Transcript of interview with Hazel Hedges by Irene Rostine, October 29, 1997

An Interview with Hazel Hedges An Oral History Conducted by Irene Rostine, M.A. ______________________________________________ Las Vegas Women Oral History Project University of Nevada, Las Vegas 1997 ii ? NSHE, Women’s Research Institute of Nevada, 1997 Produced by: Las Vegas Women Oral History Project Women’s Research Institute of Nevada, UNLV Dr. Joanne L. Goodwin, Director Irene Rostine, M.A., Interviewer Tamara Marino, Transcription iii iv This interview and transcript have been made possible through the generosity of donors to the Women’s Research Institute of Nevada. The College of Liberal Arts provides a home for the Women’s Research Institute of Nevada, as well as a wide variety of in-kind services. The History Department provided necessary reassignment for the director, as well as graduate assistants for the project. The department, as well as the college and university administration, enabled students and faculty to work together with community members to generate this selection of first-person narratives. The participants in this project thank the University for its support that gave an idea the chance to flourish. The text has received minimal editing. These measures include 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. In several cases, photographic sources (housed separately) accompany the collection as slides or black and white photographs. The following interview is part of a series of interviews conducted under the auspices of the Las Vegas Women Oral History Project. Additional transcripts may be found under that series title. Dr. Joanne Goodwin, Project Director Associate Professor, Department of History Women’s Research Institute of Nevada, Director University of Nevada Las Vegas v Preface Attracted by the warm desert climate, Hazel Hedges moved from Kansas City to Las Vegas, in 1952, with her husband and son. The oldest of thirteen children, Hazel was exposed to the construction industry at an early age while working side-by-side with her father in the lumber business. Her first informal involvement in real estate occurred when she withdrew $400 from her own savings so her father could purchase 20 acres of land in the Kansas City area. These early experiences with her father proved to be very beneficial during her real estate career. Upon her arrival in Las Vegas, she initially went to work at the Thunderbird as a waitress in the dining room, but just long enough to pay for carpet and furnishings for the family’s newly purchased home. Hazel then became a stay-at-home mom until her son was in junior high. It was then that she decided it was “her turn.” “Dying” to get into real estate, in 1960 she went to work for the Census Bureau during the day and attended real estate school at night. After passing the real estate exam, she went to work for Bond Realty. At Bond Realty, she had success in commercial real estate. A year later, she passed her brokers exam before transferring to Parkway Realty where she gained experience in selling land. However, her primary success in real estate would come from selling houses, as well as investing in land and residential properties personally. Her first investment was a two-and-a-half acre parcel purchased from funds her husband won on a Keno ticket. After leaving Parkway Realty, Hazel went to work for Deshoor, Fair, and Davis, a real estate office which she eventually bought and renamed Southside Realty. vi As Southside Realty grew, Hazel eventually secured a contract to sell FHA (Federal Housing Administration) repossessions. At the time, one of Hazel’s colleagues, Jessie Emmett, handled FHA repossessions on the north side of town and encouraged Hazel to get involved on the south side of town. This led to significant growth of Southside Reality which eventually expanded into two divisions, with one division focusing on real estate sales and the other division focusing on FHA repossessions. Eventually, Hazel’s son joined her and they operated Hedges and Wade Realty with two offices, one on each side of town. When Hazel first became involved in real estate in Las Vegas, Sahara Avenue was an unpaved road known as San Francisco Street and on-the-job training for real estate sales people consisted of nothing more than a desk, a phone, a pad of paper, and a pen – you learned as you went. Through her oral history, Hazel shares how her involvement with the Board of Realtors helped her career and how important the designation of “Realtor” is. She also discusses the role the Board’s Women’s Council played in creating formal training programs for realtors, as well as allowing women to be viewed on a level playing field with men in the real estate business. She is quick to point out, “If you go in quietly, pretty soon you’re in before they know it.” As a business woman with a full plate, Hazel still found time to give back to her community through volunteer work, including the Assistance League Las Vegas’ Operation School Bell Program, which provides clothing for area school children in need. Hazel’s self-sufficient, matter-of-fact attitude is evident in many of the experiences she shares through her oral history relative to how she made her way in the Las Vegas real estate industry. One such example she shares is when she was faced with a lazy vii contractor who was running behind