Transcript of interview with Ann K. Johnson by Wanda Cortés, March 3, 1980

UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson i An Interview with Ann K. Johnson An Oral History Conducted by Wanda Cortés 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 Ann K. Johnson ii © Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 2019 UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 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 Ann K. Johnson iv Abstract On March 3, 1980, Wanda Cortés interviewed University of Nevada, Las Vegas counselor, Ann K. Johnson (born August 28th, 1954 in Garland, Arkansas) about her life in Southern Nevada. The two discuss Johnson’s educational and occupational history. The interview concludes with a discussion on the population’s rapid growth during the seventies. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 1 Informant is Mrs. Ann Johnson. The date is March 3rd, 1980 at 9:30 AM. The place is Humanity Building, Third Floor, University of Nevada, Las Vegas. The collector is Wanda Cortés. The project is Local History Project, First Oral Interview: Life of a Las Vegas Resident. Mrs. Ann Johnson, can you tell me how long that you lived in Nevada? Twenty-five years. You like? Its home (Laughs) (Laughs) Yes, I like it. Are you married? Mm-hmm. Can you talk about your husband? (Unintelligible) or whatever? My husband is a student here majoring in physical education. We have two kids, twenty-three months each. We’d like to have a nursery. Where do you live? North Las Vegas. Can you describe the area where you live? Residential area. Mixed community. It’s in the city limits but its north of the city, it’s north of North Las Vegas. So a lot of people would consider it North Las Vegas but it’s really north. Did you go to school of Nevada? Mm-hmm, I’m a graduate student. What school do you attend? UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 2 What school do I attend? Mm. In high school? Yes. Oh, Clark. Oh okay. Who was your—how was your high school life when you were growing up? From what I’ve seen, just going over there for some of the high school basketball games and stuff, it’s a lot less discipline. There are more students there. I’m not sure where the lack of discipline is from though. I don’t know if it’s just from the different attitudes of the kids today or what, but when I went there, you had a job and you did it. There was no walking the halls, no running up and down and screaming. And every time I go there, there’s all of that, so. Do you see some difference between your high school when you were there and—? Yes, the differences that I just named. It’s just, I can’t see the discipline over here. And I’m not sure if it’s discipline or it’s fear or if it’s discipline or respect, ‘cause almost the teachers that are really good you can talk to ‘em and get involved, and I don’t know if the kids now have that. ‘Cause I don’t know how many of those same teachers are there. I know the principal up there, he was one of the main faculty. What about the buildings? The building is the same. But they’re adding a new room to it now, but other than that, it’s the exact same building. Do you go to University of Nevada, Las Vegas? Yes. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 3 Can you describe the university in the years ago and explain some changes like, differences of people, professors, on the campus? When I started here in ’72, a long time ago, I don’t know if there really were if there were, it was just in my mind, but thinking back, I think there may have been more black students. I haven’t actually checked the papers but if there weren’t more, they were more visible than they are now. Now when I go out on the campus, I very rarely see you know, a lot of black students. And I was checking the stats last year, there was only four hundred. So I haven’t checked ‘em this year, I don’t know how many students, how many black students there are in the university. But I would like to see more. Mm. The professors, a lot of ‘em are the same ones I know from when I was a student here. The buildings, I think three new buildings inside. And about the discipline here, about the activities? Well, those haven’t changed and I don’t think there was ever any discipline; but, I can’t remember doing any activities and that’s really sad on a university campus that they don’t have more things that more, other students could get involved in. I mean, they have special interest things like Octoberfest, but I would say the one activity that the most students get involved in would be Mardi Gras. (Laughs) It gives almost all the students a chance to go out and get drunk or whatever. Did the university (unintelligible) in the last years that you were here? There was a student—I don’t know, I don’t think so. I mean it’s growing in size, but the policies are still the same. