Transcript of interview with Alice Thiriot Waite by Carole Terry and Donna Andress, October 19, 2011

An Interview with Alice Ann Waite An Oral History Conducted by Carole C. Terry and Donna Andress Oral History Research Center at UNLV Libraries Junior League of Las Vegas 2014 © The Junior League of Las Vegas, Incorporated Produced by: The Oral History Research Center at UNLV Libraries Director: Claytee D. White Junior League of Las Vegas Producer: Carole C. Terry, PhD. • • 11 The recorded interview and transcript have been made possible through the generosity of the Oral History Research Center at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Libraries, and the Junior League of Las Vegas. The Center and the Junior League members worked together to generate this first-person narrative. The transcript 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 narrators. Furthermore, the two narrators, Carole C. Terry and Donna Andress, have reviewed the material to assure accuracy. Alice Waite provided all the illustrations and exhibits included in the project as well as the documents included in the Appendices. The Junior League of Las Vegas and the Oral History Research Center at the UNLV Libraries thank the University for their support of this project. Carole C. Terry, PhD, Project Director Junior League of Las Vegas Claytee D. White Oral History Research Center UNLV Libraries • • • 111 Table of Contents Oral interview with Alice Ann Thiriot Ballard Waite Appendix No. 1 - Excerpts from 1974-1975 Junior League Roster Appendix No. 2 - Press Release, Carson City Connection Appendix No. 3 - Itinerary, Carson City Connection Appendix No. 4 - Service League Application to the Association of the Junior Leagues of America, Inc. iv Illustrations Following Page • • Alice Ann Thiriot Ballard Waite Vll Las Vegas High School Student Activities 3 Kindergarten Class Picture 5 Eighth Grade Graduation 8 Junior League Coffee 12 The Carson City Connection 13 Autorama - September 29,1970 16 Junior League Acceptance Letter 17 Junior League Names Provisional Members 18 History of the Junior League of Las Vegas 19 Highlights of the Junior League of Las Vegas 19 The Rhythmettes 28 Helldorado Parade 34 Health Notices 36 KLAS - TV Experimental Television Broadcast 39 V Preface The memories and recollections of Alice Thiriot Ballard Waite provide a most interesting look at both at the Junior League of Las Vegas in the 1970s and the early days of Las Vegas. Alice recalls her childhood and young adult years after she arrived in Las Vegas at the age of five, giving the reader a rare picture of Las Vegas in the 1950s and 1960s. She was most active in the volunteer community of Las Vegas and served as Junior League President in 1964-5. Her reminiscences about the events and activities during the years while she was a Junior League member are an invaluable insight into its history. The exhibits she is sharing are an important documentation of those years after the Service League became the Junior League. She herself was a forerunner of today's Active members because she was a single, working mother while serving as the first "professional" President of the League. vi / Alice Ann Thiriot Ballard Waite President, Junior League of Las Vegas 1974-1975 Interview with Alice Thiriot Waite on October 19,2011. Interviewers Carole Terry (in bold print) and Donna Andress (in italics); Alice Waite's answers in regular print. is is is is is This is Carole Terry, and we are with Alice Thiriot Ballard Waite, who was a past president of the Junior League. It's October 19th, 2011. Donna Andress is also with us and she is also going to be asking questions. Thank you very much for coming. We appreciate it. As I said, the reason we're doing this kind of thing is because the League and UNLV want something recorded of pioneer families here in Las Vegas and pioneer actions in the Junior League. Donna very kindly has been interviewed and we also interviewed Virginia Richardson, who gave us a lot of information about the Service League because that's when she was president and she gave us newspaper articles, which we copied and will include in her booklet. I'm very happy that you agreed to do this. Donna, do you want to start and ask a first question? Well, I was trying to think were you born here, too, because I know that your siblings were born here. Jon especially I remember. Jon was born here. Now, who was born here? My bi other Jon Matthew. He's ten years younger than I am, almost ten years, and he was born heie. My father was teaching high school in Lincoln County High School, Panaca, Nevada, when I was born. But there was no hospital there and he had gone back to Northwestern that summer to work on his master's degree, so my mother went home to Salt Lake to be there. So I was born in Salt Lake City. I never lived there; I was just born there. Then the same thing occurred with my sister; my mother went to Salt Lake and my sister was born in there also. By the time Jon was bom, we had moved to Las Vegas and there was a small hospital on North Seventh Street where he was bom. So your sister is younger than your brother? 