Count Guido Roberto Deiro was born February 18, 1938 in Reno, Nevada. He was the son of vaudeville performer and recording star Count Guido Pietro Deiro, who was the first major piano-accordionist to become popular in the United States, and his teenage wife Yvonne Teresa LeBaron De Forrest. Deiro grew up in and around Las Vegas, Nevada and Southern California after his parents’ divorce in 1941.
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Elizabeth Francis (nee Knath), born in Laramie, Wyoming on November 12, 1931, was the fourth of nine children. The family then moved to Salem, Oregon and Francis attended high school there through her junior year. She finished high school in 1949 in Saratoga, Wyoming, becoming the first of her siblings to graduate.
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In the mid-1980s, Gabriel E. Garcia (b 1976) was a grade schooler when his family relocated to Las Vegas from southern California. As so many others, his parents embraced the construction boom as harbinger of work opportunity. For young Gabe, it was all about going to school and making new friends. Within a couple of years, he was experiencing a Sixth Grade Center, part of Clark County School District’s plan to desegregate local schools. For his situation, riding the bus resulted in fewer hours that his parents worried about his wellbeing.
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Harvey J. Fuller (1919-2004) was raised in Southern California, attending college before joining the army air corp during World War II. After the war, he joined the Los Angeles police department, serving from 1946 until 1977. An inveterate collector, Fuller took up collecting gaming tokens after seeing a display at Harvey's Resort Hotel in the late 1960s.
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Anna Bailey was born May 14, 1921 in Savannah, Georgia. Bailey arrived in Las Vegas in 1955 to perform as a dancer for the opening of the Moulin Rouge Hotel and Casino. Six months later the Rouge closed, leaving both Anna and her husband, Bob, without work, since Bob had been the house singer and emcee at the Hotel. Nevertheless, Anna and Bob decided to make Las Vegas their home, convinced in the growth potential of the city.
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Politician Oran Kenneth Gragson was the longest serving mayor of Las Vegas, Nevada, a position he held from 1959 to 1975. He was born February 14, 1911, near Tucamari, New Mexico. In 1919, his family moved to Arkansas, then later to Texas. Gragson came to the Las Vegas area in 1932, and worked at the Hoover Dam for a short time before finding employment in highway construction. He managed the Boulder Inn Casino and Dance Hall for a brief time, and later opened the North Main Furniture Store, followed by the Charleston Appliance Center.
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