Transcript of interview with Bill Sheehan by Claytee White, July 1, 2009

An Interview with Bill Sheehan An Oral History Conducted by Claytee D. White The Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project Oral History Research Center at UNLV University Libraries University of Nevada Las Vegas ©The Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project University of Nevada Las Vegas, 2007 Produced by: The Oral History Research Center at UNLV - University Libraries Director: Claytee D. White Editors: Barbara Tabach and Gloria Homol Transcribers: Kristin Hicks and Laurie Boetcher Interviewers and Project Assistants: Barbara Tabach and Claytee D. White ii The recorded interview and transcript have been made possible through the generosity of Dr. Harold Boyer and the Library Advisory Committee. The Oral History Research Center enables students and staff to work together with community members to generate this selection of first-person narratives. The participants in this project thank the university for the support given that allowed an idea the opportunity to flourish. The transcript received minimal editing that includes 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 accompany the individual interviews. The following interview is part of a series of interviews conducted under the auspices of the Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project. Additional transcripts may be found under that series title. Claytee D. White, Project Director Director, Oral History Research Center University Libraries University Nevada, Las Vegas iii Preface B.ll Sheehan describes his Philadelphia, PA, upbringing: Catholic schooling, importance of education and growing up with numbers (his father was a bookie). Knowing he might be drafted, he joined the Marine Corps in the 1940s and then returned home to finish he studies to become an accountant. In 1959 he became a Certified Public Accountant (CPA). A short term job in California gave him a taste of the west. It was 1962, Las Vegas was growing and experiencing a shortage of qualified accountants. Bill applied for a CPA position and immediately was hired. Thus, began his permanent residency in Las Vegas. Bill talks about his professional life and how he eventually started his own firm in 1971. He retired in 1997. He also shares personal anecdotes, impressions and observations specifically about the growth of Henderson, Nevada, as it grew from a very small town adjacent to Las Vegas into a small city of over 200,000 people. Bill is a co-trustee, with Bob Clark, of the Boyer Charitable Foundation. This interview and many more are possible through the generous donation of the Boyers. iv ORAL HISTORY RESEARCH CENTER AT UNLV Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project Use Agreement Name of Narrator: \Jj L-L./ A f~i J- •% Name of Interviewer: We, the above named, give to tWOhil History Research Center of UNLV, the recorded interview(s) initiated on [ j as an unrestricted gift, to be used for such scholarly and educational purpo^s as shall be determined, and transfer to die University of Nevada Las Vegas, legal tide and all literary property rights including copyright. This gift does not preclude die right of die interviewer, as a representative of UNLV, to use the recordings and related materials for scholarly pursuits. There will be no compensation for any interviews. Library Special Collections 4505 Maryland Parkway, Box 457010, Las Vegas, Nevada 89154-7070 (702) 895-2222 Signature ofamterviewer This is Claytee White. And I'm with Bill Sheehan, S-H-E-E-H-A-N. We're in his home in Henderson. And this is July 1st, 2009. So how are you today, Bill? Fine. Fine. Great. You have a beautiful home. I'm so glad you invited me. So tell me a little about your early life. Where did you grow up? I grew up in Philadelphia. I was born in Olney section, O-L-N-E-Y, of northeast Philadelphia. My parents thought it very important that I get a good education. So they pushed me and my brother to go to La Salle College High School. Now, today La Salle College High School has grown in stature. It is one of the very high-ranking high schools giving people an encouragement to go on to college in the Philadelphia area. I went there in 1945 and I graduated in 1949. Their emphasis in high school is on the teaching by the Christian brothers. They put a great emphasis on teaching not only many things that will benefit you later in life but also a responsibility for getting further education after you finish high school. Now, when I finished high school, I didn't have the money to go to a normal college. So I enrolled at La Salle College Evening Division. They give a college degree for five years of intensified study. You go to school for ten months a year. It's three hours a night every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. Their semester is five months long. So for ten months a year you're in college at night. You get used to it after a while. I elected to major in accounting. That was where I felt my career would be. Even then I wanted to be a CPA. I completed two years of college and I was working at the time for the Pennsylvania Railroad in downtown Philadelphia. I achieved a level with them as a traveling auditor, which normally you don't get unless you're finished college. But I was able after two years of college