The Las Vegas Age was not Las Vegas's first newspaper; that distinction belongs to the short-lived Las Vegas Times which started publishing on March 25, 1905. But only two weeks later, on April 7, C.W. Nicklin founded what was the not-yet-a-city's third paper, the Age. Nicklin edited and published the Age from the Overland Hotel each Saturday as a six-page independent weekly, at $2 per year. When the railroad finally arrived, and laid out and auctioned off the town lots, the Age and its two competitors, the Times and the Advance, boomed with the new town amid lively journalistic debate. The Age briefly triumphed when the Times and Advance collapsed, until new competition arrived, and Nicklin left the Age to his partner Charles C. Corkhill to give his attention to his other paper, the Beatty Bullfrog Miner. Corkhill struggled for two years as editor and publisher, as Las Vegas languished in post-boom depression, then persuaded local businessman Charles P. "Pop" Squires to buy the paper, only after repeatedly dropping the price. Thus began the long and fruitful newspaper career of Charles Squires, sole editor and proprietor of the Age for almost forty years. Even after he sold the paper in 1943, he continued as editor until its last owner, Frank Garside of the Review-Journal, suspended publication of the Age on November 30, 1947.
As the Las Vegas Age, under Squires' shrewd editorship, dominated its local competition as the leading local newspaper with the largest circulation, it also became the leading paper in Southern Nevada. When Las Vegas was founded it was a remote railroad establishment far from the seat of Lincoln County, in Pioche where the county's leading newspaper and the paper of legal record was the Lincoln County Record, which had been in business since 1871. With the rapid growth of Las Vegas and the decline of the Pioche mining district, the population of southern Nevada shifted to the south and the divisions between the southern and northern sections of Lincoln County, which covered the whole of southeastern Nevada, became politically heated. When the Age began publication in Las Vegas in 1905, with a larger circulation than the Record in Pioche, the county commissioners decided to award to the Age all county printing and job work. The editor of the Record, not surprisingly, was enraged and commenced a series of personal attacks on the Age and the residents of Las Vegas, likening the Age to a mushroom fungi of uncertain life, possessing a readership of "floaters, the shiftless and reckless class."
Squires became the city's foremost booster and the Age became his trumpet, fighting for the division of Lincoln County that created Clark County, or for the new dam (an original member of Nevada's Colorado River Commission, Squires was in charge of publicity), or promoting as a one-man Chamber of Commerce civic and community organizations and projects or the city's nascent tourism and resort industry. Thus, the Age became the Voice of Las Vegas, as well as the most respected "paper of record" for the city. Other newspapers came and went, some were political adversaries (Squires was a staunch conservative, pro-business Republican), and some became well-established. But the Age remained the essential Las Vegas newspaper, from its fiercely independent editorials, to its boosterism and its comprehensive reporting of the simple everyday doings of this boisterous and dynamic new city.
See full information about this title online through Nevada's participation in the National Digital Newspaper Project. All issues digitized online at: Chronicling America collection from the Library of Congress.
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Michael Signorelli, long-time Las Vegas resident and builder of many local homes, apartments and hotels, describes his upbringing, career, and stellar reputation as part of the “Building Las Vegas” oral history project. Raised in Rhode Island, the only child of an Italian-American father and a Southern Baptist mother, Michael’s early life was influenced by his father’s disability as a World War Two veteran and his non-English speaking paternal grandparents, who owned and ran a grocery store. Talking of his experiences in helping them run the grocery store he says, "I became a businessman at the age of twelve." His military service during the Vietnam War landed him at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas. Once here, Michael furthered his education at UNLV, obtaining both his MEd and PhD degrees. In Las Vegas Michael began his work in the housing arena working for Sun Home Builders and his non-profit work, helping to raise funds for the newly formed Rape Crisis Center. Signorelli went on to work for Howard Hughes's Summa Corporation, where he successfully fought against a discrimination lawsuit brought by twenty-one female dealers. In 1978 Michael started his own company, Nicro Corporation, and began building homes in the Las Vegas valley with land he acquired on a hand-shake and a verbal contract. He continued his non-profit work, which included coordinating Lady Bird Johnson’s Green Thumb project for Nevada and the Pacific Northwest. In the 1980s Signorelli was recruited by the Fitzgerald Group, where he was involved in non-gaming operations for their many hotels, cattle ranch, and an in vitro clinic. In this interview, Signorelli describes his non-Las Vegas building projects in Mesquite and Laughlin. He built the Mesquite Star hotel and casino by overcoming multiple hurdles around water access and money. Despite twice obtaining a loan for one hundred million dollars, he was never able to successfully complete the Laughlin hotel and casino, due to legal issues from his partner’s family trust. Signorelli also shares his idea for a unique hotel and casino called the Nev Star that involved his successful negotiation of a waiver to Senate Bill 208. Signorelli concludes his interview by talking about his ownership of the world-famous Golden Steer Steak House restaurant, which opened in 1958. Under Signorelli’s ownership the Golden Steer has been featured in national publications and claims many legendary fans such as NACAR driver Mario Andretti, who in 2016 celebrated his seventy-six birthday at the Golden Steer. Signorelli’s love of Las Vegas and its many positive traits come forth as he talks about his daughter and her achievements and suggests Vegas promoters should do a better job about what great schools, medical care, and government we have in Las Vegas.
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