Abstract
Oral history interview with Don Payne, Joe Buck, and Don English conducted by Perry Kaufman on November 25, 1972 for the Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas. Payne, the head of the Las Vegas News Bureau, relates moving to Las Vegas, Nevada as a child, and deciding on a career in advertising and marketing. He talks about his early career and the history of the bureau. Later, Buck and English, both photographers with the bureau, join Payne in discussing the goals of the the organization. They relate the need to establish that Las Vegas was more than gambling and how their marketing and photographs focus on the relaxing, fun, and luxurious aspects of a vacation in the area. They talk about the large volume of photographs produced by the bureau and the success of some nationwide, including the "floating craps table" and the atomic bomb test mushroom cloud framed between two casinos in downtown Las Vegas. They conclude by discussing how they have expanded their marketing to include destinations close to Las Vegas, including Lake Mead, the National Parks, and California destinations within "a day's drive".
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Scope and Contents Note
Oral history interview with Don Payne, Joe Buck, and Don English conducted by Perry Kaufman on November 25, 1972 for the Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas. Payne, the head of the Las Vegas News Bureau, relates moving to Las Vegas, Nevada as a child, and deciding on a career in advertising and marketing. He talks about his early career and the history of the bureau. Later, Buck and English, both photographers with the bureau, join Payne in discussing the goals of the the organization. They relate the need to establish that Las Vegas was more than gambling and how their marketing and photographs focus on the relaxing, fun, and luxurious aspects of a vacation in the area. They talk about the large volume of photographs produced by the bureau and the success of some nationwide, including the "floating craps table" and the atomic bomb test mushroom cloud framed between two casinos in downtown Las Vegas. They conclude by discussing how they have expanded their marketing to include destinations close to Las Vegas, including Lake Mead, the National Parks, and California destinations within "a day's drive". Digital audio available; no transcript available.
Access Note
Collection is open for research. Where use copies do not exist, production of use copies is required before access will be granted; this may delay research requests. Advanced notice is required.
Publication Rights
Materials in this collection may be protected by copyrights and other rights. See Reproductions and Use on the UNLV Special Collections and Archives website for more information about reproductions and permissions to publish. Some transcripts do not exist in final form, therefore any editing marks in a transcript (deletions, additions, corrections) are to be quoted as marked. No release form is on file for this interview. The interview is accessible onsite only, and researchers must seek permission from the interviewee or heirs for quotation, reproduction, or publication. Please contact special.collections@unlv.edu for further information.
Preferred Citation
Don Payne with Joe Buck and Don English oral history interview, 1972 November 25. OH-01447. [Cite format consulted: Audio recording or Transcript.] Oral History Research Center, Special Collections and Archives, University Libraries, University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Las Vegas, Nevada.
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Acquisition Note
University of Nevada, Las Vegas History Professor Ralph Roske donated materials for this oral history project to UNLV Libraries Special Collections and Archives in the 1980s.
Processing Note
Interview materials were processed by UNLV Libraries Special Collections and Archives in 2017. Melise Leech wrote the collection description. The audio cassette(s) for this interview have been reformatted by an external vendor into a digital format. MP3 files of the audio are available for research use. The audio and transcript has been minimally reviewed and all readily available information has been included in the description.