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Transcript of interview with Daryl Morris by Barbara Tabach, February 16, 2016

Date

2016-02-16

Description

Daryl Morris discusses growing up in Las Vegas and his love of acting.

Daryl Morris is a native of Las Vegas. Born in 1961, he is one of three sons born to Paula and Bobby Morris. He recalls his childhood of the 1960s and 1970s with great fondness of the fast friendships formed within the Jewish community. His day job is in insurance, but his great love is for acting. He tells of being smitten at the age of 11 and taking acting lessons as a youngster and then later studying with actor Jeff Goldblum. He has an impressive list of films in which he has appeared, including the opening scene of Mall Cop 2. He enjoys voice-over acting and teaching acting classes. He also tells about his Navy service, attending UNLV, and coming to settle in Las Vegas-the place he calls home. Daryl also participated in the January 31, 2016, Growing Up Jewish in Las Vegas panel discussion for the Southern Nevada Jewish Heritage Project.

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Transcript of interview with Adele Baratz by Claytee D. White, March 19, 2007

Date

2007-03-19

Description

Interview with Adele Baratz by Claytee White on March 19, 2007. In this interview, Baratz talks about her parents who came to the United States as teenagers from Russia and eventually settled in Las Vegas after a short time in California. She discusses the Jewish community in Las Vegas when she was growing up, and her father's job selling bootlegging supplies, then as a real estate broker, then as a bar owner. Baratz attended the Fifth Street Grammar School, which was built after a fire destroyed the original school, and Las Vegas High School. As a teenager, she worked at Nellis as a messenger and in the rations department, then went to nursing school in Baltimore at Sinai Hospital. She talks about her father's bar, "Al's Bar," that was popular with Union Pacific Railroad workers, and how the bar was forced out for the building of the Golden Nugget. Baratz recounts where her family lived, the growth of the Jewish community, and building the first synagogue on Carson Street.

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Transcript of interview with Doug Unger by Barbara Tabach, August 26, 2014

Date

2014-08-26

Archival Collection

Description

Interview with Doug Unger by Barbara Tabach on August 26, 2014. In the interview, Unger discusses his schooling, his family's mattress business, and his endeavors in the company and the mattress industry in Las Vegas. Unger becomes involved in Holocaust education and the Sperling Kronberg Mack Holocaust Resource Center.

Doug Unger was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and grew up working summers in a mattress factory, a family business started by his maternal grandfather. After graduating from high school in Cleveland, Doug attended the University of Cincinnati until moving to Steamboat Springs, and enrolled in Denver University, though ended his college career one class away from graduation. Eventually, Unger moved back to Cleveland, then to Las Vegas. In 1976, Dough bought Supreme Mattress and moved to Las Vegas to build his new business. Outside his successful career, Doug was always an active member in the city's Jewish community. He joined Congregation Ner Tamid, where he was a trustee. He became involved with the Jewish Federation, serving as treasurer and later as president. When he moved to Reno, Doug joined Temples Sinai and Emanu-el, and also became heavily involved with Guide Dogs for the Blind Friends Committee, serving as its director for a period of time. He was also the co-chair of the Governor's Advisory Council on Education Related to the Holocaust (GAC). Doug was instrumental in establishing the Library for Holocaust Studies as a successful organization, independent of the Jewish Federation. The Library is now located in its own, donated space, run by trained staff, and receives $200,000 from the state biennially.

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Transcript of interview with Harry Sax by Barbara Tabach, April 8, 2015

Date

2015-04-08

Archival Collection

Description

Interview with Harry Sax by Barbara Tabach on April 8, 2015. In this interview, Sax discusses his family history and upbringing in Chicago, and his military service in Munich. He returned to Chicago and became business partners with Michael Schulson, with whom he opened several Arby's outposts, and expanded to Las Vegas in 1968. He talks about life in Las Vegas in the 1970s and the competition in the fast food industry. He then talks about the reform congregation in Chicago and his connection to Judaism throughout his life. He describes himself as a "closet Jew" before becoming president at Congregation Ner Tamid in 2007. Sax discusses the programs at Ner Tamid for all ages, and his continued involvement in the community.

In 1939, Harry Sax was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son to first generation American Jews. He spent his childhood on Chicago's South, where his family belonged to a progressive Reform congregation. After graduating from Hyde Park High School, he continued his education at Indiana University. In college, Harry was a member of the ZBT Jewish fraternity, participated in a singing group, and was a cadet in the Reserve Officers' Training Corps. Upon graduating from college, Harry was stationed in Munich, Germany as a second lieutenant in the Quartermasters Corps. In addition to his required military duties, he also participated in an after-hours acting group; through this group, he was hired as an extra and for small roles, including The Great Escape. When he finished his service, Harry returned to Chicago, where he connected with a high school friend, Mike Schulson. The two became partners and purchased Arby's franchises in Chicago and Las Vegas. Thus, in 1968, while his partner remained in Chicago, Harry moved to Las Vegas and opened two franchise locations in two weeks. Though it took a few years to stabilize the business and overcome competition, he opened a third location in 1972 on South Decatur, what was then the western edge of the city. Today, Harry has nineteen locations in Las Vegas, with additional franchises in Reno and Barstow, California, and employs nearly 300 people. After about twenty years as a "closet Jew" in the city, Harry reconnected with Judaism and joined Congregation Ner Tamid in the late 1990s. He served on its board, eventually becoming vice president and then president (2007-09). He also dedicated himself to have a bar mitzvah, following up on his Jewish education and confirmation as a teenager. Harry has also served on the Anti-Defamation League's board as well as an active member of the Chamber of Commerce.

