Includes meeting agenda and minutes. CSUN Session 25 Meeting Minutes and Agendas.

Louise Lorenzi Fountain was born on Nov. 14, 1913, to David Lorenzi, a French immigrant, and Julia Travese Moore from La Belle, Missouri. Her younger years were devoted to helping her father develop and manage Lorenzi Lake Park, which was built by Lorenzi and is considered a primary landmark in the development and life of the citizens of Las Vegas. Louise Lorenzi's father has been noted as one of the 100 most influential citizens of Las Vegas by the Las Vegas Review Journal. He opened the park in 1926 with a pair of man-made lakes and a swimming pool, dance hall, band shell and other amenities. In the interview, Louise talks about her father and mother and describes Las Vegas during its early years. Louise Lorenzi married Edgar Fountain in 1936. He had hitchhiked from Georgia in search of work on the construction of Boulder Dam, now Hoover Dam. The couple left Las Vegas for 10 years and lived in Grand Coulee, Washington, where he helped build Grand Coulee Dam. After returning to Las Vegas, Louise became a full partner in several business ventures the couple started. Those included the Nevada Amusement Co., a collection of 35 coin-operated phonograph machines; Frontier Radio and Appliance Co.; and later a television sales business; partnerships in two soft-drink bottling companies and a Toyota dealership. Louise Lorenzi Fountain was active in two Methodist churches and was a member of the First Presbyterian Church. She was a charter member and regent of the Valley of Fire Chapter of The Daughters of the American Revolution. Louise Lorenzi Fountain passed away on January 29, 2006 at 92 years of age.

Darwin Gidel, born in 1924, grew up in Rockwell City, Iowa. He describes his childhood activities, schooling, and the jobs he held as a teenager. After graduating from high school in June of '42, Darwin immediately joined the military. His basic training took him from Minneapolis to Missouri, after which he was stationed in Nebraska, California, Florida, and South Carolina for further training. As he recalls his early military training, Darwin also evokes the patriotic fervor that gripped the country. He shares stories about the kindnesses he and many other enlistees received from individuals and families, ranging from rides to dinners to overnights. Darwin's overseas assignment was in London, England, beginning in November of 1943. He vividly recalls the bombing raids he flew and describes them from beginning to end. His B-l 7 was shot down over Belgium in March of 1944, and he and eight other crew members were held as POWs for eleven months. Much of Darwin's incarceration was in a Luftwaffe Hospital in Brussels, where his injured leg was removed. His memories include hospital personnel, solitary confinement, interrogation, and later being moved around to many different prisons in Germany. He clearly recalls relationships among prisoners, the configuration of German prisons, types of food served to inmates, and finally his repatriation from Annenberg Castle in Germany. After the war, Darwin earned a degree in accounting on the Gl Bill, which eventually led to general administration work in Sacramento. Along the way he married and had four children. After his wife passed away in the late seventies. Darwin eventually relocated to Las Vegas and remarried. He describes the city, recalls the small town atmosphere, and compares the impersonal bottom-line attitude of modem casinos to the folksy, welcoming feel of those establishments in the early eighties.