to get that. And I detoured my long-range plans to go work in that for a period of about four or five months and I found this was not my thing, constant travel, no home life at all. I was single, but I still missed the family home life bit. At that time we were engaged in war. And there were some motions to draft people into the service. I decided then, before I went back to my college and my career, to go in and get the service obligation out of the way. So I enlisted in the Marine Corps in January of 1952. I was 1 three years in the service. I spent 15 months over in Korea in my three-year tour with the Marine Corps. I finished up my tour January 25th, 1955, and I was back in college by February the 1st, 1955. I had one week off before I went back. I was able to get, after a year or two back, a career started working in public accounting. Okay. Before you start that, when you came back after being in military, you had the GI Bill then, didn't you? That's correct. So did you continue at La Salle at night? Yes, I did making use of the GI Bill. I didn't have that before, but I did have it when I came back. That helped. Oh, yeah, a tremendous amount. But I always had my mother and my father to push me to work, to go to school even before. And if I needed a few bucks to pay the tuition, they would loan it to me. They made us pay our own way, but at the same time they were not wealthy people in any way of measurement at all. In fact, my father worked during the war as a checker at the waterfront in downtown Philadelphia. What is a checker? Stevedores carry the goods on and off the ships. Someone counts what they carry. It's a very exclusive union. In fact, when he worked in it, the city the size of Philadelphia, there were two to 300 checkers, a very exclusive union. My brother and I could have gotten into that union because we were the sons of a checker. But our careers were already in public accounting. And why did both of you -- what is your brother's name? Tom. And why did both of you decide to become CPAs? Accounting was our thing in high school. We found out where our leanings were, where our abilities were. My father was always good with numbers. At one time in his career ~ he made no bones about this — he was a bookie. Okay, great. He was a bookie. He sold those five-cent bets that people used to make in Philadelphia on the numbers for the day. 2 The numbers. I grew up in North Carolina. And I always had relatives who lived in New York and Philadelphia and they would talk about playing the numbers. We didn't know what that was. That's correct. So I found out from my father working this — but my father was very adept. Although he wasn't college educated, he was very adept at handling numbers. Now, did your mom ever work outside the house? Yes. She went to work during the war to make sure that we had the money to go to high school. She thought it was important enough to go back to work at a very advanced age so that she could be sure that we were going to college. Did she become a "Rosie the Riveter" type of employment? Not quite the riveter type. She worked more on the assembly line and things like that. Those were the kinds of jobs that women took during the war. That's correct. Okay, wonderful. Oh, that's very interesting. What are your parents' names? I'm Junior. So my father was William J. Senior. Now, this is funny. I'm the second bom. The firstborn was named Thomas after a Catholic priest who was a cousin of my mother or something. And the firstborn you name after the Catholic priest. The second bom, it was a boy, I was Junior. I was named after my father. That really shows the importance of the church, doesn't it? That's correct. We regard it as very important. Okay, so you went into public accounting. Did you go to work for one of the big accounting firms? How did you do that? Not one of the big accounting firms as you know it today. In Philadelphia it was a big firm, McConnell & Brieden. And I don't remember the details other than I went to work for them after I passed the exam. I beg your pardon. I worked for small firms before then, mostly small firms, bounced around to two or three different small firms before then while I was going to college. I was going to night college. And as I said, I finished up in 1958, January of 1958. In those days they gave the exam once a year in November. Now they give it twice a year, the exam to become 3 a CPA. I took the exam in November and I passed it and became a CPA April 1 of 1959. Okay. And went to work for the larger firm at that time. That's correct. Now, did you become part of the audit staff or the tax division? Let me clarify. Because I was already a CPA when I went to work for this larger firm, okay, I was moved into a position of managing a group of CPAs on a large audit team. One little detail. To put the dollar sign in the proper perspective, after I passed the CPA exam and went to work for this large firm and was managing a crew of half a dozen or more on large audits, I was making the magnificent sum of $6,000 per year. But this was in 1959. Correct. So at that time what kind of money did that seem? Well, in Philadelphia you could travel all around Philadelphia for two tokens and they cost 15-cents. A seven-and-a-half-cent token would get you from one end of Philadelphia to the other through transfers and everything. So