Transcript of interview with Dick Chapter by Stan Hawkins, March 6, 1979

UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter i An Interview with Richard T. Chapter An Oral History Conducted by Stan Hawkins Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas Special Collections and Archives Oral History Research Center University Libraries University of Nevada, Las Vegas UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter ii © Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 2017 UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter iii 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 Richard T. Chapter iv Abstract On March 6, 1979, Stan Hawkins interviewed furniture refinisher, Richard T. Chapter (born January 28th, 1933 in Maine) at his home in Las Vegas, Nevada. During the interview, Richard recalls swimming at the old ranch, going into the furniture refinishing business, and the cost of living in Las Vegas. He also discusses Howard Hughes, the Boulder Dam, and the Union Pacific Railroad. Richard’s wife is also present during the interview and interjects comments about the old Mormon Fort, gambling, local business, and the weather in Las Vegas. UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 1 We’re interviewing Mr. Dick Chapter. He came here in 1946 and he is a furniture refinisher in Las Vegas. Mr. Chapter, where were you born? In (Unintelligible) Maine. What is your present address in Las Vegas? 609 Biljac. When did you move to Las Vegas? 1946. Did—why did you move here? Did the family have anything to do with it or was it the job opportunities? Yes. My stepdad was a cook and he came here to go to work at the Last Frontier, as the head chef out there. Was the job opportunities have anything to do with it? That’s correct. Yes that’s what it was. We came here for the job. Did you go through any education in Las Vegas? Yes. I went to school at Basic High School in Henderson, Nevada. Any college or anything like that? No college, no. Okay. Has the educational system changed much since you know? Well, yes, it’s changed a bunch since I went to school there. Besides growth is it just a system change? Oh yes, the most, simply, when we went to school in Henderson then we had four, you know, we had freshmen through seniors, you know. They don’t have that anymore like (unintelligible) like UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 2 sophomores to seniors and the eighth and ninth graders, separately. We didn’t have that in our day. It’s a lot different now. When you came out, what did Las Vegas look like? Well, when we got here, there was about eighteen to twenty thousand people in this town yet there was not too many clubs or, you had a few clubs up on Fremont Street. You had the Pioneer Club and the Golden Nugget, which was built at that time. Okay. And you had the Boulder Club and the Sal Sagev and the old Eldorado, which is now the Horseshoe Club. Out on the Strip they had the Last Frontier and the El Rancho. At that time, they were just starting to build the Flamingo. Was the land basically just pure desert? Oh. Was there any type of a growth on it like trees and stuff or? Oh, it was just mostly all desert. The only trees were right in the immediate town, you know, the houses and that. Henderson was really bad. What did the early casinos look like with the building frame? Well, most of the early casinos were all, especially the ones out on the Strip were all the ranch style type designs and all that, like the old ranch houses. Nothing like today. The high rises weren’t there. Were there pretty big business back then for the casinos or was that one of the big things in Las Vegas? Yes. That’s all we’ve ever had here, was the casinos, you know, yes, that was it. When did the big buildings start to rise? UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 3 When, well, most of them you know in the late fifties, middle fifties, they started building the high rises and getting away from the lower spread out type ranch style type builds. The town was low wide open back then, in the forties and the early fifties. You could go to town (unintelligible) if you wanted to (unintelligible) you could go in the casinos like that. But a lot of the easterners and that, they moved out here and they, you know, dressed a little fancier and then the old time people would just give it a look, times changed. Oh, whenever they were building the high rises with the new casinos, did it cause any problems in the town? With any type of a congestion? Did it get in anybody’s way? Oh no, not then. It didn’t cause any congestion at all. The most congestion we’ve had has been around here is the last four, five years. (Unintelligible) You used to be able to get around town here in fifteen, twenty minutes, now it’s forty-five minutes to an hour and a half. What were the travelling conditions like, you know? In Bakersfield or? The road? They were all single lane. The road from Henderson to Las Vegas was the only two-lane highway we had, or divided highway. The rest of ‘em were all single lane, ah, and if you got outside the city limits they were all dirt roads. They were all dirt like when I was a kid we took a trip to Twin Lakes and boy that was a big deal going to Twin Lakes. We was going out