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 4 Do you remember other things that you did when you were growing up? Stayed in trouble. (Laughs) (Laughs) No, I—I used to spend a lot of time in the house. Just think about being a mother and all that good stuff. I always wanted to be a mother. So I’d spend a lot of time in the house playing with the dolls between alleys with my mother and stuff. I’ve always been kind of a homey person. Mm-hmm. You progressed as you got older? (Unintelligible) Like you were— Well, I’m at a point now where most of the things I wanted as I was growing up are you know, falling into place. I wanted kids, I have two, and I didn’t want that many kids. (Laughs) Yes. (Laughs) I was always concerned with my education and now I’m a graduate student and I hope to graduate this summer with my master’s. Everything is falling into place. What kind of work do you do? I’m a counselor for the Department of Academic Advancement. With what kinds of students do you go and—? We have the educational department, the low-income students, the handicapped students, and non-English students. How can you help these kinds of students? Well, we have counseling, mostly in advising. We have tutorial programs, we have special classes. We have typing, and just—we’ll do everything we can to help you stay in college. How was the street compared to now? UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 5 The street? Yes. What street? Like avenues of the hotels—? Well, there was little, I can remember Las Vegas being real small. Or either during that time, that’s when Blacks had a place and they had to stay in it. So I don’t know if that’s the smallness that I remember because of that oath. Because the city was smaller at that time. But my parents, you know, they talk of times when there were only like one or two hotels and I guess it’s the Castaways or something, the Castaways and the Old Frontier and all those. The Old Frontier is gone now; it used to be across the street from the Sahara, but now its desert there. How do you feel about you know, the legal prostitution here in Nevada? Illegal? Yes. I haven’t really formed an opinion on that ‘cause I think it would probably be cheaper for us as taxpayers if they legalized it. Then they control the health standards, they could control the tax revenue, this way it’s just costing us more money as they’re arresting ‘em around. Do you think that this kind of prostitution in Las Vegas—you know, the people in the schools, like high schools, university students—? Well, I just heard some talk yesterday about a small prostitution ring in the dorm. So I don’t know, I don’t know if that’s (Laughs) I don’t know if I should say that on tape. (Laughs) UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 6 I don’t know if that’s because of the illegal prostitution but I seriously doubt it, though. I’m sure it could, you know—grow out of control if they legalized it. In fact, if they legalized it, they’d had a better means of controlling it. Do you think they can control the prostitution here in Vegas? I think that they spend as much time and energies working on the control as they do to the pickup and delivery system that they use now a days to take it out. I can’t see how it can take any more money or time or energies to regulate the legalization of it than it does for the grand hall and the money they spend just picking up the prostitutes, undercover agents and all that stuff. I think that one of the reasons that we have a lot of prostitution here in Vegas is for the hotels. Mm. Do you think this is one of the most reasons—do you think that they can stop you know (unintelligible)? First off, you have to consider that prostitution is one of the oldest professions. (Laughs) And I think it’s in every city. The reason that it’s more visible or noticeable in the city of—or well, like Las Vegas, is because of the title they have, you know, “Sin City.” You know, you think of the gambling, and the prostitution, and the looseness. Everybody thinks Vegas, you know, it has no community, that’s what the outsiders think. And that’s not true, and I think that’s one of the reasons that prostitution should be legalized so that it would be run like these hotels. You know, they have certain rules and regulations that they have to go by for the gambling and to get a gambling license and a liquor license, and all this kind of stuff. But they should set up a control board, or something like that for the prostitution. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 7 Have you ever had problems with any of your students? You know, just like, prostitution, you know? Ever need to counsel any student? I haven’t come across any student that openly discussed prostitution with me. No, and I haven’t go down to pick up any. Do you see rapid growth in the population here in Vegas? Oh yes, just in the number of elementary schools that they built in the last couple of years. It’s growing every day—just look around, you’re almost, every street you go on, there’s something new going up. I can remember when I went to Clark—Clark and Cashman Junior High were the only thing that sat over there in that desert. Now there’s so many apartments and town houses and 7-Elevens, and Wendy’s and McDonalds, you can hardly find Clark! I haven’t been over there for the first three or four years, but my sister-in-law moved over there, my husband and I went to visit her, and I couldn’t believe all the stuff that’s over there in that little period of time. Clark was lost in a maze of apartments and town houses. And you know, the Golden Arches, of course, in every corner—they’re there too. It is true that the state of Nevada has very good employment rates? I’m not sure how the statistics are on that, but generally speaking, I’d say it’s pretty decent. Do you think that one of the reasons is the hotels? Mm-hmm, large reason. What do you think that the most of the important reason is the hotel? Why do I think that? Mm-hmm. Because they generate a lot of work, there’s a lot of people that work in the, I don’t know how many hotels there are, I’d say fifteen-sixteen maybe. I just think they’re hundreds of people that UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 8 work in each of those hotels. And all of the bus people, the maids, the waiters, waitresses, the cooks, the janitors, and—hundreds of people that would be out of work if these hotels