Oral history interview with Isaac Barrón conducted by Maribel Estrada Calderón and Claytee D. White on March 27, 2019 for the Latinx Voices of Southern Nevada Oral History Project. Isaac Barrón was born and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada. His father entered the United States as a Bracero. Barrón attended Rancho High School and earned his bachelor's degree in secondary education from UNLV. He currently teaches history at Rancho High School and serves as North Las Vegas' Councilman. In this oral history, Barrón recalls his youth in North Las Vegas, navigating the presence of gangs, and his path to being a community activist and advocate for North Las Vegas youth. He has led volunteer efforts for community improvement projects, including the plans for a new public library. He holds the distinction of being the first Latinx member of the North Las Vegas City Council and Southern Nevada's first Hispanic Mayor Pro Tempore. In 2013, he was elected to represent Ward 1 and was reelected for a second term in April 2017. He discusses being Mexican American, the Coalition of Pan American Organizations, the Hispanic Student Union, the Bracero Program, and Rancho High School.
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Oral history interview with Cynthia Mun conducted by Vanessa Concepcion and Stefani Evans on March 31, 2021 for Reflections: The Las Vegas Asian American and Pacific Islander Oral History Project. Cynthia Mun discusses her upbringing near Seoul, South Korea and her family's immigration to Los Angeles in 1974. She talks about her parents' employment as a seamstress and a janitor, as well as the educational mentors she encountered who helped her to succeed at Westridge School for Girls in Pasadena and later at Yale University. Mun shares her corporate employment history, including helping to launch the Pandora streaming service and creating an accessible platform for E-book use before the creation of Amazon Kindle. Mun talks about her career working at MGM International and how this opened the door for her mother to become an MGM employee and access better working conditions with union employment.
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Megan Gillespie Rice was born on January 31, 1930, in Manhattan, New York.
Rice obtained a master of science degree from the Villanova University. Rice also obtained a master of science degree in cellular biology from Boston Colleg ein 1962. Rice studeied Dip Pastoral Thrology at the Gaba Pastoral Institute in Eldoret, Kenya in 1978.
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Ida Bowser was born in Tallulah, Louisiana, and in 1955 at the age of 10 she was brought to Las Vegas, Nevada to join her mother and other family members. The family originally lived on Washington and H Streets, and later moved to Madison Avenue. Ida and her brothers and sisters attended Madison Elementary School right down the block.
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Corinne "Corky" Moss (née Wollman; April 22, 1924 – 2001) was a philanthropist involved in establishing and supporting multiple educational and community efforts in Las Vegas, Nevada. She was the daughter of Murray Wollman, a Las Vegas landowner and developer, and his wife Agnes. The family moved to Las Vegas in 1936, where Moss graduated from Las Vegas High School in 1941. She graduated from Stanford University in 1945 and married Melvin S. Moss in 1946, with whom she had two daughters.
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Musician, arranger, conductor, and composer Anthony J. Franchini was born on August 2, 1898 in Naples, Italy and immigrated to the United States with his family when he was five years old. With only an 8th grade education, he worked as a music teacher in Massachusetts until he enlisted in the Army during the first World War. When he was discharged, he went to New York City, New York to pursue a career in music.
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Irene Bustamante Adams believes in the reinvention of oneself as the path to the future. And since coming to Nevada in 1990 she has proven that anything is possible.
She was born and raised in rural California where she worked the fields alongside her family members growing up. Her mother is a native of New Mexico, with family that dates back six generations; her father was born in Mexico.
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