Skip to main content

Search the Special Collections and Archives Portal

Search Results

Display    Results Per Page
Displaying results 4881 - 4890 of 37883

Transcript of interview with Rory Reid by Stefani Evans and Claytee White, July 13, 2017

Date

2017-07-13

Archival Collection

Description

Rory Reid works in the Downtown Las Vegas building fully tattooed with a mural depicting a hand holding a bouquet of flowers of which the glowing central bloom is half brain and half heart. The story behind the mural is essential to understanding why the oldest of Landra and Harry Reid’s five children loves coming to work. Born in Alexandria, Virginia, he arrived in Las Vegas as a six-month-old with his parents and led a story-book life in the Reid house on Gretel Circle, down the street from Hansel Circle and right off Lilliput Lane. After attending Doris Hancock Elementary School, James Cashman Junior High School, and Ed W. Clark High School, he served a church mission in Argentina and studied international relations and Spanish and then law at Brigham Young University before returning to Las Vegas and joining Lionel Sawyer and Collins law firm. In this interview, Reid talks about administrative law, about leaving the firm to become an executive with Lady Luck Gaming Corporation, serving as Nevada Democratic Party chair for two years, and returning to Lionel Sawyer and Collins in 2000, where he remained until 2014. He shares his motivations for running for the District G seat on the Clark County Commission in 2002, and talks about the political climate in which he took office in 2003, a few months before fellow Commissioners Dario Herrera; Lance Malone; Erin Kenny, and chair Mary Kincaid Chauncey were indicted on federal charges following Operation G Sting. Following these highly public arrests, Reid focused on restoring faith in local government. In 2010, after two terms as Clark County Commissioner and Commission chair, Reid ran for Governor of Nevada as the Democratic nominee against Brian Sandoval. In that election, as Reid puts it, "the voters told me to do something else with my life," and he returned to his law practice. However, in June of 2014, his dear friend Jim Rogers passed away. The day after Rogers died Reid discovered that he was named co-trustee of Rogers's estate, along with his widow, Beverly. Reid and Beverly Rogers together founded The Rogers Foundation to be the primary advocate for public education in Nevada. The Rogers Foundation is housed in Downtown Las Vegas in the building tattooed with the bouquet. The mural-the Wall of Understanding-is The Rogers Foundation's answer to political calls for "building a wall" and a show of solidarity with the students they serve, many of whom are undocumented immigrants or have undocumented immigrant family members. For the man who helped restore the reputation of Clark County government and who emphatically declines to run for further public office, fulfilling the mission and the work of The Rogers Foundation is one of his greatest joys-along with his family; his beagle, Oakey; and watching Liverpool compete in the English Premier League (especially when Liverpool plays his brother's favorite team, Manchester United).

Text

Transcript of interview with Woodrow Wilson by Jamie Coughtry, 1989

Date

1989

Description

Interview with Woodrow Wilson conducted by Jamie Coughtry in 1989. Born in a Mississippi sawmill town in 1915 to a family that ran a boarding house, Wilson completed high school at a private boarding school and attended two years of junior college before the declining economy forced him into the Civilian Conservation Corps to work as a cook and baker. Migrating west in 1940, Wilson soon settled in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he worked for Basic Magnesium, Inc. He became a prominent Westside community activist, founding a federal credit union and serving as president of the Las Vegas NAACP. Wilson worked for over thirty years as a warehouseman for companies that occupied the Basic Magnesium site. In 1966, he was elected to the state assembly, becoming the first black legislator in the history of Nevada, advocating open housing legislation, anti-discrimination regulations, welfare reform, and civil rights.

Text

Jewish Community Center of Southern Nevada, item 04

Description

Committee Chairmanship information.