A view of Howard Hughes emerging with an unidentified man from the Trans World Atlantic (TWA) transcontinental plane after the aircraft landed.

Margaret Ostler Stout-Hall’s personality shines in this interview, in which she discusses growing up in Las Vegas’s Rancho Circle. She moved to Las Vegas with her family in 1951, when she was twelve and her father bought Las Vegas’s Seven-Up Bottling Company. She immediately found friends at John S. Park Elementary School and later at Las Vegas High School, where she became a Rhythmette. Margaret describes her Rancho Circle neighborhood, dragging Fremont Street, working at the El Portal Theater, and dancing at the Wildcat Lair. As a Rhythmette, she traveled to New York and Philadelphia to perform on the “Ed Sullivan Show” and the Elks National Convention. Stout-Hall credits Rhythmette advisor, Evelyn Stuckey, for developing a sense of confidence, belonging, and responsibility in the young women she led. It was this confidence that enabled Margaret to go to work for Harry Reid after she suffered a tragic loss. Former Rhythmettes honored Stuckey by lobbying the Clark County School District to name a school after their former mentor; the school opened in 2010.

The official portrait painting of Howard Hughes. In 1998, Russ Stevenson presented the painting, along with many of his other Hughes Airwest files and memoirs, to the Special Collections Library of the University of Texas at Dallas.

Howard Hughes (in a black suit) sitting with other unidentified men at a banquet held for him in Texas.

The black and white view of Howard Hughes after breaking his own cross country speed record.

From the Howard Cannon Photograph Collection (PH-00192)