1 She's 3 1/2 years younger than I am. She's in the middle? Yes. My sister is Jeannetta. Okay. And so when did you all come to Las Vegas? Summer of 1940. My dad had been teaching at Lincoln County High School. Interestingly enough, when he was in the eighth grade at Hiko, which was a one-room school — How do you spell that? H-I-K-O. It's just north of Alamo. But my grandparents' ranch that my dad grew up on was between Alamo and Hiko, and so they went to school in Hiko. They have a picture of the little cart, the horse pulling the cart with all the kids riding up to Hiko to the school. Maude Frazier, who was deputy superintendent of public instruction for Nevada's four southern counties, came to Hiko to give my father the exam to pass the eighth grade. Well, when he was teaching in Lincoln County High School, she came up as the superintendent of schools in Las Vegas then and said, "I think Las Vegas High School is going to be bigger than Lincoln County High School someday. Would you like to come and teach in Las Vegas?" I'm sure it took a lot of thought because at that time the schools were similar in size. Dad decided to come to Las Vegas. My father was cited in a recent book about Ralph Denton, an activist attorney in Las Vegas, and I'd like to read it to you: "One thing my mother [Hazel Baker Denton, member of the high school board of Lincoln County] was very interested in: making certain that vacancies on the faculty were filled, if possible, by University of Nevada students, rather than graduates of out-of-state colleges. She wanted Nevada kids to teach in Nevada schools.... However, Mom's preference for University graduates didn't mean she couldn't support hiring someone from another school. There's one instance of that: Joe Thiriot, who taught in a Las Vegas high school for many years, was a fine man and a fine teacher. Mom was on the board that hired him to Lincoln County. His degree may have been from Brigham Young, but he'd been raised in Pahranagat Valley!"1 So he came here to be a teacher. In Las Vegas High School. I wasn't quite five when we moved here. Michael S. Green and R. I. King, eds., A Liberal Conscience: The Oral History of Ralph Denton, Nevadan.(Reno, NV: University of Nevada Oral History Program, 2001) 7. 2 In what? Well, he taught drama mostly, speech, debate, English, Stagecraft, mostly those. He did the choral group -- in Lincoln County High School where he had a statewide renowned choir. Yes, he did. At least that's what it said in the Lincoln County High School paper. [Laughing] He also had an elementary school named after him here in Las Vegas. Now, did your mother work at all? My mother was also a teacher. In? She taught in Granite School District in Salt Lake City, Utah, for many years before Mom and Dad got married. Then after they were married she didn't teach for a while. She did a lot of substituting. In those days — I read back in some of their notes — she would run over and take my dad's class for a little while so he could go sing with the Kiwanis Quartet. That's in Lincoln County? That was in Las Vegas. Oh, that was in Las Vegas. Oh, wow. But she did a lot of permanent substituting as well. So there was a Kiwanis [Club]? Yes, my dad sang with the Kiwanis Quartet. The group was called The Westerners. They did a lot of singing around Las Vegas and representing Las Vegas in a lot of conventions and things like that. Donna, tell Alice your memory of her mother that you mentioned. Oh, her mother was one of the sweetest ladies 1 ever knew. She went with us on some trips. We went Alatsok a with the University and her mom was there. She was always so gracious and so sweet when we'd come by. Sometimes we'd come by the house without ever letting anybody know. Gail and Mr. Thiriot shared gem making, jewelry making, and so we would go by once in a while. Tell us the memory you have about Alice's mother and the costumes in the high school. Oh. Well, she made costumes, but she also made the curtain. That was the