of town. On your way to work every morning did you have paved roads to go every morning or did you have to go dirt? Oh yes, we had paved roads going around town but, well, when I delivered, I work for Sears, you know, before I got in with the business, and you know, like up in West Charleston area there, when they first start building out there. It was paved most all the way right up to the edges of the UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 4 belt, then after that you went into dirt road like Decatur was all dirt. And we used to travel across from High Park area to the Twin Lakes area on Decatur, which was all dirt road. And this road going right up here at West Charleston here was all dirt, all the way up to Red Rock. About what times did they start changing all that to start paving the outer roads? Well, like Charleston, Decatur, and all that, that was in the sixties, they started having paved roads. I think, you know I don’t remember exactly when the dates were, you know, you just kind of noticed things changing (unintelligible) before you know it, it’s here. Mm-hm. You’ve talked about the population before. Do you feel that the population ratio back then is comparable to now or do you think that this town is really, is boomed with the population? Oh, it’s boomed. It started booming when I went in the service in the 1950. It started booming and then from then it just snowballed. We had a, you know, a small low explosion and we had those couple of years there when we had the recession. But then, right after that, it just kept going and going (unintelligible) right now. They figured what 1980 five hundred thousand people. What were the people like back whenever you moved here? I’ve noticed since I’ve been out here I’ve had trouble meeting a lot of people. Back then when you get eighteen thousand, twenty thousand people in a town, just about everybody knows everybody else. They’re friendly. We had no problems. Have you noticed a change in that, a lot? Oh yes. That’s because of the eastern people, you know, they, they’re harder to get to know. They come like from New York and that and then when you get a bunch of people in from UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 5 different parts of the country and mix ‘em together and they all have different lifestyles and everything and then it’s harder to get to know ‘em. Ah, let’s see, do you feel that through your life, that Las Vegas has really been a nice place to live? The living condition part of it has been good? I love it. It has everything you want. Any kind of recreation you want. It’s a twenty-four hour town. You have fishing, you have camping, your Mt. Charleston up here. I don’t think a guy could ask for anything more. It’s not a bad town, I don’t think so either. Since you’ve been out here has the climate changed much? Yes. The climate has changed. It used to be hotter than it is now. Bu the growth has, with all the trees and lawns, they have more humidity now. The temperature in the summertime here used to run a hundred and fifteen a hundred and eighteen degrees a lot of times, it don’t get up there like that, maybe one or two days now. But most of the time it runs right around a hundred and ten a hundred and twelve. But back in the forties and the fifties it’d usually be running up around a hundred and fifteen a hundred and eighteen for maybe a week or two at a time. What was the humidity like back then compared to now? Oh, it was low. There was no humidity at all. Five percent or something like that. Three percent. Now it’s running, what? Twenty percent, fifteen percent. The temperature has dropped and the humidity came up. In your life have you ever noticed that the weather has caused any problems in the city? Only weather problems we had, we was in flash floods. (Laughs) And that’s because of the way, you know, the flood control was (unintelligible). They don’t—some of these streets that we have like Charleston Boulevard at one time was a natural dry wash and anytime it rained up there in UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 6 these mountains, the water would run right straight down Charleston. So now they paved ‘em and they didn’t make any deviations up here for the water to run. So when it rains the water still runs right down Charleston. And of course we had the other one over there on Flamingo, that was a natural dry wash. And then, because of the building and some of the road changes and this, they have created a few of their own, too. This new Fremont expressway, they’ve got a problem over there every time it rains. I have heard, talking to people about, I’ve heard something about a big mudslide. Did that have any effect or do you know anything about that? A mudslide? Around here? Or it was up in people’s houses and stuff? Okay, well, let’s see, back in, holy mackerel, it was in 1955 and ’56. I think it was in ’55. We had one of the worst floods that we’ve ever had here in Las Vegas, and of course, I, you know, these guys with all these records and everything, they compare this and they compare that and then they say this last one we had was worst than that. At that time the Huntridge area down there was fairly new when them homes were built in the late forties, ’46 on up to ’50. They were all