On March 1, 1980, Gloria Banks interviewed her business acquaintance, Kenneth F. Johann (born 1924 in New York City) about his work life in Las Vegas, Nevada. The two discuss the origins of Johann’s business and early land prices in Southern Nevada. Johann explains the history of his investments as well as how land development progressed in Las Vegas from the 1950s and onward.
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On February 7, 1976, collector, Marc Hechter interviewed Herbert and Erma Holtam in the collector’s home in Las Vegas, Nevada. This interview covers the history of the early Las Vegas Valley area. The discussion includes an in-depth overview of the Helldorado Parade and Helldorado Village. The building of the hotels on the Strip, homesteading, and local housing developments, are also discussed.
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The Donn Arden Papers (1910s-1990s) document Arden's sixty-plus years in the entertainment industry working in showrooms and nightclubs all over the world including Paris, France, Las Vegas, Nevada, New York, New York, and Los Angeles, California. Donn Arden worked as a choreographer, producer and director known for creating extravagant production shows that combined spectacular scenery and disaster with sequined and feathered showgirls. The collection is comprised of production notes, programs, photographs, posters, sheet music, correspondence, costume design sketches, press clippings, and magazine articles.
Archival Collection
Interview with Irving Kirshbaum by Cheryl Rogers on February 23, 1979. In this interview, Kirshbaum discusses the Riviera Hotel where he began working in 1955. He also talks about the landscape of the Las Vegas Strip in the 1950s, and the state of gambling, comps, customer service, and dealer training. The interviewer asks about the treatment of minorities at the Riviera, and in Las Vegas generally, and the effect of corporate ownership on casinos.
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Oral history interview with José Luis Gutiérrez conducted by Maribel Estrada Calderón and Barbara Tabach on October 1, 2018 for the Latinx Voices of Southern Nevada Oral History Project. Also present during this interview is José's close friend Sergio Salgado, who was interviewed separately for the Latinx Voices project in 2018. José discusses his early life growing up in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico, and his migration to Tijuana and then Santa Barbara, California as a teenager. He talks about his restaurant employment history both in California and in Las Vegas, including his time working at the Jolly Parrot, the Dunes Hotel and Casino, and his own eatery: Tortilleria Los Arcos. Subjects discussed include: Tortilleria Los Arcos; Club Social Mexicano.
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The manuscript synopsis for the television series Good Ole Hank is accompanied by a letter from Harry Cohn of Columbia Pictures (Hollywood, Calif.), rejecting the proposal.
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Minnesotan Don Laughlin landed far from the land of (more than) 10,000 lakes. His office 90 miles south of Las Vegas in the eponymous town of Laughlin commands an unimpeded view of a very different landscape from that of his youth. Here, where the Colorado River flows south through one of its narrowest channels, Laughlin arrived in about 1966 and purchased what would become the Riverside Resort Hotel and Casino. The endeavor was so successful that the then-settlement of 10 to 15 people at that tiny spot on the river grew to be an unincorporated town housing more than 7,000 people in 2010. Today, Laughlin the man continues to promote and support Laughlin the town via flood control projects and infrastructure development. In this interview, Laughlin sits amid the antique slot machines in his office and enjoys the view as he recalls his childhood on the family farm in southern Minnesota, and talks about leaving the farm in the late 1940s for nearby Owatonna to do watchmaking and watch repairing while simultaneously running a slot machine and pinball parlor. After visiting Las Vegas on vacation, he arrived permanently in 1952 and bartended at the Thunderbird Hotel until he bought his own bar and restaurant in Downtown Las Vegas, which he named Laughlin’s Made Right Café. After selling the café, he bought the 101 Club in North Las Vegas. He began searching for a casino for a casino to buy, seeking only those located on the border of a state that did not allow gambling. When he found the small hotel/casino on the Colorado River he purchased it. He talks of building an airstrip across the street and making daily trips to Las Vegas to buy groceries, beer, and toilet paper-essentially, everything one would need to run a hotel, restaurant, and casino-sometimes making three trips in one day. He continues to own and manage his hotel/casino at the age of 85, and he is in his office every day, all day, seven days a week. He gave up flying last year because he claims he’s too old to pilot his own aircraft. So is especially advantageous that the town that bears his name can now supply almost everything that he and the Riverside Resort Hotel and Casino need.
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