schedule. Hazel simply said, “Well, I’ll just tell you something. I’ve got a whole case of whiskey. I’m coming back at three o’clock this afternoon with it in the trunk of my car and, if you’re through, you can have the whiskey and give me the keys to the house.” Needless to say, he was through when Hazel got back and she got her keys. Hazel’s life experiences, inner strength, and no-nonsense approach contributed to her successes and to the Las Vegas community in many ways over many decades. As she shares in this oral history, “I had lots of self-confidence. I really believed that I could do it because my dad raised me that way.” Hazel Hedges most certainly did "do it." viii An Interview with Hazel Hedges An Oral History Conducted by Irene Rostine, M.A. ix 1 This is an oral interview with Hazel Hedges on October the 29th, 1997 at Las Vegas, Nevada by Irene Rostine. [Tape 1, Side A] Good afternoon, Hazel. Hello. Before we start our interview, I’m going to read you this Deed of Gift Agreement so that you thoroughly understand what we’re doing here. It says [agreement read]. Is that agreeable? Do you understand the terms? It’s agreeable to me. Thank you very much, Hazel. Hazel, could you tell me when you first came to Las Vegas? 1951 and, then in 1952, I came again and bought a house. What were the circumstances that brought you here? Did your husband have a job? No, we had no jobs. None at all. We just wanted to come from the cold country of Kansas City and we were coming here every year on vacation anyway. So, when we got serious about moving here and giving up the cold and the snow, we looked at San Diego and we looked at Las Vegas. It was January and San Diego didn’t look good in January, but Las Vegas looked really good. So, we beat it back here and I bought a house that was a concrete slab to be finished in ninety days. We went back to Kansas City and gave ninety-days’ notice where we worked at a private country club. We expected the house to be ready in ninety days. We came with everything. It was just like we left it, a concrete slab. What did you do then? We lived in a worst place that you could possibly live, across from where the Showboat is now in a motel called, I believe, the Blackjack, for ninety days. Terrible. 2 What did you do with all of your furniture and things? We checked it in someplace because we had a U-Haul we had rented. So, we checked it in someplace. I don’t remember where, and left. Either that or we kept the U-Haul at the motel and paid the rate on it. I don’t remember which. I don’t think we ever unloaded it, really. We probably left it in the big thing we brought it in with Jim’s bike strapped on the side and the ice skates. I said, “You mean you’re taking the ice skates to Las Vegas?” [Laughing.] Jim is your son? My son. How old was he? He was in the third grade when we finally moved in the house. Sunrise Acres School, which was nothing, but Army barracks up on concrete blocks about three feet off the ground with big cracks. You could see the sun shining underneath the building all day long in the sand. It wasn’t what we thought Las Vegas would be like. You probably were thinking the glamour and the glitter. Well, we were thinking of a decent place to live more than anything. We never dreamed a school would have the sun shining underneath the building up on cinder blocks. Was there a housing shortage at that time? There was one or two subdivisions being built and that seemed to be all. It was sort of just catch-up after World War II? I don’t know if it was really catch-up. I don’t think it had anything to do with World War II except people began to move about, it seems, and they were looking for better climates. It was time to make a move, apparently, for lots of people. I think that World War II did create a mobile society and people started to move. They’d 3 been other places and seen what was on the other side of the fence. The other side of the mountain looked good. That’s right. Did your husband get a job then after you came back and you were living at the motel? Oh, yes, right away at the Desert Inn. What did he do there? Wait a minute. We both went in the Thunderbird and applied for a job. I went to Louis Saldini, who was the maitre d’ in the showroom. My husband went to the front desk and we both met in the lobby in five minutes and we both had a job. That was really fast? [Laughing.] Then I said, “But wait. Look in the dining room. They’re holding those trays up in the air and walking around. I can’t do that. I better go back and tell the maitre d I can’t do that. I never did that before.” I went back and he looked me up and down and he says, “What’s the matter with you? You can do it. Come on to work.” So, I came to work that night not knowing how you hold that big tray up there with all these things on it. Then I found the girl in front of me. She went to pick her order up from wherever you pick it up in the kitchen there and it’s shoulder height. The table it comes off [and it is shoulder height.] So, here you are and you’re at attention. I saw a young man pick a tray up ahead of me and I sort of waited and when he came back, I said, “You’re doing that?” He said, “Oh, yes.” He was from Nellis [Air Force Base]. Young, lots of young airmen working. I said, “How much does she pay you?” and he says, “A dollar a night.” I said, “Will you work for me too?” and he said, “Yes.” [Laughing.] So