brand new homes. Do you know where Huntridge is? Basically. Well, the old Huntridge Theatre down there on West Charleston, on East Charleston, right about Fifth, about Maryland Parkway. All those homes are called the Huntridge area. And when we had that flood that year, the people in Huntridge opened their back doors and let the water run through the house—and there was mud. It wasn’t a mudslide. But everything was covered with mud. Charleston Boulevard was completely wiped out. I mean, we have these floods nowadays but it don’t tear up the pavement. Charleston at that time, there was two big (unintelligible) on UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 7 each side of the pavement there where it just collapsed. The water dug down underneath the pavement and the pavement collapsed and it was like that all the way down. Bonanza underpass was completely filled and besides it was cars trapped down there in the underpass. Well, this year, I know, as my first year out here, I noticed the big snow we had. Oh well. Is this one of the big rare occasions? We’ve had a few. We had one and we was talking about that the other day, I mean, my wife and I, ‘cause, one in ’49, I believe it was, was probably as big as this last snow we had. Their records don’t coincide with what I remember. We had the last part of January, we had a foot, and in the first part of February, we had a foot. But they were about a week apart. And it all melted in between? Yes. And they were talking about that snowstorm being bigger than this one. But this one dropped, what was it, eighteen inches? You know, all at once. But that one didn’t drop eighteen inches all at once. It was a foot and a foot and about a week apart. I have pictures here. Everybody helped to shovel it. I’ve got pictures here somewhere in the house. (Unintelligible) Yes. Well, it got so bad we had to go shovel snow off the roofs out there in Henderson ‘cause the roofs caved in. They were built for that then? Yes, they didn’t have to do it this time. Okay. Did, the weather when you moved out here, did it cause a change in your lifestyle, from what you were used to? UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 8 Well, no because— You had a heatstroke. Huh? You had a heatstroke. Well, yes, but that’s when I moved to Needles before I came here. But I was just a little guy when I moved out here so, you know, whether, little people don’t get affected by weather like older people would, you know, like moving from extreme cold to extreme heat. A young person can take it more in stride than an older person. I moved here from, you know, New York, but kids sometimes do things that they’re not supposed to do and like I got in trouble down there in Needles when they first moved there, it wasn’t in Vegas. I got out there, running around barefooted in a hundred degree a hundred and twenty degree heat and had a heat (unintelligible) but outside of that, (unintelligible) I love the heat. Okay. Has there been any unusual events of any kind that you can recall, here in Las Vegas? Unusual events? (Unintelligible) Well, you know, what are you talking about unusual events? Like a building caving in or a big fire or? Oh, just anything out of the ordinary. It’s not, you know, I mean something not just like a little house burning down but more of a catastrophic— Well, I can tell you something that’s catastrophic, I guess. It’s probably something that nobody else ever sees in their lifetime. You probably read about it but—when I lived in Henderson we UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 9 used to ride our bikes to the lake, seven miles, and I seen tarantula march, migration, and nobody ever sees that. (Laughs) Hundreds of thousands of tarantula. Where were they coming from? Out of the hills. They formed a line coming out of the hills up there by the old Manganese Ore Plant. It must’ve been ten feet, fifteen feet across, and they were just coming out of the hills up there, far as you can see—tarantulas, marching, and they marched down across the desert, across the highway and then down back across towards the lake. Nobody’s ever, very few people have ever seen that. And that’s just where they stayed, just down there by the lake? No, it’s a, I don’t—it’s a ritual, that these tarantulas go through. I don’t know how many, every so many years. But nobody ever sees it but I did see it. You’re one of the fortunate few, yes? (Laughs) I am. I told somebody else this a while back. He said that, “You couldn’t have seen that!” (Laughs) I said, “But I did.” Because I, when I rode through ‘em on my bicycle I lifted my legs up because there were so many of ‘em, I didn’t want ‘em to crawl and you know, get on my legs, my feet and that. I put my feet up on the handle bars and we rode through ‘em. There was about four of us kids who did that. I wouldn’t have done it myself. (Laughs) It’s a true story, too. I don’t (unintelligible) who’d like to hear that out there. (Laughs) UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 10 Glad you didn’t get a picture of them. I don’t know what they call ‘em, the guy that has to do with bugs and spiders and stuff, you might tell him about that. What was the approximate crime rate when you first moved out here? Low. Crime rate? Kids. Hm. It