Search Results
Transcript of interview with Rita Golub by Alisa Fife, March 14, 1981
Date
Archival Collection
Description
On March 14, 1981, Alisa Fife interviewed her friend’s grandmother, telephone operator and housewife, Rita Golub (born May 1st, 1920 in New York City, New York) in her home in Las Vegas, Nevada. The interview covers Rita Golub’s life in Las Vegas and includes discussion in regards to Queen Mother. Rita also discusses the Strip, night entertainment and social and religious activities in Las Vegas.
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Transcript of interview with Vincent Kethen by Claytee White, December 23, 2009
Date
Archival Collection
Description
In 1964, the year that Vincent Kethen was born, desegregation of Las Vegas schools began. Like many African-American children living in the Las Vegas Westside neighborhood, Vincent was bused out of his neighborhood in third grade to attend a white school. In his case, this meant attending John S. Park Elementary and later other predominantly white schools. He talks about these experiences. John S. Park was a neighborhood of manicured lawns, while the school bus and the classroom were places fraught with fisticuffs. The experience of growing up during that era are recalled. Vincent provides a sense of that it was like to reside in his home neighborhood and the onslaught of the drug culture altered gang-lead neighborhoods. Being bused had positive results he explains, such as athletics, which served as an equalizer. For Vincent, a solid upbringing, which included love of church and the chance to attend college, encouraged him to make good decisions about his future. He received a four-year degree and he returned to Las Vegas to "give back." For over a decade and a half, her has coached young basketball players and helped them see their options for a brighter future than they might otherwise have seen.
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Transcript of interview with Ronald Simone by Claytee White, May 5, 2009
Date
Archival Collection
Description
Musician Ronald Simone of Las Vegas credits his father’s guidance and his upbringing in New Haven, Connecticut, for shaping his musical and educational aspirations. Due to its proximity to New York City and the influence of Yale University, New Haven offered its residents the finest in musical entertainment; as a result, many musical greats were from or had lived in New Haven and most Broadway shows opened at New Haven’s Shubert Theater. Born in 1935 with the gift of perfect pitch, Simone began to play the piano at a young age and could play most pieces by ear. He began playing professionally at age eight in 1943 with a weekly stint on a radio show, Kitty's Revue. Still in grade school during World War II he began touring locally with an amateur producer, who formed a show that played military bases and hospitals around Connecticut and into New York and Massachusetts. In high school Simone formed his own trio and a quartet and played piano in gin mills, illegal card rooms, and resorts in upstate New York while playing trumpet in the high school band. He joined the Musicians Union at 18 and continued to play in New York and Connecticut clubs and theaters throughout his five years at Yale. During his second year at Yale the School of Music became a graduate school, from which Ron graduated in 1958. Ron’s sister Louise married one of his Yale classmates, a drummer, and the couple moved to Las Vegas. Ron visited his sister in 1959, loved the musical opportunities he saw, transferred his Musicians Union membership, and moved to Las Vegas with his friend, violinist Joe Mack, in September 1960. After sub work and playing a lounge show at the Riviera, he spent five and a half years in the Riviera showroom, moving in 1966 to the Desert Inn, where he played piano in the exclusive Monte Carlo Room for five years for the likes of Dean Martin, Sandy Koufax, Sammy Davis Jr., and Kirk Kerkorian. From there Simone went to the Dunes, where he remained for the next nineteen years working with choreographer Ronnie Lewis and rehearsing and playing all the Casino de Paris shows, line numbers, and production numbers. In July 1989, Musicians Local 369 went on strike. Because Simone was playing the Follies Bergere at the Tropicana—the first house band to strike—he was among the first musicians to walk out. Musicians at all but three Strip hotels (Circus Circus, Riviera, and the Stardust) followed. While the musicians strike lasted nearly eight months, Simone was recruited for sanctioned sub work for the duration at the Lido de Paris show at the Stardust. After the strike ended he worked with Johnny Haig's relief band playing six nights a week at various hotels.