you hired somebody to lift those trays? Then he would stop at a stand and you’d have to toss the salad in front of the customer. The 4 Cherries Jubilee had to be flamed in front of the customer, but the maitre d' did that. You’d have to make the baked potato with the sour cream and chives in front of the customer. So, you had to put on a show. You were in the showroom anyway. So, you did your little act every night. [Laughing.] I did my act every night and I looked forward to the day when I could quit which was when we had paid for the furniture and the carpet. That took two years is all. Was this for your new house? Yes, for the new house. Then when we got that paid for, I quit work and stayed home because I had Jim. He was in the fourth grade then. I had always read you were supposed to stay home with the kids until they’re big enough. I stayed home until he was a junior in high school and then I’m dying to buy real estate, to go to work, to do something. I figured he’s going to make it. So, I went to real estate class. One of the banks downtown had a class taught by Charlie Collins who, at one time, had been President of the Board of Realtors. If you could pass that then you could take the state exam. So, I did that and at the same time I took the census for 1960. I stayed up all night working on my real estate exam because the next day was real estate exam day. With the census you had to meet weekly deadlines. You had to have everything out of your office in the mail by midnight on Saturday night. So, I had no time to sleep that night, but I passed the exam and went to work for Charlie Collins. I can’t remember what he called his company. Bond Realty it was called. That was in 1960 then? Yes. What was the test like that you took in 1960? Was it eight hours? It was an all-day thing if that’s what you needed, if I remember. I didn’t take the broker’s exam 5 then. I just took the salesman. I took the broker’s exam about year later because I found this was for me. I didn’t want to be at the bottom of the ladder. I’d rather be up a few rungs. So, I took the broker’s and I had the highest compliment that Mr. Collins had ever given anybody. He wasn’t one to hand out compliments. He said, “I’ll tell you now, I knew you were the one that was going to make it when it came to women in real estate.” [Laughing.] So, that was like pouring honey in front of a bee. You came back for more? He did nothing, but brag on me. He had such a tiny little office. He was out of town and I thought, “There are no listings here.” I found one that had expired on a supermarket over on Lake Mead Boulevard, but when I looked it up, it had expired. It belonged to a man in business downtown. I can’t remember his name off hand. Yet, it was expired. I thought, “Well, I know who to sell it to,” because the book I read said that the person occupying the space is the logical buyer. So, I thought, “That sounds reasonable.” I thought, “I’ll go over and sell it to that kid who is renting it, the grocer.” I went by his office. He had a printing company. I can’t remember that name. I had to extend the listing. He didn’t change the price, just extended it. I went over there and I stayed four hours. It took me four hours. First, he told me he didn’t have any money to buy the building. It might have been called Lake Mead Supermarket or something like that. Whatever the name of the street was, that’s what it was named after. But the book I read said that the person occupying the space is the logical buyer. It didn’t say anything about whether he had money or not. So the more I talked, the more convinced he became, apparently, and he called his father. When I left there three hours later, I had sold it to him. Signed, deposit, and everything. Was this your first commercial sale? 6 Oh, yes. Of course my boss, Mr. Collins, was out of town, so I didn’t get to come in and yell, “I did it.” Then, when I went to the owner to give him his copy, he was mad because he didn’t think anybody would buy it. He really didn’t want to sell it that bad. He was mad at me and threatened to sue me. So, I stopped in Chuck Peter’s [an attorney] office downtown over at the Woolworth store there. I’d met him through the university in taking my classes. I said, “You know, I think Mr. Collins needs an attorney. I don’t know what to do.” He said, “I’m his attorney.” [Laughing.] Talk about luck. I’ve had so much luck that it scares me. I think perseverance was part of it. What about the training Mr. Collins gave you? Gave me none. No training? None whatever. This is 1960 early real estate. So, you got your license, went to the office, and went to work? Told you nothing. There was nobody in the office, but he and me. He was out of town a lot? He went out of town a good bit. He was graduated from Yale University. He had all kinds of certificates. He was the best walker they had. That means hiking and I had to hike downtown to someplace. Down there where you got cheap food every day at noon. He was going ninety miles an hour and that was about six blocks down there. I got lots of walking in. Where was his office located? Ninth just off of Fremont Street. It was called Bond Realty. I could always ask him something if he was there, but he was always gone out and about. He originally came from back east. 7 You said you picked up this book and you read it and it sort of gave you a clue