was low. Very low? Yes. It’s nothing like it is now. Not like today. Just in the last three or four days, we read in the paper they found a body a day out here in the desert. You know, what to you got with eighteen, twenty thousand people at that time the crime rate was low. We used to leave our doors open here. All night? Sure. Yes. That burglaries and kids breaking in and what have you, we didn’t have that. Fifty-five we didn’t (unintelligible) Say about the middle of fifty—yes, we did lock no doors in that day. No. Seem like it, you know, around sixty, could be late fifties and early sixties and then we started having a lot of crime. But then the city was growing too quick. Is that when the high rises started coming in about or, just? UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 11 No. It’s when the city started growing, more people move in, you get more population and your crime rates gonna go up in proportion, yes, you know, the less population you have, the less crime you’re gonna have, that’s for sure. Do you feel it went up in proportion or do you think it’s—? Oh yes. It’s jumped? Yes. Well, look at the town, you know. It’s Las Vegas. You’re gonna have a little more of anything than you have in other places. I imagine, of course, you know, for our population, we do have more than most towns with the same population. But I—we didn’t have too much crime back in those days. Well, what type of police force did you have back then? The type of security or whatever? (Laughs) well, you know— I mean, is it the same basic now or was there a sheriff, deputy? Yes. There was a sheriff. Now I’m tryna think of his name, Jones. Sheriff Jones, I think his name was. Yes. It was, we didn’t have too much problems. I don’t know if I can tell you this on this tape or not. (Laughs) He was kind of a character. He only (unintelligible) he was throwing one of the (unintelligible) recruits out here at (unintelligible) and the town people were getting down on him so he go close it up. But they didn’t know he owned it. And he’d close it up and then about a week later he’d open it back up again. (Unintelligible) Oh, did he run the whole town? I mean, did he sheriff the whole town or just a certain part? UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 12 I don’t think he was as powerful as like Lamb was, you know, Lamb (unintelligible) as far as law enforcement, part of the city. But (unintelligible) wasn’t that prominent. He was just a good sheriff. Okay, let’s see. Our kids got training. Most of the kids around here knew all, you know, policemen and that, you know, it was just like one big happy family. Okay, when you moved here how—well, ‘cause you were young but, as you got older, how was the cost of living compared to other places in the United States? Well, that’s you know, I talked to other people and some people say the cost of living is higher than it is here. Food is higher, rent is higher, living here thirty-four years I really can’t tell you how it is to other places. (Unintelligible) You know, well, I was a kid in school, my mother, if you’re talking about the cost of houses and this and that, why, my mother bought a house down on North Sixteenth Street in 1950 and she paid six thousand dollars for a three bedroom, two bedroom, I’m sorry, two bedroom. She paid six thousand dollars. (Unintelligible) That same house now costs forty thousand. But the land should include that, too. Land was cheap here, at that, you know, back in those days, land was cheap, and course it’s gone up proportionally, you know, just like everything else has here. But as far as the cost of living, I can’t tell you. (Laughs) Because my folks was the ones that, you know, that made the money, UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 13 and my stepdad was the one that worked, I didn’t. The only thing I did was set (unintelligible) for going out or delivering papers or some such thing in order to pick up a few bucks here and there. Was Lake Mead far whenever you moved out here? I heard you talking about the Twin Lakes was that—? Twin Lakes? That’s right down there in Twin Lakes area. We, what were you asking me about that? Did—was Lake Mead, Lake Mead? Yes. It was? Yes. Right. What do you think that’s done for this town? Oh it’s done a lot. Lake Mead gives us all our water, that’s for sure. (Unintelligible) I used to spend all my summers out at Lake Mead, years ago. Course I don’t care too much for it now like I used to. You go out there now and so many boats and water skiers and it’s not the same as it used to be, you know. It was kind of a private lake for me. Then you could go off somewhere there, now in Vegas Wash you could walk down the shoreline two hundred yards and be by yourself. (Unintelligible) The place (unintelligible) with boats and skiers. Have any of the problems with pollution in Lake Mead? Always has been. That’s the largest—they had an article there in the paper not too long ago from the base out there, “Largest Stagnated Pond of Water” in the count—in anywhere. “Cause it just sits and the plants out there they always empty their junk into the lake and then the sewerage plant empties their junk. Course it wasn’t as bad back in ’46 or ’47, or ’48 as it is now. Because UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 