thing that just 3 Las \ egas High School Student Activities (Las Vegas Review Journal) Las Veo O Las Vegas Review-Journal 17 CRAFT WORK—The partment, instructed ing the practical applu working in class, left as they appear rum major. The i n formation on t h e h i g h band has oO members and absolutely blew my mind that she made that whole curtain for the stage. It was a velvet-type curtain, and I could not believe that she took on a project that huge. But she did it and it was beautiful. Did you know this? No. Oh, well. I'm glad you're here, Donna. I remember well the costumes. My dad did the plays and he would kind of design the costumes and tell her what he wanted and she would create it. She was a wonderful seamstress. So how often did he have plays at the school? Quite often? A lot. They did major three-act plays back in the days, before TV and all that entertainment, as often as every six weeks. We were graded on a six-week period then, in those days, instead of twice a semester like it is now. Every six weeks we'd get report cards. So they would do a major play at least four times a year and often five and six times a year. I remember they did "Anne of Green Gables. "It was wonderful. They did lots of fun, fun plays. Your father volunteered obviously to sing with the Kiwanis. Was he active in any other extracurricular group? Well, he sang with a choral group at Christmas. He did. And they put on gorgeous plays and shows at the university in Ham He sang with the Desert Chorale for many years. That's it. And early, early, when he first came here, he sang with a community barbershop-quartet-type chorus. And then he started singing with the Kiwanis Quartet, the Westerners, and they almost reached 50 years of singing together. The bass, Wayne Gamette, died the year before it was 50 years. Wayne Gamette, Joseph Wendell, Fred Gillis and my father were the quartet members. Wayne Gamette was the bass. Joe Wendell was the baritone. Fred Gillis was first tenor. My dad was second tenor. Great. 4 They made records. He sang into his eighties. Oh, yes. well into his eighties, late eighties. In fact, I think it was early nineties before he quit singing. Could be. When you came here in 1940, was your father involved in the service at all during the war? No. Because he was a teacher? Well, he was past the draft age. In the quartet they used to laugh. They would call themselves the three-four F's and the old man, my Dad. What about other volunteer groups. Dad also belonged to NSSA, Las Vegas Gem Society and the Community Concert Association as well as the Knife and Fork Club, a dinner club that invited speakers from all over the country. He was certainly involved in Las Vegas. Let me ask you about yourself now. You came to Las Vegas in 1940 and you were five years old. So you must have started kindergarten here, right, or first grade? They had a crazy system in those days. I started kindergarten in January of 1941 because my birthday was after the cutoff date. But they had what they called the midsection. And so myself, Jim Marshall, Sylvia Myers, a whole bunch. (I have this cute little picture of our kindergarten class with some of our handkerchiefs pinned to our dresses — [laughing] — back in those days, I don't remember tissues.) We started kindergarten first in January. We did half of the year's kindergarten, then we went through summer, and then we finished kindergarten the next December. And in January we started first grade and then had summer vacation, and we finished first grade in the fall. Second grade began in January. By then my mother was just so upset with the system, she said, "This is absolutely the craziest thing I've ever heard of." So she went to the principal and she said, "If I have my daughter tutored over the summer, can she start third grade in the fall?" My birthday was the twenty-seventh of September, and 5 1 KINDERGARTEN CLASS PICTURE On the steps of the Kindergarten Building, Fifth Street School back row: Unknown, I red Leavitt, Rex (Tony) Bell, Marilyn Sims, Frank Downey, Reynold Jones Unknown tourth row: Rona Lee Ault, Catherine Blaekman, Unknown, Jim Marshall, Unknown. Unknown third row: All Unknown second row: Richard I lunter, Unknown, Unknown, Unknown, Alice Thiriot, Yolandea Mulder. E. J Ledger first row: 1 inknown, Sylvia Myers, Marlene Provenzono?, Janice Conger, Unknown. Bill Case A September first was the cutoff. So, they said yes. So Jim Marshall and I went to a lady to be tutored for the summer, finished all the reading, all the math, all the important subjects. We started third