on how to sell a property? Is that how you learned, initially, how to do these things? There wasn’t any place to go to learn anything. The Board of Realtors had nothing to offer. There was no place to learn anything. Did you join the Board of Realtors when you first started? Yes, absolutely. I had to because Mr. Collins being a member and ex-president, it was just taken for granted that you would belong to the Board of Realtors. If he was realtor, then everybody in his office had to be a realtor? I guess. I don’t know if it’s that way now. It was when I started. I’m sure it’s been that way forever. Were there any benefits to you, do you think, by joining the Board of Realtors? Were they able to help you? There were no educational classes offered at that time. The title company had sort of begun, but you didn’t have to be anything to go to their sessions. You could just be the general public? Yes, just about. Then they held their meetings in the lobby of F.I.B. [First Interstate Bank], if I remember, on Third Street it seems to me, somewhere down there. So, actually you had your phone and your pen and your pad? And my own little room with no windows. Waiting for the phone to ring? He advertised very little. I didn’t stay with him too long. How long did you work for him? I stayed about a year and then I went to Parkway Realty. Rex Claridge was the broker. They 8 specialized in land, more or less. He hated houses. He’d just run if someone mentioned a house, but we sold everything anyway. It was a prominent location rather than hidden away from everybody on North Ninth Street. Where was he located? On Maryland Parkway between Lewis and Clark somewhere right in there. Which did you like best, land or houses? Well, I liked both, but I fell into houses because I was closer to houses. I was nearer to houses. I had no problem with the land because he took me out. I will say this for him. Mr. Collins, he took me out with his car and we would go out and he showed me how to locate section corners and all those little homestead, two-and-a-half acre parcels. I could read the marks and walk the lines. Lots of those were out there where the airport is now or just south of there. In fact, the first piece of property I bought was a two-and-a-half acre piece of land. The man wanted twenty-six hundred dollars for it. It was out there off of the Tonopah Highway. It’s covered with houses now. I paid his asking price. I offered less and he wouldn’t take it, but I asked for six months escrow. I was really wheeling and dealing. [Laughing.] Getting a little money together there? Well, my husband had a Keno ticket for ten thousand dollars and he gave me the money. I paid the car off and I paid something else off and something else off and I still had money left. Enough to pay twenty-five hundred dollars for that little two-and-a-half acre piece of land which I sold for three times that much within less than six months. What year was that? It was probably in ‘63. So, ten thousand dollars really went a long way in 1963? 9 Considering you could buy a car for three or four thousand dollars, yes, and a house for twelve thousand and five hundred dollars. I knew what houses cost and I knew what cars cost. I didn’t know what anything else cost except groceries. [Laughing.] What were the boundaries at this period of 1960? Las Vegas was a lot smaller then than it is now? It didn’t go near Henderson, of course. We went out where the airport is now for those two-and-a-half acre pieces. But that was country-like? That was really out in the “boonies” off the old L.A. Highway and Mr. Collins would drive his car right down out in the middle of the desert. He didn’t get stuck or anything? No. Well, once he did and I was late for a meeting. When I got there they wanted to know what happened to me and I said, “Well, Mr. Collins broke his steering panel or something there in the desert and we had to walk.” I hope it wasn’t summertime. [Laughing.] I don’t remember getting sunburned or anything. The city itself was not very large? There was no Sahara. That was called San Francisco Street and it was not paved. Where the Sahara Hotel is now was the Club Bingo. I think that belonged to some people that eventually made the Sahara Hotel out of it. If you went across the railroad tracks, there wasn’t much in that direction. You could go out the Tonopah Highway and find those two-and-a-half acre parcels out there. There were a lot of those out there. [They were] homestead parcels, but they couldn’t get a title unless they made the improvements which was a well and a habitable 10 dwelling. I was in shock when I found out what a “habitable dwelling” was. It looked like an outhouse from Kansas. [Laughing.] Cardboard or wood? It was made out of rough slab lumber. Had a roof on it. Supposed to be called livable? I guess it was if you were a miner out in the desert. The only high school in town was Vegas High. Of course, there was no thought of a university. It was a pretty small town? I want to think that it was around ten thousand people, but I’m not sure. You had a car then, so you drove yourself around town? Oh, yes. I had a car and my husband had a pickup truck. We each had our own transportation. When did you decide to go into business for yourself? How did that come about? Well, I worked for Mr. Collins and then I went over to Rex Claridge’s Parkway Realty and it seemed