it would cost me 15 cents to go from home down to downtown Philadelphia from my home and back. That's the best perspective figure I can think of. And today if I was in Philadelphia at my advanced age as long as I didn't travel during the busy hours it costs nothing. Seniors can travel on the public transportation as long as they avoid the rush hours free of charge. That's wonderful. That's wonderful the way things have changed. Yes. Now, when I was working my way through school, I worked for an accounting firm in Los Angeles. Now, this was in the 70s. The levels were manager, principal and partner. Correct. How was it structured when you started? Okay. When I started I was just a manager. I didn't stay that long with them after I passed because I couldn't accept the idea of what they were dictating I made when I knew out west they were making a lot more. How did you know what was going on out west? 4 When I was in the Marine Corps, I went through radio school in San Diego. So I had a taste of California life and the western life. And then after radio school I came back and went to Camp Pendleton for overseas training. And at Camp Pendleton I heard of Nevada. I never had been to Nevada, but I had heard of Nevada. And I decided that I wanted to come out and look and see what it was all about. So I moved out to take a job — I inquired around and found out. And I took a job in Riverside, California initially. But that job only lasted six months. Then I came over July 4th, (1962) — 47 years ago, just to establish a residence and a job that was waiting for me here in Las Vegas, Nevada. How did you go about getting that job? The job that I had in Riverside, California had terminated in around June. It wasn't my cup of tea. I didnt enjoy it and they didn't enjoy me. So mutual leaving. I came over here because I was active in the Jaycees. And the Jaycees had their national convention in late June of 1962. So I came over here and carried my resume with me. I went to one of the larger CPA firms in downtown and met the head partner, Mr. Nelson Conway. And he took one look at my resume and said, shoot, I'd hire you, but I just hired a man yesterday and I have no room for you. But let me call up a friend of mine. Basically in those years Nevada was screaming for all the professional help they could get. There were not enough CPAs to go around. There were not enough attorneys. There were not enough doctors. They were screaming because the growth was coming and they didn't have enough experienced people. In the whole state of Nevada there were probably 100 active CPAs in 1962. So I had a job waiting for me. And then after I interviewed with this other individual, he hired me on the spot. And I came to take my position as an employee with him the day after the Fourth of July of 1962. Wow. So what was the name of the company that you worked with? Rudd, R-U-D-D, who is dead now. It was he and his wife. And they had several other partners -- Joe Salgo, who is still around, and I forget the third name. And he's long gone. But Joe Salgo is a retired CPA. He's still somewhere in the valley. This Mr. (Jack) Rudd worked with several other 5 people as partner. And eventually I became a partner with him before I left him in 1970 to go on my own. So you were there for about eight years. That's right. I started on my own January the 1st of 1971. So before we get to that, what kind of clients or was there a special emphasis with that firm? No. No. It was general, all-around accounting. They did some specialty in automobile dealerships because I did work for him working for several automobile dealerships. Incidentally, accounting for an automobile dealership is highly specialized. Few people are aware of it. But no two cars are sold for the same figure. The same car? New car dealerships. It sounds like every car that's made this way is sold ~ no. There's discounts that are in effect now, discounts that are in effect with a dealership. It's a very tough accounting. And this is the reason why they did some specialty in that area. Not too much in casinos. Usually think you could jump right in casinos. We did a little bit of casino work, but nothing big. The bigger firms did that casino work. Did you join any organizations? Now, you were a member of the Jaycees. Tell me about the Jaycees. When I got here the Jaycees were a very strong organization. I was just barely under 35 when I got here. So 35 is the year you must get out. I got friendly with several, one was later a chief justice of the Supreme Court. Chuck Kotzen was a pharmacist. You get talking to these people and got friendly with them and they were running for offices in Jaycees. And here I was a CPA. So I fit in well with a team to go in. But it was a warm, friendly, strong organization at the time. I'll give a little illustration of the way people were. They had just met me. I had known them maybe two or three meetings. They asked do you have any desire to go out in a boat? And I said not really. He said, well, you want to use our boat ~ 26-foot boat ~ here's the keys; go take it down to Lake Mead and take it out this weekend. I didn't know how to row a rowboat. Okay. And they were offering me the keys to a 26-foot boat. But this is the way people were. We had a good friendship with a group of them that I met in that organization to play golf. Golf