grade in the fall. About two or three years after that, they did away with that system and scooted people up or back or wherever they went so they didn't have that system anymore. And where did you go to school? Las Vegas Fifth Street School. I attended beginning in kindergarten and graduated from there in the eighth grade. Ah, the one they've just restored. Exactly. What they restored was the Sixth, Seventh and Eighth grade building. The kindergarten building, the First, Second, Third, Fourth and Fifth grade buildings are gone now. The Foley Federal Building is now where those buildings stood. And is that where your mother taught? No, she taught in Salt Lake, but she subbed in the Fifth Street School and Las Vegas High School. We did all our plays at the Fifth Street School when I was in high school because there was no auditorium at Las Vegas High School, but the Fifth Street School had an auditorium with a stage. So we would walk over there and that's where we put on all the high school plays. My father produced and directed the plays with the students in the Drama and Stagecraft Class. And you went to high school over here at Las Vegas High School. Las Vegas High School. And when did you graduate? 1953. I was the valedictorian. After you graduated from high school, did you go on with your education? Yes. I went to Brigham Young University. I completed in a little over three years, got married, started having children, and came back to Las Vegas. At that time, they were in dire need of teachers. Harold Brinley who was the superintendent of schools came to me and said, "I know you're in education. How much work have you done?" Well, I had already done some student teaching, taken all of the core classes and that kind of thing. So he said, "I need a teacher badly. Will you teach for me?" I said, "I don't have a degree." He said, "I'll give you a 6 provisional certificate," because I had had enough education classes. So I taught first grade at North Ninth Street School the first year I taught. Then I had another baby, and he came back again. He said, "I've just got to have a teacher." I said, "I have a newborn, a two-year-old, and I just can't." He said, "I'll hire a sub. When can you come back?" I said, "Okay. Thanksgiving." So I started teaching again that next year. What year would that be that you started again? Fifty-eight, in 1958 at Thanksgiving. There was a substitute in this little second-grade class. And that year I taught at Fifth Street School in the room that I had gone to the fifth grade in. Oh, what fun. That's great. How many children do you have? I have five. I have four boys and a girl. Then I didn't teach anymore till later. Then I started doing a lot of substituting, at the same time taking classes at UNLV, which was Nevada Southern at the time. Because the credits didn't transfer well, I actually graduated from Brigham Young University quite a few years later than I should have. But I had five children by then. I went back two summers to Brigham Young University to get the rest of the credits that I needed and took all my children with me and we lived on campus. My children just had the best time. It was so fun. My two teen-age cousins who lived in Salt Lake City came down and stayed with us and helped with my children. So there were seven kids and me. Now, Alice, where was your husband with this? Did he come with you when you went back to school, or did he stay here? Where did you meet him? Oh, I met him at B.Y.U. He graduated from there in '57. My name was Ballard, when I got married. So my children's last names are all Ballard. B-A-L-L-A-R-D? Yes. So by then we were having a lot of dissension and troubles. I just went back for a six-week period the first summer and took the kids, and then the second time I went back for the whole summer and took the kids. So you and your first husband, then, were divorced? Right. And your first husband's name was? 7 Harold Ballard. What's your second husband's name? Vern R. Waite. And where did you meet him? Well, Vern actually was born in Bunkerville, Nevada, so he is a native Nevadan. He practiced dentistry here in Las Vegas for a lot of years. I think I kind of knew who he was at that time, but we weren't acquainted. His brother lived in the same area that my mother and father did, just a couple of streets over. In fact, we lived just down here on South Ninth Street, just two blocks south of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' First Ward Building. The building is still standing, is a family history center and is only two blocks