native to Nevada. Hmm. There not any of ‘em native to this spot, with exception of a few like the scorpion and the rattle snake. Right. And packrats and lizards and things of this sort. Are packrats something like field mice? No. A packrat is a peculiar type of a rat. He is kinda like a trader, he will always swap something for the thing that he carries off, and they carry off a very number of things, and they store ‘em, pack ‘em away. But they are not like the normal rat that you run into in the big cities, they’re not like the Norwegian rat, or the roof rat, they’re a different pack. (Laughs). Hm. So, what kind of insects and things do you find in the houses here? Oh, we have five different kinds of cockroaches, two different insects, the family of bristle tails, which is called a fire breathe and silverfish, we have the European earwig, clover mite, and the UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 17 springtails. We have the red spider mite, and we have black widow spiders, the brown recluse spider, and we have brown dog ticks. We have an assortment of pantry pests, such as the saw tooth green beetle, and various kinds of moths that feed on grain products. All of these have been brought into the area by people moving in from other places. In people’s clothes, and furniture, and so forth? Mm-hmm. A few years ago the grapeleaf skeletonizer was trying to be controlled by the state. But it wasn’t native to this country, it was brought in from California, and very shortly the state department decided they couldn’t handle it, so they just released it. They stopped any control on it, they weren’t able to control it anyway. Now then it’s a yearly pest that everybody has to deal with and they try to raise Virginia Creek (unintelligible) any kind of grapevines, and it literally strips the grapevines. Hm. The bark off of the vine? Or— No. it strips the leaves. The leaves. It strips the pulp right out of the leaf itself. Hm. How about, wildlife, okay, the rodents? Rodents, we have house mice, and field mice, and a few gofers, but no rat problem, as such, no, not any of the big rats that you normally associate with big towns. However, it’s a matter of time, just a matter of time. There’s plenty of places here for them to survive, and plenty for them to feed on. Do they need water? Or— Oh, they need water and food and a habitat and there’s plenty of that available. Mm-hmm. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 18 The only thing it’s missing is the rats. Right. It’s just a matter of time until somebody brings them in, I don’t think they would do this intentionally. No. (Laughs) It’d be accidental. But when they do, then we’ll have a problem. Mm-hmm. How about snakes? You get, find snakes in people’s homes you have to— Occasionally, more, we find ‘em more in the yards than we do in the homes. Do you eliminate those, too? Ah, yes. As a matter of fact I got a call about two months ago to get a rattlesnake out of a house and a hotel. Woo. (Laughs). That’d be a surprise, wouldn’t it? (Laughs) Yes. Okay. Anything special you’d like to tell me about? Well, Nevada is a peculiar place. It’s, a number of old stories about Nevada, but I think perhaps the one that’s a best suited is that you wear out a pair of shoes in Nevada, and you’ll never be happy living somewhere else. Mm-hmm. And we see it happen all the time. People decided they’re gonna move someplace else to live for a while and they do and one day they call up and say, “Hey, Paul, how about coming out and servicing my house. I’m back in town again.” And this has happened a number of times. People move away after they’ve been living here for a while, they move back to some town where they UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 19 roll up the sidewalks at five o’clock in the evening, and then they want a loaf a bread and they can’t find a place to buy one, they move back to Las Vegas. You can certainly find a loaf a bread anytime here, right? That’s right! Or anything else that you want. True. True. (Laughs) One more thing, old ranches around here, like the old Stewart Ranch, do you know anything about that? Or— No. I’m not familiar with the old Stewart Ranch. I was involved with an outdoor barbecue here about four or five months ago out at the Vera Krupp Ranch; it’s now the Spring Mountain Ranch, State Spring Mountain Ranch, and it’s quite a place to see. It’s opened on the weekends, and this barbeque that we had was for the Fish and Game Convention, involved Fish and Game officials from all over the United States. Mm-hmm, they were here, about 4- or 500 men from different parts of the United States were here at a barbeque that was given at the Vera Krupp. It was kind of an interesting thing. It’s a nice place to visit. Where is that located? It’s, the Vera Krupp Ranch is about halfway between here and Pahrump, its right up in the mountains. Nice paved road going by it, you don’t have to go by horseback to get back into it like you might have at one time or another. Okay. Would you be willing to participate in a longer interview if requested? Oh, I think so, it would just depend on what the questions were. Okay. UNLV University Libraries Frances Harelik 20 (Laughs) Thank you. (Tape ends)