so simple. I was gung-ho and it seemed too simple. Real estate didn’t seem a bit complicated as far as I was concerned. I understood the documents. Of course we have lots more now. I understood mortgages. You made more sales by handling everything. It just wound up that you were selling more houses than you were land, so it’s obvious that you’re going to tend to your listings. You’ve got more listings in houses than you have in land probably. Land doesn’t take much attention and the listing’s going to expire if you don’t sell it. There was a different reason for selling your house. It was either to leave town or buy a better one because new ones are being built and are beginning to come in. It was real crazy then. I don’t know which I would have made more off of, land or houses. I don’t know. I think houses at that time, but people began to come in from California and they’d buy a piece and just hold on to it until doomsday. There’s no profit made if people are buying and holding. 11 You sold this piece of commercial property, the supermarket. How did that wind up? Did the sale go? It wound up he backed out. Somebody backed out. I don’t remember. It never did close, but everybody had agreed and the contract I wrote agreed with [the negotiations]. He didn’t want to give him a chance to perform. I thought, “Well, this is ridiculous.” You had this experience with a commercial sale and you knew about land? You had your residential sales and then you opened your own office? Well, no. I left Parkway Realty and then I worked for Dick Davis, Don Fiore, and Doug Deshoor. They owned what they called Deshoor, Fiore, and Davis. We had the whole duplex there on the corner of Sixth and Sahara. One day, they came in and walked through the office and said, “Well, we are no more. Does anybody want to buy this?” Al Levy was working there, but he was out of town. I said, “I do.” I stood up and they said, “Okay, come on in,” and I bought it that day. Just like that? Just like that. What did you call your business? Southside Realty. Doug helped me. They drew me up a logo and all this and they thought Southside Realty was a good-sounding name to sell residential real estate. So, I was Southside Realty. I stayed there in that one building and Doug had moved across the street on that corner in a building. Then, I didn’t want as much room as I had in this whole big building, so Doug said, “Come on over to my place.” So, I went over to Doug’s and worked out of there about a year under my own logo, Southside Realty. Then, I began looking for a place to buy. I think that was 1967 when I came down here to Pardee who was selling his duplexes. Talked to the 12 man there. These duplexes were new then, in 1967? Fairly new. They had mostly been sold. I think they had tenants in some of them and they were selling those, too. I talked to him and he said, “Why don’t you buy that one on the corner down there?” and I said, “Well, I didn’t know it was for sale.” He was talking about the one on the corner of St. Louis Avenue. So, we talked and we made a deal and I bought it that day, subject to my getting the zoning, which I got no problem. That’s where I stayed until I quit. When you were working on Sahara, in the old Doug Deshoor building, did you work alone there or did you have any agents working with you? I had agents at first, but the ones that wanted to stay there, stayed, but they began to dwindle away because they wanted their own business, too. So when I moved over to Doug’s office, it was just me. Then, I knew that if I would get an office, I wasn’t going to pay rent anymore. That’s all there was to it. I didn’t want to be shuffled around. So I bought this, applied for the zoning, and everything went just perfect. Nobody complained. Nobody got up in arms and said, “No, no, no.” That’s where I stayed. What was it like when you were working alone by yourself? Did you have to do clerical work, your office work, and selling? Oh, yeah, everything. That didn’t bother me. I just wanted to be free of that. That’s why I needed an office where I could afford a secretary. I needed a place big enough to afford a secretary and one or two salesmen. That’s when you really took on salesmen is when you moved on to St. Louis? I never took on any until I moved on this corner. How many secretaries did you have? 13 Well, I had two secretaries. I had one secretary at first and I probably had eight or nine sales people. Then these FHA repossessed homes became an item. I knew Bob and Jessie Emmett very well and Bob said, “Why don’t you go down and bid on that on your side of town.” They had that side of town. I said, “Do you think I could get it?” He said, “Sure.” So, I went down and took the exam. I don’t think I bid actually. I took the exam because there was no price involved. I got the contract. So, you sold the FHA repossessions on the south side? We rehabbed and marketed all the repossessed on this side of town. Everything this side of Main Street, I guess is what it was, and Jessie and Bob had the other side of town. When you rehabbed them, this is because people had moved out and torn them up? Oh, yes. A lot of times they were abandoned almost because when people were evicted, the house just sat there boarded up. So, we un-boarded and put everything in ship-shape and then marketed them. Did people run off with the air conditioners? No, no. Well, I don’t