courses weren't as crowded as they are now. And it was an enjoyable group to play golf 6 with, friendships. But anyway, to get back to what you were asking a little bit more, I got going when I went — boy, with Mr. Rudd he asked me to come out to Henderson to establish an office in Henderson. He wanted one because he already had a couple of good size clients out here and he wanted to get the city audit of Henderson. And we did. We established a nice rapport with Henderson. And I established my residence out here while I was still with him. He encouraged me -- and I enjoyed it — getting involved with some social organizations. I got involved. In fact, in 1970 I think I got involved with ~ well, I was on the board of directors of Black Mountain Golf and Country Club, which is where I live now. And I became president of that organization. I got involved with my Rotary Club, Henderson Rotary Club. In those days there was one Rotary Club for each city. That's all. And I later became president of that organization. I got involved with the Henderson Chamber of Commerce. And I later became president of that organization. I was always involved with Catholic Charities. They dragged me into their meetings. I served for 25 years on the board and finished up the last year as president of that in 1993. And then I was asked to go on - they used the expression -- the little board. And that is the board that ran housing developments for Catholic Charities. They have a corporation set up for each housing development. They had four. And so I served on that board for 15 years. I was the president of that for about five years. More recently I've been involved with Henderson Seniors' Auxiliary. I have served on that. And that's an organization to try to take care of the seniors' needs in the city of Henderson. I served on that board for --1 don't know; I'm not sure how many years -- ten years or so. And I was the president of that for about three years. So I've been involved with my community greatly. Great. Yes. I also served as the head of the CPA Society in Clark County for one year. I was pushed by another CPA. His comment to me - Danny Goldfarb, he was very active. I think there's a school named after him; he was very active in politics. He says, Bill, do it early; get it out of the way; then you don't have to get bugged by it. I like that. 7 So that's how he pushed me into running it for one year. Okay. Tell me about the Jaycees. What kinds of activities are Jayeees involved in? Back in those days they were involved - see, 35 year age you get out. And that's when you're just beginning a career if you want to get into politics. Some of them went on into politics later. But promoting events, raising money to promote - oh, boy, I'm trying to remember. That's too far back. Really I can't remember the details of the Jaycees. But it's more of a business related organization? Correct. Absolutely business related. You had to be in business to be in it. You weren't invited to join unless you were involved in some business, really. The Rotary Club, I'm really interested in that because Dr. Harold Boyer was one of the original Rotarians here. Tell me about the Rotary Club and their kinds of activities in a new and upcoming city. They tried to assist businesses getting going in their particular area. They tried to work coordinated. And if you were an active member of Rotary and you wanted to retain your active status, you were invited to attend different other Rotary Clubs in the area at their meetings. When I was the president of it — it's an international organization, too - I remember going to England. And I went to up above London, a small town above London where the national convention was - national, I'm sorry, the international, international convention was held as a representative of my club. And the following year I was asked to go again because the man who was the president couldn't make it for some reason. So I went to Toronto, Canada for the following year. Illustration, you mentioned Harold Boyer. Harold Boyer's wife didn't like to go on trips. He was very active in Rotary. So I was up there with my wife and daughter. The daughter was a teenager. She didn't want to go out to dinner with us at night. So she stayed in the place, in the hotel. And the two of us went out to dinner. Dr. Boyer was up there. He knocked on the door and got my daughter. And she told him where we were. So he came walking down the street to the hotel. Anyway, Rotary was — Oh. But Dr. Boyer came walking down the street. And he had dinner with us. Oh, great. 