Oral history interview with James Deacon conducted by Mary K. Keiser on August 24, 2006 for the UNLV @ 50 Oral History Project. In this interview James Deacon discusses interviewing with Dean Bill Carson in the summer of 1960 for a job at the University of Nevada, Southern Regional Division (currently University of Nevada, Las Vegas). He also talks about moving to Reno, Nevada with his family and teaching at the University of Nevada, Reno for two summers, then promptly returning to UNLV. Deacon then discusses how he was instrumental in organizing the Department of Environmental Studies and in helping to develop a masters and Ph.D. program in biology at UNLV.