Tom and Erma Godbey Photograph Collection (PH-00262)

Thomas Mayborn Godbey was born in St. Joseph, Missouri in 1899. He moved west to Silverton, Colorado in 1923 to work in the mining industry. When work dried up in Colorado, he moved his family to Oatman, Arizona to continue working in the mines. After trying to organize for safer working conditions, Godbey was let go and moved his family to an area near the Colorado River in 1931. The family settled outside of what would become Boulder City, Nevada, in a tent city known as Ragtown. Tom Godbey’s first job in Nevada was working to build roads into the Hoover Dam construction site. In 1932, he received the first permit to lease property and build a private residence in Boulder City. He served in the Nevada legislature as an assemblyman from 1954 to 1958 and again from 1960 to 1966. He died in 1977.

Erma Ouida Godbey was born in 1905 in Colorado. She met Tom Godbey in Silverton, Colorado at her high school graduation. The two married in 1923. The Godbeys had five children: Thomas, Jim, Laura, Ila, and Alice. They were active members of the American Legion in Boulder City, taking part in the drum and bugle corps and orchestra. The children also participated in their school’s band. Erma was president of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Auxiliary and Navy Mothers during World War II, and remained active in the American Red Cross after the war ended. Erma Godbey died on October 1, 1993.

Sources:

Godbey, Erma O. “Erma O. Godbey: Pioneering in Boulder City, Nevada.” Interview by Mary Ellen Glass. University of Nevada Oral History Program, March 7-9, 1966. Transcript. https://archive.org/details/GodbeyErma/mode/2up

“Sisters Recall Growing Up in Boulder City in the 30s.” Las Vegas Review-Journal. September 26, 2010. https://www.reviewjournal.com/news/sisters-recall-growing-up-in-boulder-city-in-the-30s/