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Meeting minutes for Consolidated Student Senate, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, January 09, 2004
Date
Archival Collection
Description
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UNLV Libraries Collection of MGM Mirage Corporation Promotional Materials and Reports
Identifier
Abstract
The UNLV Libraries Collection of MGM Mirage Corporation Promotional Materials and Reports includes promotional materials, newspaper and magazine clippings, financial reports, annual reports, diversity reports, press releases, and press kits for the MGM Mirage Corporation in Las Vegas, Nevada, dating from 1973 to 2007.
Archival Collection
José Luis Viñas Papers
Identifier
Abstract
The collection contains drawings, photographs, and posters featuring costumes designed by José Luis Viñas, a Spanish costume designer active in Las Vegas, Nevada, from 1960 to 2000. Viñas is best known for his costume designs for
Archival Collection
Photographs of McDonald's sign, 2800 S Las Vegas Blvd, Las Vegas (Nev.), 2002
Date
Archival Collection
Description
Site address: 2800 S Las Vegas Blvd
Sign details: Located just south of the Westward Ho's south parking lot is the third and northern most version of the sign. Unlike its other two relatives, this sign is solely designated to the McDonald's establishment. It is located in a small landscaped area directly east of the front of the restaurant. This section essentially comprises the front of the establishment itself. It stands tall on the west side of the strip facing north south.
Sign condition: Structure 5 Surface 4 Lighting 4 It is noted that the structural integrity is intact. Certain elements of lighting are out or not working but still present. The surface appears to be slightly deteriorating at this point.
Sign form: Pylon
Sign-specific description: The odd member of the three McDonald's pylons is different in almost every aspect, considering the similarity of the first two to each other. The sign construction itself is a more sleek, opting to integrate the entire structure into a much smoother design than the previous design as well. The other two cabinets are impressive indeed, but the placement of the cabinets is less clumsy than the others. The pole itself is thinner, painted brown steel flat post, which rises into the air, recording a small rectangular anomaly in the vertical line, which is used to support a yellow plastic internally lit cabinet. The four-sided shape swells out on each side, but transitions smoothly as the vertical shot continues upward. The brown post T's off to either side actually stretching to the widest point of the sign. It then grows vertically once again to create the sides of the cabinet. The shape that the brown portion creates is now more akin to a "U" shape rather than a "T." The entire surface of the pylon which is designated brown in laced with incandescent bulbs. Inside this U shape the face of the cabinet is designated red, and set higher above the surface plain of the face. The red fluted steel face is adorned with vertical neon bars and white channel letters floating above the surface. The channel letters are filled with bars of white neon. The giant golden arches break up the top edge of the red cabinet. The arches themselves are yellow painted steel, whose face are encrusted with yellow incandescent bulbs as well as border of yellow neon which floats around the edge of the arch. The tops and bottom surfaces are finished in a reflective, gold, polished metal. A channel runs up the center of the post and a yellow tube of neon glows as a centering stripe. This stripe actually ties in the internally lit yellow sign, with the crowning arches, quite well.
Sign - type of display: Neon; Incandescent; Backlit
Sign - media: Steel; Plastic
Sign - non-neon treatments: Paint
Sign animation: Oscillating, flashing
Notes: The white incandescent bulbs on the face of the sign illuminate in a chasing pattern from bottom to top, leaving all the bulbs illuminated in it's path, oscillating as they are illuminated. The post vertically illuminates, and when the bulbs reach the top of the brown arms of the U shape, the vertical, red, neon bars on the red portion of the cabinet, chase in simultaneously from either side. They meet in the middle leaving all the bars and thus the cabinet fully illuminated. The cabinet stays lit for a few moments, then the bars curtain out from the middle, back to either side, leaving the bars dark in the animations path. Once they reach the edge, the incandescent bulbs follow suit, and chase back down to the bottom, leaving all the bulbs dark it the chasing path. The yellow incandescent bulbs, which are on the face of the golden arches, constantly oscillate during the animations sequence.
