Born and raised in the Philippines, Maila Aganon emigrated with her parents in 1992, after she completed her first semester of college. She describes as "typical" her youth as the youngest child (with brothers 5 and 7 years older) of a teacher who worked in another village and a father who worked out of the country. Although independent, she was part of a tightly knit village. The household spoke three languages: her mother's dialect, her father's dialect, and Tagalog.

"Don Ashbaugh served in both World War I and World War II as a correspondent for Stars and Stripes and as editor of an airbase newspaper. And in between he graduated from the University of Southern California in 1927 and worked on newspapers from Manila to Paris, including nine years in Los Angeles, first with the Los Angeles County News and then with the Los Angeles Times.

In 1934 he joined the publicity department of Paramount Pictures. When World War II broke out in 1941, he joined the army.

Hazel Mae Bowden was born on February 22, 1922. She married Hershell Wade on November 30, 1939, and had one son, James Hedges. The couple divorced and in 1950 she married Charles William Hedges. She moved from Kansas City to Las Vegas with her husband and son in 1952. She worked briefly as a waitress in the dining room at the Thunderbird and then became a stay at home mother until her son was in junior high school. Then after she went to real estate school, she went to work in commercial real estate at Bond Realty.

Patricia Marchese worked for the city of Las Vegas and Clark County, Nevada for 30 years. She created numerous art and cultural programs for places like the Civic Symphony, Charleston Heights Arts Center, Rainbow Company Theatre, along with consulting work for the Allied Arts Council.

Marchese was born July 12, 1943 and grew up in Johnston, Pennsylvania. Marchese was raised on a farm surrounded by relatives. Marchese and her husband, Lamar, graduated from the University of South Florida and relocated to Las Vegas, Nevada in 1972.