from the Junior League's Morelli House. By then Vern had retired and moved to Oregon. Vem's wife had passed away, and some friends said, "You need to come down and meet Alice." And so he did. So, I knew his family, but I really hadn't been acquainted with him. Anyway, that's how we met. That's great. When did you get married? April of 1978. After we got married, my family and I moved Oregon where Vern lived. Where in Oregon? Lake Oswego. It's a beautiful suburb just south of Portland. Great. Now, you had you said four children. Five. Five children. What are their names? Kerry Scott Ballard is my oldest son. He was born on May 27, 1956, in Henderson, Nevada. He now lives in Michigan. He has three children and three grandchildren. My second son, Rodney Blake Ballard, who goes by Blake, was bom on August 3, 1958. He lives here in Las Vegas. He's part owner of the Sahara Air Conditioning Company. My second son has five children. All of them are married and he now has seven grandchildren. My third son, Kris Ballard, is an attorney, was born February 26,1960. His oldest two daughters are at BYU. The others are in high school, junior high and grade school. My daughter is my fourth child, Tara Ann Ballard Bollinger, her married name, bom on 8 EIGHTH GRADE GRADUATION Fifth Street School Alice Thiriot - Second row, fifth from left Principal - D. D. Keller July 28 1961. She lives in Meridian, Idaho. She doesn't have any children; she just helps other mothers and helps a lot with children of friends and family. She's a great gal. My youngest son, Brad Ballard, born November 16,1963, is an attorney here in Vegas and he has five children. His oldest two are in high school this year and he has three in grade school. With your association with Brigham Young University in Utah, then is it safe for me to assume that your family is one of the founding Mormon families in Utah? Actually, yes, in Utah. I did some research on German people in Las Vegas. There are a number of German Mormons and they lived in Bunkerville and places like that. That's why I wanted to ask you if your family had roots that went back that far. My mother's maiden name was Miller. My grandmother's maiden name was Minerva Smith, and she was the daughter of Joseph F. Smith who was one of the presidents of our church. So her grandfather would have been Hyrum Smith who was one of the early members of our church. His brother was Joseph Smith. Hyrum Smith and Joseph Smith and their families were both some of the first members of our church. Wow. My mother's grandmother was Sarah Ellen Richards. Sarah's father was Willard Richards, who was also involved early on in the church. Actually, Willard Richards was with the first wagon train that came to Utah. My maternal grandfather's parents (my mother's father) were all bom in Scotland and they came to the United States in the late 1800s. My grandfather was bom in Pennsylvania, Mathew Alexander Miller, but all of his family are from Scotland. They came to Utah later. So were they part of the group of Mormons that came from the British Isles? Actually, they didn't come because of the church. They just came to escape Scotland, I think, and ended up in Pennsylvania to work in the mines. Then they joined the church and came west. On my father's side, his grandmother, Alice Hannah Avery Timms, joined the church in England and was part of the group that came to the United States as members of the church. 9 They were like a lot of struggling families, interestingly enough, who came a few at a time as they could afford to. Some would come and then a few more would come and a few more would come. Finally their whole family came. She married my great grandfather, Peter Joseph Thiriot, who was born in France. He came to the United States with his parents. They landed in the New Orleans area, came up the river, and ended up in the Minnesota area. When the parents died, the children all just decided to come west. My grandfather, George William Thiriot, was bom in Park City, Utah. My grandmother, Alvira Rhoana Henrie, was bom in Panquitch, Utah. But, yes, many of those families were from England. So I have many English ancestors, but Scotch, French, and Dutch as well. That is fascinating and I'm glad that you shared that with us because it will be nice for your family to have that in writing for generations downstream. I was named for my father's grandmother, whose name was Alice. I was also bom on my mother's favorite cousin's birthday, whose name was Alice. And interestingly enough, my mother's name was Ellen and her mother's