weren’t here, and we have no other type of industries at all. I think it’s one of the few places where you can make a decent living in a low class job. Or well, quoted “low-class” job. Some of those people make more than I do. Do you think that’s one of the reasons? Because a lot of people you know, that came to Vegas stayed here? Yes. Because Vegas is one of the few places where you can make small income and still live pretty comfortably. Compared to living standards for Las Vegas, and say, California—California, the land and stuff is higher, the property is higher. You get a home, you pay three times what you’d pay here. There’s state tax, we don’t have state tax here. The cost of land and home—housing is reasonable here; now there are those who would, I’m sure, eliminate that. If you made, say twenty-thousand dollars that—no, let’s say fifteen thousand dollars in Las Vegas, you could live semi-comfortably. But in the state of California, I don’t think you can really live comfortably on fifteen-thousand dollars. By the time you finish paying 380 I think—my brother goes to school here, and he’s a freshman in College. He’s pay like three hundred and eighty dollars a month for a one bedroom apartment, if by the times my parents could afford to buy a house there, it’d be like eighty-ninety thousand dollars for a small house, not necessarily in a nice neighborhood. It’s just outrageous. So, he has to live in an apartment. And here, know students complain, but you can get a two-bedroom apartment here for three hundred. Yes, ‘cause right now I pay 265 for one bedroom, and I paid last semester 350 with air conditioning (unintelligible). You know, we tried to find a house in California for the summer, but we were supposed to pay like six hundred, only for (unintelligible) bedrooms. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 9 Exactly. It’s unreal. Every time the state takes their bite, and federal government takes their bite, and try to make your mortgage payment and your groceries and all that good stuff, you can’t see how you’d have anything to really live on, you know, survive. But I don’t really consider survival, living. (Laughs) I like to splurge everyone in a while, go out. You think that it’s, you know, that that’s really a difference between California, Nevada—? (Unintelligible) Well, like I said, I think overall, Las Vegas is an excellent place to live because of the opportunities here. It’s a small city and it’s growing. That’s the most important thing. Wherever there’s growth, there’s going to be energy generated. People moving and buying, people moving up. So that means all these people that are, if they’re maids, they move up to become housekeepers, as they move through hotels and more they build, these housekeepers will be move up, to say, head of housekeeping, and as long as there’s that type of growth, I’m not dissatisfied that the jobs are under the umbrella of low class jobs. ‘Cause when you think that you can make sixty dollars a day for clearing a table, that’s not too low class. When I went to (unintelligible) for Christmas, and I came back, I found a lot of complex apartments. Yes. It’s incredible. I don’t want to live here in five years. (Laughs) It’s going to be packed. Yes. It’s going to be packed because they’re building more and more and we’re getting closer and closer together. It’s really going to be bad after all, but that’s growth. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 10 The people here, you know, it’s really nice. A lot of nice people and a lot of (unintelligible) I never saw before coming. I never grew up in this part of United States you know, but here in Vegas, you know, we have a lot of—I can understand what’s important because we don’t have these kinds of problems. Altogether, we live altogether, take care of each other. We don’t care about nothing. That’s why you can’t move out of Las Vegas. I think it’s a very, very, safe city. Hmm. Where can you go? There’s racism everywhere, you can’t run from it. You know, you might as well stay and try to build something for yourself and deal with it. I mean, I can’t spend my life moving from city to city. Yes. To avoid racism. I just have to equip my kids to live in the system to try and change it. But you know, trip all the way out, and they can’t. (Unintelligible) really nice people who can understand you. There are a lot of nice people here in Vegas. And there are a lot of real (unintelligible) so it balances out most times. When I came here, I had fear of (unintelligible) here, I found a lot of Black people that are really, really, better than a lot of white people. They understand me. I never thought I’d find this kind of here. Do they have a lot of Black people where you are? Yes. That’s very nice. It’s beautiful, it’s like Hawaiian island. Fishes. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 11 Hmm. Can you tell me a little about your work, about you know, all the things that you are supposed to do around here? Well, I’m supposed to see any student that needs help. If they can manage to get up here and give me a call and tell me what they need, I’ll try and handle it. A lot of students have problems getting to class, say they’re sick or something. They can call me and say, “Would you contact this instructor or contact that instructor,” then I’ll get in contact with the instructor and you know, let them know that a student might be there, and if possible, to send somebody over to take it over by work-study students and peer counselors. So we do that type of thing. We make referrals to other departments on campus, say, financial aid— Mm-hmm. The Learning Resource Center, and student personnel, housing, and that type of thing. We help students do their financial aid applications, (unintelligible) some of the mistakes they’re making, those mistakes will cost ‘em. Well, like I said before, generally, anything that has to do with your college education, I mean, we’ll try and help you out. We can’t make any promises to say “We will do this,” and “We will do that,” but we will try, that we can say. Mm-hmm. And about the type—how are we supposed to do—? Well first, you’ll have to be a member of the program, and I’ll that takes is about five to ten minutes to fill out the application and do the little orientation. After that, any paper that you need, regardless of whether it’s school oriented or work oriented, resumes, letters of applications, this type of things, we’ll type for you. We do ask normally a three day period. Three working days. So if you leave out a paper by Friday, we will get it to you by Tuesday evening or early Wednesday. But the service is free and the work is guaranteed. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 12 What about, the counselor? How many counselors are here? Two full time counselors, two peer counselors, a director, and two secretaries. Who is the director of the—? Dr. William (Unintelligible) and (Unintelligible) is the other counselor. Is he from Las Vegas? The director? Yes. No, he’s from Chicago. How long was he here? Two years. What about the other one? I think (Unintelligible) has been here about eight years and she’s from, I think, (Unintelligible) She came here to the US from (Unintelligible)? I think she came to Vegas a little earlier than that. But her husband was in the military and we moved around a lot. I think before she came here she was in (Unintelligible) and before that, she did her graduate work at USC. How long time you’ve been working here? About five years. You like it here? Mm-hmm. You like the students? You don’t make a lot of money, but a lot of times you can see what you’ve accomplished by watching students. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 13 (Unintelligible) ‘Cause when I was a student here, (Unintelligible) was my counselor. So now we work together. What kind of education, in what department you came here? I have a B.A. in communication studies and finishing up my master’s in guidance and counseling. You never saw or studied in other university? I spent summer schools at University of Pepperdine in California. Mm-hmm. But all of my regular semesters I’d spend at UNLV. I just went to summer school in California to get away for the summer. You see a lot of (unintelligible) between Pepperdine and UNLV? Oh yes. ‘Cause when I went to Pepperdine, they didn’t have the new campus in Malibu. This was the old campus in not such a good neighborhood and there was a lot of regulations, and you couldn’t go out after dark because they’d been having these murders and stuff. Here at UNLV there’s co-ed dorms and no lock out time and all that stuff. The first time we went to Pepperdine, my girlfriend and I, we got locked out at the dorm. They wouldn’t let us in. We had to go to the (Unintelligible) of the university to get into the dorm. ‘Cause they have all these rules and regulations that we didn’t know about! I mean, they gave us the papers, but it was like our first day, and we didn’t read it. We went to see the city. So when we got back at eleven, the final lock up was at like, 10:30. So they didn’t let us in. Do you go to Pepperdine now? Mm-mm. Haven’t been there in maybe four years, five years? And you didn’t see the campus? The new campus? UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 14 Oh, I’ve seen it. But I haven’t actually gone to each of the buildings and you know, I’ve just seen it from a distance. Do you think that is a big difference than the other university? Oh yes, it’s much nicer. It’s on the beach, and it’s just much nicer, it’s newer. The other campuses are older. Just more modern. Ah. Do you remember Las Vegas when you was little? You can see Vegas now? What do you think about all these water that is out here? Rain and stuff? Yes. I think it was like that when I was little. ‘Cause Vegas has never had a decent drainage system. Any type of rains, the sewers or whatever, those things fill up and the streets flood and there’s some streets you can’t even go down while it’s raining—like Charleston and Eastern and Nellis Boulevard. These types. I’m not sure, I’m not sure if they’ll every do anything about it, because a couple of years ago they did a study. And they said, “Would it be feasible to install all these drains?” Because there’s a lot of rain that Vegas gets. When it rains, it only rains for a few minutes, and it only rains hard every New Year’s or something, so they don’t feel that it’s worth it. They’re missing out. What do you think about the weather here? Oh, I like the weather. You like it? It’s warm most of the year and even when it gets cold you don’t need a garage of clothing, you know? (Laughs) UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 15 You don’t need—I like it. The weather’s decent. What do you think is the reason for the difference in weather here and in Reno, (Unintelligible)? Well, we’re in the southern tip of the state. Reno and Carson, that’s Northern Nevada. So it’s always quite warmer in the south. Right now, we have very good sunshine. But in Reno— Yesterday it snowed. Reno is snowing, my god. That’s one of the reasons, another one of the reasons that I stay in Vegas. The weather’s nice most of the time. I don’t like real cold places, I don’t like wearing a lot of clothes. At least I can come out in just a