14 we didn’t have the conglomerate of people there, that we do now. But there’s a lot of more pollution out there now than there was. Well, back in ’46, ’47, ’48, was there a lot or was there just a minimal amount? Oh no. It was nice out there. We used to swim at Vegas Wash. If you ever been out there you, at Vegas Wash, there’s some old beach houses that sit way back up. The water used to be all the way up there and it was a nice sandy beach. Yes. We used to spend a lot of time there. It was pretty clean then. It’s not clean now. No doubt about it. When did the growth in schooling take place? The, I mean, the expansion of the high schools, the JS, and even UNLV at that matter. Well, you see, once you get out of school you kind of lose contact with, you know, what schools, what, you see, when I went to school, there was Las Vegas High, there was Henderson out there, and the old Fifth Street School, which is what they call Las Vegas Boulevard now, and that was it. And then, after that I think Rancho went in. You see, I got out of school in 1952. That’s when my graduation date was in 1952. That was out of high school? Yes. So, and then Rancho went in, you know, right after that, you know, and then, I guess it wasn’t long after that, I think, what is it, Clark? Mm-mm. It was (Unintelligible) I mean high schools. Probably Valley, I think. Mm-hm. God, they’ve got so many schools now, you know, we had two schools there, actually three and we—well, we had the old grade school down there on Twenty-Fifth or Eastern, whatever they UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 15 want to call it now, that was one of the first schools. But I guess they build these schools as they need ‘em. So it was just basically because they needed a new room and not just be—? Well, yes, they needed—the people moving into this town, you know. The biggest extraction started right in 1950, right after, you know, I got out and went in the service. And from then there it’s been a gradual climb right up to what we have now. In fact, I think they’ve built more schools. We still need schools. We still need more schools but they’ve built more schools here in the last ten years than I’ve seen built while I was going to school. They just seem to spring up all over the place. Did you or anybody else in the Las Vegas area, do you like the fact that UNLV was gonna be built? Oh yes. You bet. We needed it. You know, this is the biggest city in Nevada. What are we doing? We have a college up there in Reno, you know, most of the kids wanted to go to college and stay in Nevada had to go to Reno, you bet. It was a great thing for UNLV to come along. Do you remember anything about the atomic tests? The underground—? (Laughs) Oh yes. Can you tell me a little bit about that? What do you want to know about that? Everybody was panicking when they were gonna have ‘em. We’ve had quite a few of ‘em. And the ones that I really didn’t like, like when we had the surface blasts. The ones that were, you know, people were more afraid of then anything else. Then at the time when they were having those surface blasts, and I think you’ve been probably UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 16 reading in the paper, you know, about the fallout that they’ve had up in Utah, in the southern part of Utah, up around Mesquite, St. George. Sorry, I’ve never heard about that. Well, at the time that they were having those, we were in (unintelligible) and we used to sit there in our restaurant and look out oh, after they set one of those blasts off, you could see the clouds floating, the radioactive clouds, headed towards Utah. And then, of course, right after that you’d read in the paper, the next day or two, that a bunch of sheep were dying off or— (Unintelligible) They were saying that the cattle were sick and that ANC kept telling us there wasn’t any fallout and we have nothing to worry about. But it was bad; besides look at all the land they took from us for that. Was there any adverse side effects on any, you know, buildings? No. Or people? Except for, you know, like if you had a small earthquake, you know, very small earthquake, you can get a little building slate here and there. But there was no collapse of any type? No. Not that I can, never even read about it, maybe a few broken windows you know, but nothing serious. Are they still going on with these now or—? Underground tests? They’ve (unintelligible) they just had one about three weeks ago in the valley, if you’re talking about atomic bomb tests. UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 17 Did they do that because of the desert land out here just being all open? They thought this was the best spot. Well, they thought it was probably the best place, it was the least populated, at that time that they set it up. Were you ever the head of any organizations of any kind or involved in any organizations? No. None. None whatsoever. How was the, well, when was the airport put in? When was the airport put it? God, I can’t remember what date or year. You mean, the Hughes air terminal out here, right? Yes. McCarran International. McCarran International. It’s been there a long time. It’s been there as long as I have, I believe. But was it— (Unintelligible) Was it kind of