name was Minerva. Grandma had a little sister named Alice that died in 1901 when she was in her twenties. But they were very close sisters. So in the hospital, grandma named my mother Alice. Then grandma's father came when mom was eight days old and he said, "She's the oldest daughter; you need to name her after your mother." Her name was Sarah Ellen, but he kind of thought two first names were a little much for women. Then they have to write all these names, maiden names. So he said, "Just name her Ellen." And so my grandma thought," Okay," So she named her daughter, my mother, Ellen. One time, my mother needed her birth certificate. She went to Salt Lake City to get it. They could not find her birth certificate because they were looking for Ellen Miller. So they looked it up under her parents' names. My mother was bom in a hospital in Salt Lake City, and she found that her mother had named her Alice after this favorite little sister of hers. "Alice" was the name listed on the birth certificate in the vital statistics records. But after her father visited, she called her daughter Ellen but did not change the vital records. So my mother's "official" name was Alice. And now I have a great-granddaughter also named Alice. 10 Oh, how wonderful. So I was named after my great-grandmother, Alice Thiriot, and she is named after her great-grandmother. Isn't that fun? Oh, that's a wonderful tradition. That's fabulous. Thank you. Well, I don't want to digress too much, and I want to get back to your life. You mentioned you were a teacher. What kind of volunteer activities did you do, if any? You sound pretty busy with five kids. You had five Ballard children, but none with Dr. Waite. Is that true? Yes. Okay. So you had five children. You were a teacher. Did you have time to volunteer in the community at all? Well, I was a member of Junior Mesquite for a few years and we did some volunteer work. Then I joined Service League the 1968-1969 year — it was still Service League at that point — and we did a lot of service work at the thrift shop. I have notes in my records that I worked on the puppet shows. We did puppet shows in the schools on safety and that kind of thing. And then I just did a lot of administrative work in the Service League. The Puppetry Committee was particularly fun. We performed a show the first Tuesday of the month for children in the kindergarten through fourth or sixth grades. In addition, we gave special Saturday showings for Searchlight, Blue Diamond and Goodsprings working with the Young Audiences organization. It took many hours setting up the plays, constructing the puppets, and touring to all the schools. The many letters we received from principals, teachers and even students were very rewarding, and we had more requests than we could fill. Who were some other gals that you worked with? Do you remember? I have my notes. I found a lot of fun stuff. Actually, I had gone through and thrown away a lot of stuff not too long ago. But I did keep some and I kept all the literature from the year I was president. I should have kept more because I know that I had a lot of fun things. Oh, that's wonderful. I am interested in all the activities of the League while you president. I was president, 1974-1975. 11 Here is the newspaper picture from our Christmas Coffee. It was part of the Sustainers' Christmas Project where we supported children and families from needy schools. Every member brought gifts to be distributed lster in the month. We also donated cookies or cakes as refreshments. We still hold the coffee in December and the Bear project is still very active. Oh, you have the roster. Oh, what fun. I do. May I borrow that and make a copy? I'm not going to obviously copy the whole thing, but I would like to include in an appendix maybe some of the lists with the past presidents and this kind of thing to make sure that they don't get lost. (See pages 43 - 49 .) Yes. The year that I was president, Cheryl Rogers, Purdue now was Vice President - a great help to me. Mary Jo Miller, Norma Jean Halstead, Pearl Busch, and then a lot of — these were all of the committee chairmen, special committee chairman. Then this was just a lot of the girls that were in League that year. In fact, even the sustaining members. Oh, great. Great. You don't mind if we copy some of that, do you? Then the reports of the officers. These are fun to read back through, you know, just some of the things that we did that year. That year we went to Carson City. Donna, do you remember that? That was so fun. And I do have my stuff that I