shirt and skirt and then return. (Unintelligible) in Reno or Denver or someplace like that, I’d have to wear like a turtleneck and a shirt under that and a coat and a jacket— That’s one of the reasons I came here too because the weather is like in Puerto Rico but the only reasons is because in here, it’s about one hundred degrees and Puerto Rico is about ninety-five, but it’s really humid there. And we have dry heat here, I like that too. Hmm. I think it is better. You can’t, you know, you can’t feel the moistness, I know. I can remember going to visit my grandmother and she lived in Arkansas and (unintelligible) it’s so humid there. During my time there, I think the highest temperature was like eighty but it felt like two hundred because it was like I was steaming all day. It was terrible, I couldn’t wait to get back to Vegas to 115. (Laughs) UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 16 (Laughs) I went to Reno on Thanksgiving and it snowed on the mountain, going to the mountains, and was visiting, and was really different. Yes. You know, really different weather, community. Just here, when we came back to Vegas, it was so hot. Yes. What a big difference in the weather. It’s—it’s just more comfortable for me all around. A lot of times I want to leave Vegas and go on a vacation or something, and especially when you drive, when you come off the hill, like living in LA, and you can see the lights of home, it looks so good to be coming home. So I like it here, I’m satisfied. A lot of lights. Yes, a lot of lights. We have here a lot of good hotels. We have very good shows here, I think that’s one of the reasons that a lot of people came here and stayed here. A lot of conventions. We have a lot of tourism. Mm-hmm. And that’s why, another reason why the city has a bad name. Most of the people who come here and do all these things are tourists. Mm-hmm. But when you see it in another state’s paper, it doesn’t say, you know, John Doe from California robbed a bank in Las Vegas—it says, “Another Bank Was Robbed in Las Vegas,”— Mm-hmm. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 17 You know, making it seem like the community people here are doing all of the bad things and it’s not all, but in Las Vegas, the rape, the robberies, occur because of the tourism. They have a lot of American tourists? A lot of people is from Denver, you know, Utah, Europe. You know, the colder cities here and we have, I think they’re all here. Even during the winter while it’s in Vegas, we’ll have a lot of tourists, but during the summer, for real, I mean, you can barely turn on some of these streets around of the Strip because of the people and trying to get to the Strip. All the hotels are booked full. When I came here, you know, I can see a lot of complex, a lot of people, but now, I see, I can see a lot of people. More people, they want things to do. Yes. Because just across the street from the university, when I was a student here, there was no Carl’s Jr. There was no Campus Village. There was no (Unintelligible) but now y’all are—no Jojo’s, no Wendy’s, none of that. The other thing that is really wrong is around here is the (unintelligible) and University of the Heartlands. But other than that, there’s a Rebel Service Station down the corner, and same station on those two corners on Tropicana. But all the service stations on the community is new. Safeway and Dairy Queen, they were just buildings and the Segway Shopping center and the Dairy Queen. The rest of it wasn’t even here. What else, like the sports, can you study here? All I can think of now is basketball and football. Yes. The same? Yes. Except there weren’t any major conferences and they weren’t really thinking of major conferences really. But during my time when I became a university student, that’ when I talked about what came out and all this good stuff. But I was here during the time there was Running Rebels, that their name, that’s really running. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 18 Well, do they have a lot of sports here? Yes. Soccer, volleyball, softball for girls. Girls’ basketball team. They didn’t have any of the (unintelligible) Did the university have a lot of coaches for that team? (Unintelligible) I think they only had two basketball coaches and had coached them in the system. I’m not a football fan so I don’t know how many football had. Probably a lot though. And about the scholarships, you know, years ago, were there more opportunities? More people are living on scholarships, especially females. So it’s working out. That’s a good point. We cannot be a student just to study. More and more or people are getting a chance to go to college because of the new federal regulation and federal monies. You know, middle-income legislatures, now even if your parents make, say twenty-five thousand dollars, you’d still be eligible for something, guarantee, mostly. Because of the new income—so more and more people are getting a chance, and more and more people are choosing UNLV because its (unintelligible) Last year when the overall international average, schools were losing students, the numbers were down across the country. UNLV’s went up. Do you think that the hotels are helping UNLV? Like the hotel major, they have a lot of people in these departments. Yes, I’m sure they are. ‘Cause these people have to do their midterms in these hotels, so they must be helping them. I think that is one of the best about the UNLV. Mm-hmm. UNLV University Libraries Ann K. Johnson 19 This is one of the best place to study hotel management. Okay thanks for your conversation and for your interview. Thank you. (Audio ends)