a—? It was a little old small airport, you know, but I can remember, oh, that’s been here since in the forties, probably before that. ‘Cause see Nellis (unintelligible) even out there in forty—before the war, Nellis Air Force Base. And I know McCarran’s got to have been there since I’ve been here. ‘Cause we used to drive right down to it on Paradise Road and then take a little jog and go around it. Now you gotta go clear down to Eastern to get around it. Before Paradise, you used to go, you could go all the way though from Paradise, clear to Sunset. I don’t know if you know anything about the streets or anything but now you can’t. Paradise dead ends down there (Laughs) and you have to take a lift and go clear out to Eastern to get around that airport or you used to be able to drive right straight down Paradise to Sunset, that’s how much it’s expanded UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 18 since I’ve been here. But it was here, it was here. It’s got to have been there as long as I’ve been here. Has there been any industry in this city or anywhere around? Not until just recently. The only industry that we have had here is the gambling industry. I was gonna say, is there anything that’s helped put Las Vegas on the map besides just gaming? No. Gaming is what did it. But now, you know, of course, big businesses is finding out, I guess, they get a big tax break by having some of their warehouses and what have you, like Levi Strauss went in up there and there’s a couple of more, I understand that’s going in. And—but as far as industry, no. They haven’t helped us a bit. (Unintelligible) Oh, Howard Hughes was gonna put in a big air terminal in here, oh man, back in the forties. But they froze him out. He owns all this land west of (unintelligible) Who owns it now? Howard Hughes. Still? It’s still Hughes’s land as far as I know. But he was gonna put in a big aircraft factory here and that and, back in the late forties, you know, and all the big wigs here froze him out. So he went to Florida and put it up. He said, to heck with this. But he still owns the land out here. Or his, Hughes’s Enterprises does. What happened during the energy crisis in this town? Did they ever worry about energy in the younger days? Or I mean, in the older days? UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 19 No. They never had no problem none, back in the early forties and fifties. Course energy prices affects every town, you know. Yes. Not only in Las Vegas but what it did here is they had to shut down their lights and that on the clubs, first time in—since I’ve ever been here, that they had ‘em off, you know, to conserve energy, and it looks like we’re gonna have the same thing here pretty soon. Just at night, I mean they have to keep ‘em off at night, and, or do they just—? No. they shut ‘em off period. Shut ‘em down to a minimum. Then they were operated with the minimum amount of electricity that they could get by with. Was gaming—I know it was big but was there as many people coming in and losing and betting the big money as there are now? We’ve always had, especially from California, we’ve always had a lot of, you know, gamblers and people coming in from California and losing their money and that. ‘Cause I heard when I moved out here that there was a lot of people that they would bet their cars, they would bet— They’d bet anything. (Laughs) (Unintelligible) Oh, actually, well, you know, you see different things here while you’re in town, we, my wife worked, you know, she worked Downtown change girl and waitress for a couple through the years and we’d go down, I’d go Downtown to pick her up or something, we’d be standing around watching people gamble and we’d see a couple there one night, little girl, her life savings. They sold her farm, they were on their way to California, they was gonna retire. UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 20 What game were they playing? (Unintelligible) Blackjack. Blackjack. He lost his wallet. He—they lost everything, man. The whole works, they lost right there on that blackjack table. Mm-hm. He took—in the Boulder Club, the old Boulder Club, he took the whole table and he was playing the limit per hand. I give him money to go back. And his wife kept going. She says, “Honey, you’re gonna lose it all.” He says, “I’ve gotta get it back.” He never got it back. They—he lost everything that he owned, right there. (Unintelligible) And at that time I think it was over, a little over a hundred thousand bucks he had. But at that time that wasn’t bad. He could retire on that, back in the forties or fifties. When was that (Unintelligible)? Five. Fifty-five. You could live, you know, you could, it wasn’t an overabundance of money but you could retire on it and if you had social security coming in— Did you ever go up in the mountains much? Oh yes. All the time. (Laughs) You just, I mean, was there anything up there just besides mountain, or, like now they have, I know the couple lodges up there and—? Mt. Charleston? UNLV University Libraries Richard T. Chapter 21 Mm-hm. Oh, they’ve always had a lodge up there. But the old lodge, the original lodge burnt down. Yes. I can’t, you know—have you been to Mt. Charleston? Love it! Okay. You know as you’re going up the canyon there