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Transcript of interivew with Elmer Curley by Claytee D. White, November 1, 2011

Date

2011-11-01

Description

Elmer Curley is known simply as Curley. He came to Las Vegas to work in the area of public service for the UNLV library in August 1967. Thus he launched a lifelong move from a smaller community north of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to Las Vegas. He only imagined it would be a four to five year move. To his amazement he continue to live here and retired shortly before this interview after a successful career at the library. During this narrative he talks about moving into the University Park Apartments, working with a small budget in the earlier years of the "round building" library, and the humor of receiving book donations that could result in multiple copies of a title. Over the years since 1967, Curley worked with a long list of the various directors observed many changes to the city and experienced the inspiring growth of UNLV.

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Transcript of interview with Helen M. Cecil by Claytee D. White, April 24, 2007

Date

2007-04-24

Description

Helen Mott Cecil was born in 1916 and grew up in Las Vegas. Her grandparents were miners and her grandmother owned property on the Westside. She recalls a friendly neighborhood and walking back and forth to school with neighborhood children. The family moved several times finally settling at 601 South Main Street. While attending Las Vegas High School she participated in several Helldorado parades with her father and brother. At the age of 15, Helen remembers the constriction of the first downtown post office. When the Hoover Dam started in 1931, her father was the under-sheriff. One of his duties was distributing health cards to prostitutes. Her memories include Saturday night dances in Anderson's Mess Hall in Boulder City, atomic bomb testing at the Nevada Test Site walking to church services on Fremont Street, Woodlawn Cemetery, the old Henderson Townsite and meeting President Roosevelt at the Hoover Dam dedication. As a high school student she served as president and counselor in her Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In 1934 she graduated from Las Vegas High School. Helen held numerous jobs before getting married at the age of 26-bookkeeper, movie theatre usher, telephone operator, and secretarial work. Her husband Bill worked at all three post office locations in the Las Vegas area. At the age of 91, Helen and her sister still live and enioy life in Las Vegas sharing their many memories of early Las Vegas.

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Transcript of interview with Paul J. Christensen by Claytee D. White, February 19, 2008

Date

2008-02-19

Description

Personal history of Las Vegas through the eyes of a public servant. Growing up in Las Vegas during the 1940s. Education history and childhood memories. Downtown. Experiences in the US Air Force: flying B-47s loaded with nuclear bombs; training. NV Test Site. Family jewelry business in Las Vegas. Election to the board of the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce. Election to the Las Vegas City Council and the beginning of a career in politics. Jam auction. Tussle with the Clark County Commission over wastewater in the valley: details of the dispute, extended to the state and Environmental Protection Agency. Move to the County Commission and why? The Mob during the 1950s and 60s. The Mormon community in Las Vegas. Howard Hughes. Experiences sitting on the County Commission. Chairman of the Convention Authority. Remarks on Las Vegas' future water supply. Election defeat. Corruption on the County Commission (Erin Kenny). Distinguished Nevadan award. County Hospital. Quick Care Centers. Opinion on the growth of Las Vegas. Speedway Children's Charities. Dina Titus. Experiences with African Americans. Lucy Stewart. Beaver, NV.

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Transcript of interview with D. Taylor by Claytee White, July 25, 2014

Date

2014-07-25

Archival Collection

Description

D. Taylor knew from the time he graduated Georgetown University he wanted to make his career in the labor movement. He credits his Virginia-born mother as an early mentor; she was at once “nice,” “tough,” “genteel,” and “liberal,” and she instilled these values in her son. As a new college grad, Taylor headed west to Lake Tahoe, where he was hired in 1981 by the Culinary Union to organize workers and oversee an eleven-and-a-half-month strike. Culinary then sent him to organize Las Vegas in 1984, a few years after Ronald Reagan crushed the 1981 Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization strike and only months after the Amalgamated Transit Union strike against Greyhound went down in defeat. In this interview, Taylor recalls that in 1984, most Las Vegas casinos were no longer owned by individuals and families but by multinational corporations that refused to negotiate improved health insurance coverage for their workers. Taylor led a citywide strike that ultimately cost the union six casinos and about eight thousand members. In 1987, Culinary sent him back to Las Vegas, where he has remained. He tells the history of the union in Las Vegas and its leadership, especially crediting Al Bramlet in the 1970s for recruiting a diverse workforce and promoting casino hiring through the union. In 1987 Taylor changed the union rep structure to give a larger voice to Las Vegas’s racially diverse workforce and began recruiting potential leaders of color (like Hattie Canty)—thus, he followed Bramlet’s lead but pushed it further to create a truly bottom-up organization. The husband and father is especially proud of the various programs Culinary Workers Union Local 226 has implemented to improve the lives of Las Vegas union workers and their families but sees widening gaps in the city between those who have great wealth and those who do not. To Taylor, his work is “always about the members. They endure so much. They sacrifice so much.”

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Transcript of interview with John J. Delibos by Claytee D. White, October 2, 2012

Date

2012-10-02

Description

With roots in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, John J. Delibos epitomizes a true Las Vegan. At the age of eight, his family moved from Wisconsin to Las Vegas to take advantage of emerging employment opportunities. Raised in a devout Catholic household, his mother and father demonstrated a strong work ethic that John would emulate. After graduating from Cornell University, John returns to Las Vegas. Over the course of his young adulthood, John meets many of Las Vegas' key developers, including the McKellars, the Boyds, and the Thomases. He works in various capacities, in various casinos around town. Eventually, John retires from gaming and works full-time as an interior designer, a skill he cultivated since childhood. Throughout the interview, John recollects, with meticulous detail, the development of Las Vegas since the 1960s, neighborhood by neighborhood, street by street, property by property. John now lives at Turnberry, overlooking a very different Las Vegas than that which he first saw as a child living at The DeVille.