recall anything tragic at all about it. I just don’t. I don’t think people were into that that much unless it was in a bad, bad neighborhood on the Westside over there where the black people lived. I didn’t have that. I’m sure there was some of that in certain areas, but we didn’t have any of it in this area that I can recall. We got all of North Las Vegas, too. I don’t recall vandalism. Maybe spray paint here and there. They weren’t even defacing the telephone poles and the curbs with spray paint in those days. I guess that’s something that came later. Everything was boarded up anyway with boards. We had to board the windows and things. When you did this rehab, did your husband help you? 14 No, no, no. We had contractors that did all of it - roofers. I used to climb up on the ladder, clear up to the top, and they’d say, “Oh, you can’t come up here Mrs. Hedges.” I’d say, “You get out of my way.” I had a superintendent, a big black man that worked for me named Larry. He was the sweetest thing that ever walked and he was so good. You couldn’t find a better man that Larry. So by then, I had to have a secretary for that department. Up to then, we were only using half that office building, but then I cleared out the other half and we had a back door and a front door and the FHA operated out of one half and Southside Realty the other half. What was the makeup of your sales force? Do you remember if it was mostly women, men, fifty-fifty? It was about fifty-fifty I think. When you had this crew and you were operating the office, did you have some kind of training for your sales agents? The Board of Realtors had something if I remember. I didn’t have any real training. Most of the people that came to work for me had come from some other office. I didn’t really having any training programs. When they came from the other office, they already knew a little bit of what they were expecting? If they were brand new, of course, I hovered over them a bit, but I didn’t say, “Well, this is the way you sell a house,” and lay out a program and talk them to death until they say “yes.” For some reason or the other, it was easy for me to recognize when I had a sale already made and then you would shut up. We did have sales meetings once a week for the crew, reminders and things like that and talk about the market, and talk about things we’d seen. Everybody would have a bit to say. I did notice that a property would almost sell itself a lot of times and then an 15 agent would scare the sale. I used to think, “Ah-ha, they bought it,” and then I would not stay close to them. I’d let them stay far enough away that they could talk to each other a bit. I remember one day I looked out the window and the two of them were out there talking under the tree and I thought, “Ah, they bought the house. I can tell.” It wasn’t difficult to sell a house because it’s like selling anything, I guess. If you have the pneumonia and I offer you the cure, you’re probably going to take it. Yeah, and be glad to get it. If it’s obvious to you that this is the cure, it wasn’t hard to sell a house. No way. You don’t just show them everything in the book. Of course, we didn’t have multiple listing at first either. Did your sales agents belong to the Board of Realtors, too? Oh, they had to belong also. At the time you opened your office, there was no multiple listing service at that point? When I opened my office, yes there was. I believe we had, up in the Hair-Schroeder Building on the second floor, we met every Friday morning and talked about our listings. We didn’t have a book yet or anything. We took a bus and went and looked at new listings. That was the extent of it. Do you know when the multiple listing really started to come in? We were stumbling along, really, until we hired Gene Nebeker. We didn’t have an executive officer of any kind. That’s for the Board of Realtors? Yes, and when Gene Nebeker came in, we went to lots of seminars in California and other places and we saw what they had to work with. Then we decided we needed an executive officer and a building of our own. That’s when things really began to hum and be sort of 16 online. You could talk to each other and nobody was going to steal anything from you. You knew that you’d better have a listing and have it signed and things like that. You couldn’t work on somebody’s word. We had a lot of classes then and seminars. We didn’t have that the first seven or eight years I worked. We’d have to go to California or go to something in another city. That’s what you did then, in order to get a little training, would be to attend a seminar out of state and come back with what you’d learned? California or Phoenix or wherever it was and then we would try to come home. [End Tape 1, Side A] [Begin Tape 1, Side B] We were talking about the Board of Realtors and Gene Nebeker being the person that did the organizing? We needed somebody to hover over us and let us know what was going on in other places. This was a pioneer town in everything I ever heard of from the day I arrived here. We had to learn all this stuff that everybody else knew and we found that out when we went out of town. There was so much we didn’t know. There were so many ways to handle things that we didn’t know. We needed somebody here to organize us so that we were all on the same track and working with each other and doing it right and getting a bit of a