got at Carson City. We need a picture. Well, you know, there weren't pictures. But I do have lots of literature about that trip, the Carson City Connection, that wonderful trip that we took that year. It was scheduled to coincide with the Carson City's Centennial Celebration. We took, I think my record said, more than 70 ladies. We had both Actives and Sustainers because we invited all of the sustaining members that wanted to go. I think you, Donna, went with us too. We went up to Carson City and we went to the museum and the legislature where they introduced us. We kind of had something to do with the Service League that was in Reno at the time. The press release lists many of the activities. My next-door neighbor was Keith Ashworth, and he was Speaker of the 12 Sunday, December 8, 1974—Las Vegas Review-Journal—3B * m • ' *vxsjSS mm mm mgm? GIFTS FOR YOUTH — Alice Ballard, left, with Adele Stuart, hostess Lovee duBoef and Marcia Goodman, receive gifts brought by guests to the Junior League's annual Christmas Coffee held Wednesday. The gifts will be distributed during the holiday to children in need in this area. A i i « i t f R - J P h o t o At Junior League coffee Tradition pursued One of the oldest holiday tradi­tions in Las Vegas was continued Wednesday when the Junior League held its annual Christmas coffee for members and guests and gathered gifts and toys to be distributed to families in need in the area. The home of Lovee duBoef was the setting for the party, which accented foreign customs. The rooms and the Christmas tree were hung with authentic orna­ments, mostly handmade, from India. The menu also featured delicacies made by league mem­bers from recipes from India, including a seafood crepe with curry sauce and another stuffed with fruits. Also cookies, kiwi fruit, coconut and pineapple were available. On the serving tables were tall wooden candles and a brass gong from India with a gold tea service and gold flatware at each ©id of the table. The cloth covering the tea table was traditional sari cloth embedded with crystals on tones of blue, green and beige. The party was sponsored by the sustaining members of the league, of which Peggy Gamba-rana is chairman. Arlene Sou­thard was party chairman, as­sisted by all sustaining members Subchairmen included Kax Mow- V - ' bray, TonaSiefert, BethGarside, Beda Cornwall, Mary Laub, Rita Gubler, Jean Boman, Florence Lee Cahlan, Donna Andress, Monte Brandt, Virginia Germain and Eunice Boles. Doree Dij ckerson,7 in a tradition-al Santa Claus suit, greeted more than 350 guests at the entrance and accepted their gifts for holi­day distribution. A cookbook con­taining the party recipes was also distributed to arrivals. House. I think, at that time. So I got to sit by him on the dais as he presided at the session of the Assembly. This is while it was the Service League? No. This was Junior League then because I was president that year. But it was just such a neat trip. Everybody just loved it. We just went up on buses. We didn't fly. Didn't we go to the prison, too? Yes. we did. It was great fun. The newspaper sent a reporter with us. They would never do that now. I mean they're just too busy covering all kinds of events now. It's harder to get the word out on projects that you're doing and things. I have the five-page itinerary of all our activities, the tours, the invitation list for our cocktail party (all the Assemblymen and Senators). It lists all the ladies who went on the trip. After Carson City, we connected with the Service League of Reno (the future Junior League). We were VERY busy for two days! This is most interesting. I am going to include the itinerary and release in the appendix. (See pages 50 - 55.) So you made notes about the activities your Presidential year for us. These are some notes that I made some time ago evidently. I worked with the puppet things for three years and we went to a puppetry convention in Salt Lake one year. What year, do you know? 1969. Puppeteers of America convention. I also volunteered in the school with the Junior Great Books program. I was a Cub Scout den mother for a lot of years. I had all these little boys, which was fun. I absolutely loved doing Cub Scouts. That was the most fun. So you really enjoyed working with kids? Oh, yes. And then, let's see, I did a lot of — and our church did a lot of volunteer work with the teaching classes and that kind of thing. Then when my kids got to be teenagers, with the teenage groups, I worked with them a lot. Other than the Carson City Connection, did you take other trips? I