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Program from Christmas with Class at the Thomas and Mack Center, December 16, 1983

Date

1983-12-16

Description

This program is from the gala opening of the Thomas and Mack Center at the University of Nevada Las Vegas in 1983, which featured a celebrity lineup including Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Diana Ross. The program provides details of the contributions of Jerome Mack and Parry Thomas to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

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Transcript of interview with Charles Salton by George Green, April 23, 1976

Date

1976-04-23

Description

Interview with Charles Salton by George Green on April 23, 1976. Salton discusses arriving in Las Vegas in 1929, after his family had moved from New Jersey to Huntington Beach, California. His father sold real estate, and expected a boom after the authorization for the construction of Hoover Dam. His father was involved in bootlegging and then owned Al's Bar, a drinking and gambling establishment, on the alley at South First Street. Salton describes the area around Fremont Street and Las Vegas Boulevard with businesses and grocery stores, the grammar school and high school, and the hospital. Salton talks about his social activities, including involvement in the Jewish Community Center (Temple Beth Sholom), and several of the bars, clubs and casinos in the area. He briefly discusses the mob influence in the casinos versus corporate ownership and then speaks about the education system in Clark County.

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Invitation and program for Temple Beth Sholom building dedication, September 2000

Date

2000

Archival Collection

Description

Temple Beth Sholom invitation and program for the building dedication includes a guide to the Judaic art in the synagogue and a list of past presidents.

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Transcript of interview with Fran Fine-Ventura by Barbara Tabach, March 4, 2015

Date

2015-03-04

Archival Collection

Description

In this interview, Fine discusses her childhood as well as the path that led to her career in law, which included working on a presidential campaign in New York City as well as several legal secretary positions in Washington, D.C., Texas and California, before eventually receiving her law degree from Golden Gate University. In addition, she reflects upon working on the infamous Jeff MacDonald murder trial in the 1970s as well as her experience becoming?and ending her service as?a Family Court Judge. Fine also discusses her community service work, particularly with the Women?s Philanthropy Board of the Jewish Federation and with Temple Beth Am.

Frances-Ann "Fran" Fine-Ventura is an attorney at the Fine and Price Law Group in Las Vegas, Nevada. She was born September 28, 1951, in Cleveland, Ohio, and moved to Arizona at the age of eleven when her father sought new economic opportunities out West. Fine eventually moved to Las Vegas shortly after she graduated law school in 1983. Fine worked for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Nevada in the early 1980s, then at several private law firms. From 1992 to 1998, she served as a District Court Judge in the Family Division of the Eighth Judicial District Court. Fine is involved in the Las Vegas community via the Nevada School of the Arts and the Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) Foundation in Clark County, Nevada. She has also been involved with the Women's Philanthropy Board of the Jewish Federation of Las Vegas since 1984, and served as chair from 2014 to 2016. Fran Fine's brother is Las Vegas real estate developer Mark Fine. In this interview, Fine discusses her childhood as well as the path that led to her career in law, which included working on a presidential campaign in New York City as well as several legal secretary positions in Washington, D.C., Texas and California, before eventually receiving her law degree from Golden Gate University. In addition, she reflects upon working on the infamous Jeff MacDonald murder trial in the 1970s as well as her experience becoming?and ending her service as?a Family Court Judge. Fine also discusses her community service work, particularly with the Women?s Philanthropy Board of the Jewish Federation and with Temple Beth Am.

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Transcript of interview with Flora Mason by Barbara Tabach, December 8, 2014

Date

2014-12-08

Description

Flora Mason (1940- ) is a Las Vegas, Nevada philanthropist and community leader. She was born Florica Esformes to a Sephardic Jewish parents who emigrated from Greece to New York. This Mediterranean influence can be seen in the meals she serves for the Jewish holidays. Flora?s grandfather had a pushcart business in New York and her father became a produce broker, which led the family to Miami, Florida. She graduated from high school in Miami and also met Stuart Mason there. The young couple married in 1958. They had been married for 58 years when Stuart passed away in 2012. In this oral history, Flora recalls her life?from witnessing signage that read: no blacks, no dogs, no Jews in the South to meeting her husband while a teenager to raising her three children in Las Vegas. Along the way, she has always found time to form fast friendships and to inspire productive community organizations. v For example, Flora and Stuart founded the Las Vegas Chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation in 1970. It was a disease that their daughter Deborah had suffered from. They also established the Mason Undergraduate Peer Coach Program at University of Nevada, Las Vegas Libraries in 2006. Flora was the first woman elected by the general membership to serve on the Temple Beth Sholom Board of Directors. She has served on the National Board of Directors of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, been involved with the Jewish Federation of Las Vegas, the Anti-Defamation League among many other Jewish and non-Jewish community organizations. Flora?s college education began at the University of Miami and focused on completing both her undergraduate and graduate degrees at UNLV, where she majored in English literature. She then became a lecturer in the UNLV English department from 1985 to 1993. Flora and Stuart Mason had three children: sons William and James who joined the family?s successful three-generation commercial construction business Taylor International, and daughter Deborah. In this oral history, Flora shares the joy of being a grandparent, her love of travel, and the opportunities of meeting Israeli dignitaries over the years. She also candidly reflects on dealing with grief and the Jewish rituals surrounding death.

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Temple Beth Sholom Master by-laws, February 12, 1998

Date

1998-02-12

Archival Collection

Description

This document establishes the purposes and duties of the board of directors and the make up of the membership of Temple Beth Sholom.

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