8 We were extremely close to Dr. Boyer. And his wife, Jane, when we met with her, we had no problems getting along with her also. She had problems getting along with a lot of people. But she and I hit it off well. That was the reason why he asked me to get involved as trustee for several of his trusts. And I'm still trustee for the '92 Trust, which handles the properties that he had put in, and then the BoyerError! Reference source not found. Foundation, which I work with an attorney that was close with Boyer and other clients, other mutual clients for years, Bob Clark. And so Bob and I are co-trustees of the foundation. And one of the things that — we always try to make our decisions on how we're going to spend the money. Believe me that's a job trying to find the right way to spend money. It sounds like it's an easy chore, but it's a difficult chore. When you try to put yourself in the position of the man who created this foundation and say, what would he do if he was sitting beside me? How would he want this money spent? And you try to make your decisions based on that fact. He was greatly involved with this oral history program. And he was greatly involved with this country doctors' museum back in Arkansas, Arkansas Country Doctors' Museum because Dr. Boyer's father was a doctor. And Dr. Boyer's father [Dr. Herbert Boyer] worked up until his 90s as a doctor until right before he died. Today that can't happen. Insurance for doctors prohibits that from happening. I never thought about that. Doctors can't get insurance when they're above a certain age. So the idea of a doctor working into his 90s is not possible today. Oh, that's sad. It's sad. But the insurance cost prohibits it. Now, the doctor can work in an administrative way maybe, perhaps, but not treating patients. That is sad because we're living longer and being healthier. That's correct. But insurance prohibits doctors from the opportunity of working as a doctor up beyond a certain age. Well, I appreciate those stories about the Rotary Club and the Jaycees. Now, when you moved to Henderson it was in the 60s or 70s? 9 Almost 47 years ago today because it was the Fourth of July weekend that I came in. Okay. And then you moved — where did you live in Las Vegas at first? I lived initially, the first month or couple of months, in an apartment with another individual that I knew from Philadelphia who worked for the airline industry across from UNLV. I didn't live there long. So Maryland Parkway someplace probably. That's true. Yeah. I just lived there as I say for a few months. And then you moved to Henderson. Then I moved to Henderson. Was there a Black Mountain Country Club at that time? Yes. But it was ~ this building that we're in was just barely being built the year or two after that, this home that we're in. The couple that developed this I knew as clients, Jo McBeath and he was a pharmacist. He was the only pharmacist in Henderson. Henderson was a town of 12- to 15,000 people. Today I think it's 272,000 people. So Henderson was a small town. Jo McBeath was one of the leaders and his wife was even more of a leader than he was. People knew that. I'm not putting Jo McBeath down when I say this. But Dotty McBeath was recognized. She's the one that designed this house working in close coordination with an architect who was a real close friend of the family. He used to live about six doors down. He's dead and his wife's dead. Jo is long time dead. And Dotty just died a few years back. Now, tell me about Dotty. Being a woman and that active in a new community, what was that like for her? What did you know about Dotty? She was a leader in the community. She was recognized as being a leader in the community. Well, to give you an example, they had three children. Two of them, the two boys, are doctors. One is an eye surgeon in the area of optic surgery over in Los Angeles area somewhere. And the other boy was a general practitioner working in Las Vegas area. The daughter married a man from Taiwan and she moved to Taiwan. But he became the leader — for Taiwan the leader of the Olympic program. So he was a leader in the country of Taiwan. The point I'm getting at is she pushed these children to get a superb education. And that was very important to her. As I say she was a leader in the community. Everybody knew Dotty McBeath. More people knew Dotty than 10 knew Jo because Jo was busy being a pharmacist and he was on the board of directors of the bank. He was a leader in his own right, but not like Dotty was. Tell me more about Catholic Charities. We here in this area know of Catholic Charities, everybody. We know of the Catholic Charities, the big building downtown and all that they do. Tell me about 25 years on the board. Okay. Give you a quick synopsis in dollars. The budget was 237,000 when I came on. It was over 6 million at the end when I left. And now it's probably up above 10 million because the organization is recognized as being able to carry out work with the grants that the federal government gives and carry out the duties of the grant. Other organizations would get the grants. They would falter. They would come to Catholic Charities. Will you take over? They're faltering. They have 18 modes of activities at the time I left all from adoption to senior job placement, many other ~ feeding, providing the meals for the needy, once again working with federal grants to a large extent. But they always needed more money than they had. I worked in close coordination for many years with a fellow named TomError! Reference source not found. Miller. Tom Miller was the executive director for many of the years I was there along with a man that people might remember — he served on the board with me — Joe Delaney. He was very active on the board with me in the years that I was on the board. But to see the growth of the organization from the start, it was incredible. But the growth was always there in taking on new activities that no one else wanted in some cases. You weren't competing for them because everybody knew that you could do it and no one else could. They moved their location on Main Street to a different location on Main Street. It just was an amazing organization to work closely with. And here's the thing that people don't understand because it is still run and controlled by the bishop. When I was the president I said, hey, huh-uh, I'm the president; he's the board chairman; I do what he wants. So the bishop of the diocese is the one that's the ultimate control over what happens in Catholic Charities. So now, but suppose there's a bishop in Henderson — Excuse me. There's only one bishop for the Catholic Church in Clark County. 