Geoconda Argüello-Kline was born July 7, 1955 and was raised in Nicaragua. She left Nicaragua in 1979 as a political refugee and settled in Miami, Florida. The wages there did not allow her to take care of her family, so she moved to Las Vegas, Nevada following family members who had taken union jobs upon their arrival. She joined as well and worked as a guest room attendant for eight years.
Mary Hausch was born September of 1949 in Akron, Ohio. Hausch arrived in Las Vegas, Nevada during a spring vacation with four friends. The spontaneity of the trip and her enjoyment of the weather resulted in her applying for, and getting, a reporter position at the Las Vegas Review- Journal (R-J). For the next nineteen years, she worked her way up the newspaper ladder, covered local education issues that included desegregation, a groundbreaking series of Prisoners of War- Missing in Action war stories, and the Nevada legislature.