Sign environment: As compared to the other two properties, the environment of this McDonald's is quite different. The other two were integrated into the strip mall design, utilizing the pylon itself for other advertisements as well. Even though the McDonald's pylon stood out as the dominant figure among their surroundings, They still felt as if they were part of a whole as well. The environment, which the northern pylon portrays, also reflects its surroundings as well. This environment of the Westward Ho, the Stardust, the Riviera, and the Circus Circus, bring about a certain garish nature in its design that fits in present in the McDonald's pylon.( see artistic significance and theme for further).
Sign manufacturer: YESCO
Sign - thematic influences: The theme of the McDonald's establishment is in the realm of the well-established McDonalds corporation. The golden arches, and solid red hue, have become synonymous with the name "McDonald's," and is an image, which has been communicated to the masses of people for half a century. It is an icon that is associated with America all over the world. McDonalds has created it's own realm and thematic influence over the years from all of it's extensive advertisements and marketing. Therefore, the theme of the establishment's signs draws from itself and the world, which the name has created. Being one of the most commonly seen images in America, this sign is tailored to fit into the illustrious, illuminative properties held on the Las Vegas Strip. It fits into the category of everyday images and businesses dressed up for Las Vegas, which include, Arabia's, Arco AM/PM, Walgreen's, and Fatburger.
Sign - artistic significance: Besides what is mentioned in the above paragraph about the above nature of the iconography of the said logo, this particular sign draws off of its surroundings to display certain aesthetic elements.
Surveyor: Joshua Cannaday
Survey - date completed: 2002
Sign keywords: Oscillating; Flashing; Pylon; Neon; Incandescent; Backlit; Steel; Plastic; Paint
Mixed Content
Ernest Oon oral history interview: transcript
Date
Archival Collection
Description
Oral history interview with Ernest Oon conducted by Cecilia Winchell, Stefani Evans, and Jerwin Tiu on February 16, 2023 for the Reflections: the Las Vegas Asian American and Pacific Islander Oral History Project. In this interview, Oon recalls his childhood in Singapore, where his father worked on the Health and Sports Council for the Singaporean Government and his mother worked as a television assistant producer. Growing up, Oon recalls being very active, participating in everything from soccer to Tae Kwon Do. In an effort to continue his education without being being interrupted by Singapore's civil service program, Oon applied to college in the United States and ended up attending California State University. Although he was on the medicine track in Singapore, he switched to finance. After a series of jobs within credit banking, he is now a chief credit officer for Bank of Nevada. Throughout the interview, Oon reflects on the changes in his life living in different places, the street food from Singapore, and his unique tennis game.
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Young Electric Sign Company (YESCO) Corporate Records
Identifier
Abstract
The Young Electric Sign Company (YESCO) Corporate Records (1914-2000) document the history of the Young Electric Sign Company (YESCO) and is comprised of photographs of sign production and finished signs, negatives, slides, transparencies, anniversary scrapbooks, and videotapes. The collection also contains meeting minutes, correspondence, price books, drawings, calculations, newspaper and trade magazine articles on YESCO, advertising materials, and oral history interviews and audio recordings of YESCO designers and executives. YESCO is responsible for many of the neon signs in and around Las Vegas, Nevada and Reno, Nevada, as well as other Western states.
Archival Collection
Gary Guy Wilson Architectural Drawings
Identifier
Abstract
The collection is comprised of drawings (1965-1996) completed by American architect Gary Guy Wilson and/or his architectural firm, Gary Guy Wilson, AIA, Architect Studios and contains 613 sets of drawings from over 250 different projects. Primarily focused on the Las Vegas, Nevada area, the materials feature hand-drawn architectural drawings, ranging from preliminary sketches to construction documents, and a number of printed computer aided drawings. The drawings also contain work from a number of consultants, engineers, and other architects who collaborated on the development of the various projects. The drawings include: commercial and professional buildings of varying scales, such as convenience stores, hotels, casinos, shopping centers, and office developments; schools; military buildings at both Nellis and Indian Springs Air Force Bases; multi-family residential developments; and custom single-family homes located throughout the Southwest (United States).
Archival Collection