11 Oh, really? Oh, so that's how it's set up. With 2 million -- It's not like ~ the bishop terminology for LDS Church is different from bishop terminology for the Catholic Church. So 2 million people and only one bishop. That's correct. Wow. Amazing. Yeah. And now, Catholic Charities — is there a division here in Henderson as well as one in Las Vegas? No. So it's just one. There's just one. There are some activities that were carried out by Catholic Charities. When you say division, there were no divisional offices. But there are certain responsibilities that were carried out by certain activity levels here in Henderson. Now, what interests me about that is earlier you said something about housing. I didn't realize Catholic Charities had anything to do with housing. Okay. Yes. They provide through HUD. They built one big tower, Stella Fleming Tower, which has 103 rooms in it or something like that in Las Vegas. And that's in the vicinity of Alta and Decatur. That's the big example of it. I met Stella Fleming when I was on the board of Catholic Charities when this was first built. And you have meetings when I'm on the board with the housing. And it was one board that covered four or five housing developments, Charles Shallow housing development out in North Las Vegas area ~ and I met Charles Shallow before he died. He was a priest from Philadelphia who came out here. And he was the one that ran it for years, the housing end of it. And now there is a board that runs it, which meets regularly. And we have one — I'm off it now. So I've been off it for a year now. I just decided that after 40 years with it that was enough. Twenty-five on the one and 15 years on the housing board, that was enough. I just got burned out with it shall we say. But you meet and discuss the problems. And there are always new problems with some of the residents giving the managers a hard time or not meeting the requirements of the federal as far 12 as getting the maintenance levels up with what's required. There's always some kind of problems that are involved. And you're always looking forward to building a new one. If you have any ~ and the man running it, I can't remember his name at the moment. But there is a director who is nominally paid. He's not paid anything resembling a salary, but he's paid something for doing it. And he does this as — this is his life. He loves housing for seniors. And this is all senior housing. And you're living with the rules that HUD puts out. We even got one of the retired HUD employees on the board. We have a retired banker on the board. It's better to have older people on the board because you're more in tune to recognizing the problems of seniors. Right. And their needs. Their needs. That's correct. Yes. Well, that is interesting. You said something about the Henderson Seniors' Auxiliary. What is that? It was an organization formed to assist carrying out the grants for the food delivery initially. So is that part of Catholic Charities? It was Catholic Charities control, but this was embarrassing for me because when I was the president I had to kick Catholic Charities out because they had put a woman in charge of it who was not recognizing the fact that you had to have a qualified cook. And the woman she brought in was not qualified. The food was inedible. And I had a fight to kick Catholic Charities out. And I love Catholic Charities. Yes, you do. But here in Henderson -- and we went through battles -- we on the board of Henderson Seniors' Auxiliary, we went through battles with the woman running it for the Henderson area and the executive director of Catholic Charities in Vegas about fixing up the level of the food. And they wouldn't do anything. And we went through the argument to the City of Henderson about it. They wouldn't do anything. Finally it turns out that the Division of Aging and Services, federal, came in and said we're not going to renew their contract. So they finally recognized that what we were saying was true. But to give you an idea, we went and hired a man, a consultant, to come in to do an analysis for us. We had some money raised that we raised through different functions to pay for 13 this. He wouldn't take much, a few hundred dollars. And he recognized that ~ everybody recognized the problem, but no one would do anything about it. But that's an illustration of what Henderson Seniors' Auxiliary is. And now with the foundation that I'm involved with, with you, I give $5,000 each year to Henderson Seniors' Auxiliary because I feel confident if I was sitting next to Dr. Boyer he would say, yes, do it, Bill. It's not a huge amount, but it helps them to carry out their functions of caring for the citizens of Henderson and delivering the food to the shut-ins. The federal grant that you get from the federal govern