In 1976, Jacqueline "Jaki" Baskow was an aspiring actress when she and a friend accepted an invitation to worked in a movie studio in Las Vegas. She had three-hundred dollars to her name, a dream and lots of dynamic energy. Though the movie studio offer did not quite materialized as she hoped - the invitation had come from Batman co-creator Bob Kane - Jaki's trajectory into Las Vegas, working with talents and planning events became an over forty year career. In this interview, she talks about growing up Jewish in Camden, New Jersey where her father was a murder victim; her tenacious effort to find the perpetrator included the help of celebrity detective Joe Schillaci. She shares stories of the colorful array of A-list entertainers she has worked with to build her successful business, Baskow and Associates. She has built a niche of handling large corporate events, hiring talent and attention to details for exciting events. She reflects on the people and moments that impelled her on; mentors such as Bobby Morris and Frank Sinatra and Jilly Rizzo.

On June 24, 1975, collector Donna Mattson interviewed native Nevadan mechanic, Stephen La Thair Hawley, (born October 15th, 1936, in Ely, Nevada) in his home in Las Vegas, Nevada. This interview offers a historical overview of early Las Vegas including gambling and an in-depth discussion on local economic, environmental, and social changes.

Toni Clark (born Lena Gaglionese) spent her youth in Seattle, Washington where she was born on April 4, 1915 to Angelene and Salvatore Gaglionese. Her father and mother moved to the Seattle area when they immigrated to the United States from Naples, Italy years earlier. Salvatore worked as a street cleaner for the city of Seattle and Angelene cared for the house and family until her early death. Toni grew up with three siblings, her father and step-mother, and an uncle and cousins next door. After attending Seattle’s Franklin High School for three years, she left. “I just didn’t like school so I quit,” she said, and spent the next couple of years at home. From these simple origins, Toni became “the first lady of Las Vegas” as some admirers called her, referring to the role she played in the transformation of Las Vegas from a frontier town into a glamorous resort town during the 1950s and 1960s. In 1941, before the Second World War began, Toni traveled to San Diego to visit friends and decided to stay. After a year of caring for a young boy, she moved into the Barbara Worth Hotel which was owned by Wilbur Clark. Clark’s father ran the hotel and suggested that Toni apply for a job at his son’s new bar and restaurant, the Monte Carlo. She had not met Wilbur Clark at the time and her shyness dissuaded her from making the move. Nevertheless, she did apply and went to work as the hostess of the Monte Carlo in downtown San Diego. Wilbur and Toni’s courtship began slowly. He gave her the name Toni, saying she “looked more like a Toni than a Lena,” and she kept it. In 1944, around the time Wilbur Clark relocated to Las Vegas where he had purchased the El Rancho Hotel, the couple married in Reno, Nevada and permanently made Las Vegas their home. Clark’s involvement in Las Vegas clubs and gambling expanded with the Monte Carlo downtown and the Player’s Club on the strip. But his dream to create a luxury resort hotel came to fruition when the Desert Inn opened in 1950. The fifth major property on the strip, the Desert Inn had several features that distinguished it from other places. The Skyroom offered a private club atmosphere for talking, music, and dancing. The Monte Carlo Room served French cuisine. The Doll House provided round-the-clock childcare for children of hotel guests. The Painted Desert Room, the property’s showroom, featured top performers and the Donn Arden Dancers. All these features combined to create a resort that offered guests an exquisite setting for a gambling vacation. Toni Clark had a special place at the heart of the Desert Inn’s social life. She brought a gracious and elegant charm to social events associated with the property. Although she said she was never involved in the business of the hotel-casino, she played a unique role setting a new tone for the enterprise. She entertained guests and dignitaries at the hotel as well as her home; organized fashion shows featuring the top designers of the time for the wives of high-rollers; and created celebrations of special events, notably her husband’s late December birthday, with annual parties. When Wilbur Clark died in 1965, Toni Clark remained active in the city’s social life. She did not disappear as others had, but continued to plan and attend social functions. As part of her service to the community, she took particular pleasure in her work with the Variety Club. She continued to reside in Las Vegas until her death in 2006.

The Kim Sisters, composed of three sisters, Sook-ja, Ai-ja, and Mia, came from Korea to Las Vegas in February 1959. Their first contract in America was to perform at the Thunderbird Hotel for four weeks as part of the China Doll Revue, the main showroom program. This engagement led to a successful career. Their popularity reached was at its height at the end of the 1960s when they performed throughout the United States and Europe. Sook-ja Kim is the oldest of the sisters. After his sister Ai-ja died in 1987, Sook-ja teamed up with her two brothers and continued to perform until 1989. Now semi-retired from show business, with occasional performances in Korea, she is working as a real estate agent. In this interview, she talked about her childhood, her career, and the family she has built since coming to America. Sook-ja was born in 1941 in Seoul, Korea as the third child of seven in a musical family. Her father was a conductor and her mother, a popular singer. After the Korean War, her mother arranged to send the Kim Sisters to America. When they came to Las Vegas, there were virtually no Koreans in the area. They depended on each other to take care of themselves. Some of the difficulties they had to adjust to in American were language, food, and cultural differences. Over the span of almost forty years in America, Sook-ja became acculturated without discarding her ethnic identity of family priorities. Her life-long guiding principle has been to adopt certain American values while continuing to keep her cherished Korean ethnic values. Through their performances, the Kim Sister informed the audience about Koreans and their culture. As the oldest of the group, Sook-ja was entrusted the care of her sisters, and later her brothers, the Kim brothers. Once she settled in Las Vegas, she brought more than forty members of her extended family to the city, contributing to the growth of the Las Vegas Korean community.

A resident of Southern Nevada from the age of three, Susan Watson shares her memories of growing up and living in Las Vegas. After a year in Boulder City, Susan's father bought an old army barrack and converted it to a home in North Las Vegas; Susan remembers playing in the desert with her siblings and attending elementary and middle school before starting at Rancho High. Watching her mother design costumes for Strip performers and beautiful dresses for her own high school dances no doubt helped Susan develop her own sense of taste and style - something that she would put to good use over many years as an interior designer. Before that though, Susan shares her memories of what life was like in the Las Vegas of the 1950s and 1960s: cruising Fremont Street; movie nights; after-school work; favorite teachers; lunches on the lawn; and dance club. All combine to paint a vivid picture of a smaller town and a simpler time in the Las Vegas valley.