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Transcript of interview with Susan Cowan by Andres Moses, January 31, 2006

Date

2006-01-31

Description

Susan Cowan grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, and enjoyed a loving childhood with her parents, older sister and grandparents, complete with family vacations to California and Mexico. Called to dancing ever since she can remember, this passion remained with her throughout her life. By the time Susan graduated from high school, she had moved five different times. This nomadic nature continued once being married and having two children, eventually settling in Boulder, Colorado. It was here that Susan began working in higher education, as a secretary at the University of Colorado-Boulder, where she met her second husband. During her 19 years at UC-Boulder, Susan advanced in her career, becoming the lead administrator for the Chemistry Department. It was also here that Susan took dance classes again, with some of the best in the field. Susan and her husband moved to Las Vegas after nearly 25 years in Boulder, where she quickly found a community to express herself in dance.

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Transcript of interview with Judith Boyer by Claytee D. White, November 8, 2005

Date

2005-11-08

Description

Before moving to Las Vegas, Judith Boyer graduated from the University of Southern California where she received a degree in business merchandising. She grew up in the Los Angeles area as an only child and discusses Southern California, married life and traveling. Judith moved to Las Vegas in November of 1948, worked at Ronzoni's Department Store on Fremont Street and then got the chance to work for Bonanza Airlines as a stewardess. Hostessing for an airline was her dream job and she did it for two years, but gave it up to marry Karsten Bronken and start their family. She discusses Las Vegas as it was in the 1950s. Her memories encompass great stories about the city when people still rode horses around town, participated in Heldorado Parades and enjoyed the early hotels and casinos that were so different from those of today. After her first husband passed away, Judith married Dr. Harold Boyer, who was a dermatologist in Las Vegas for many years. She shares several memories and anecdote

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Transcript of interview with Martin Dean Dupalo by Claytee D. White, October 24, 2005

Date

2005-10-24

Description

Martin Dean Dupalo was born February 20, 1967. His parents were Eva Auge, a German citizen, and Milton Dupalo. Martin shares many stories and anecdotes concerning his family background, his father's 21 year military career, his mother's tribulations in WWII Berlin, and the many sites the family visited all over the world. Martin gives a wealth of details regarding Las Vegas and UNLV in the seventies and eighties. He lists the schools he attended in Clark County and recalls some of the friends and professors his father knew while attending UNLV. Martin graduated from Eldorado High in 1985, attended UNLV, and was selected for a Truman Congressional Scholarship at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He describes the house and surrounding area in which he and his father and brother, Michael Dean, lived. He also includes comments and anecdotes regarding entertainment in the Vegas Valley. After a stint as a fire fighter, four years in the Air Force and Air Force Reserve, and a brief marriage, Martin began teaching at UNLV in 2003. He discusses race relations as he has experienced them in his family, the military, Las Vegas, and at UNLV. His closing comments are in regard to war, world population, and the possibility of peace.

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Transcript of interview with John Foley by Irene Rostine, May 11, 2011

Date

2011-05-11

Archival Collection

Description

John Foley is the youngest of five sons bora to Roger T. and Helen Foley. John's grandfather, Thomas L. Foley was an early transplant to Nevada when he headed for Goldfield in 1907. By 1910 Grandfather Foley had persuaded his son Roger T. to move west - it was a boom time. Roger who was finishing law school in Chicago passed both the Nevada and California bar exams in 1911. Two years later he married Helen who he knew from Chicago and with that launch a legal dynasty in southern Nevada: Roger, Thomas, George, Joseph and John. Each son would enjoy participating successfully in the history of Las Vegas. In this series of interviews, John shares his personal accomplishments as well as mentions his brothers contributions and service to the community. He talks about being young men, his brothers going off to war, the part-time jobs made available by the ever changing landscape of the area, new jobs and growth. He attended Fifth Street Elementary School and Las Vegas High School, actively encouraged the creation of the Boyd Law School at UNLV, and was elected a Nevada State Senator among many other activities as well as being father to his six children. John witnessed Las Vegas outgrowing its "little sister to Reno" role and now enjoys bragging that a fourth generation of Foleys lives in Las Vegas, many of whom carry on the family tradition of being lawyers.

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Transcript of interview with Mahlon Brown by Claytee D. White, December 16, 2003

Date

2003-12-16

Description

Attorney Mahlon Brown begins by talking about his family. His dad was a senator for Nevada, his grandmother was an "amazing, strong, powerful, and insightful" woman, and his mother he describes as beautiful, well-read, and a music lover. He reminisces about his undergraduate days at Howard University and the job he held as a Capitol policeman during the sixties. This included guarding JFK's casket. Mahlon recalls many notable Nevadans that he knew personally, worked closely with, or came up against in meetings or trials. He shares many anecdotes and stories about his contact with Judge Foley, Ronald Pollock, Kenny Guinn, Father Vitali, and Earl White, to mention just a few. He also shares memories of women like Ruby Duncan, Mary Wesley and Maya Miller. Attorney Brown describes the duties of the office of Justice of the Peace which he held for a few years, as well as some of the cases he and Jack Anderson handled when they worked in Legal Services. He also describes the poverty workshop he and Jack ran for three or four years, which gave welfare recipients a chance to air their opinions. Mahlon shares his opinions, insights, and firsthand knowledge of the Mob, Howard Hughes, Mayor Oscar Goodman, Malcolm X, James Brown, integration on the Strip, and many other topics. His personal connections and lengthy history of working and living in Las Vegas make for knowledgeable and entertaining reading.

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