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Transcript of interview with Joyce Mack by Barbara Tabach, February 23, 2015
Date
Archival Collection
Description
In this interview, Joyce Mack discusses meeting her husband, Jerry Mack, in Los Angeles,their early life as a couple, and moving to Las Vegas at the suggestion of Jerry's father, Nate Mack. She discusses how Jerry met Parry Thomas and their banking and real estate investments. Mrs. Mack talks about the opening of the Thomas and Mack Center at UNLV, and the development of the strip hotels, and discusses her children.
Joyce Mack: wife to Jerry Mack and matriarch of one of the most influential families of Las Vegas history. During this oral history conversation, she begins by tracing her family ancestry from Kiev to New York to Omaha and then Los Angeles, where she was born and raised. At a UCLA fraternity party in the early 1940s, a teenage Joyce Rosenberg was swept off her feet by her older brother's friend Jerry Mack. Jerry was from Boulder City, Nevada and had attended school in Las Vegas. In 1946, the couple married and took an extended honeymoon throughout the United States and Cuba. Soon afterwards, Jerry's father Nate Mack, a businessman and real estate developer encouraged the newlyweds to come to Las Vegas. She tells of Jerry sharing his vision of the valley's future. Thus began a successful journey that traverses decades of Las Vegas history and breathtaking growth in which the Macks were active participants and leaders. Joyce recalls the people the first met, who they raised their children side-by-side with and became lasting friends. These people were other Las Vegas pioneers including the Greenspuns and mostly importantly her husband's partnership with Parry Thomas which created the Bank of Las Vegas. It was their partnership she explains that reduced the presence of the mob element. As members of the small Jewish community of the late 1940s, the Macks would participate in the founding of Temple Beth Sholom.
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Transcript of interview with Deanne Alterwitz-Stralser by Barbara Tabach, November 1, 2014
Date
Archival Collection
Description
Interview with Deanne Alterwitz-Stralser with contributions from her son Daryl Alterwitz on November 1, 2014. In this interview Deanne talks about her Jewish upbringing near the Illinois-Indiana state line, meeting her first husband Oscar, with whom she had four children, and the difficulties with keeping kosher. The family moved to Las Vegas from Gary, Indiana for opportunities in the furniture business. Daryl weighs in on his father's personality, business decisions, and their move to Las Vegas. They discuss the location of the store the Alterwitz's bought (Walker Furniture) and purchasing the building from Jackie Gaughan, and the different tastes in furniture in Las Vegas. Then they talk about the Jewish community and the division between the east and west sides.
On New Year's Day, 1931, Deanne Alterwitz-Stralser was born Deanne Friedman in Hammond, Indiana, the daughter of an insurance salesman and a stay-at-home mom. Deanne spent her childhood in Calumet City, just across the state line in Illinois, and was raised with a strong Jewish identity. At the age of sixteen, she met her first husband, Oscar Alterwitz, at an Alpha Zadik Alpha (AZA) dance in Gary, Indiana, and the two were married in 1950. Deanne and Oscar settled in Gary, where they had four children?Aimee, Larry, Daryl and Linda?and took over the Alterwitz family furniture business. Eventually, the couple grew the business to three successful retail furniture stores. However, a decline in the city's safety and opportunities forced the Alterwitz's to consider relocating, and in 1973, after a family vote, Deanne and Oscar moved their family to Las Vegas. Upon arrival, Deanne and Oscar bought Walker Furniture from original owners, George and Ruth Walker. Deanne used her artistic eye and training from the Art Institute of Chicago to lead the design and merchandising elements of the business. Socially, Deanne integrated into the local Jewish community, and ensured her children participated in Jewish life as well. Deanne and Oscar's children still remained involved in Walker Furniture operations, including Daryl, who serves as the company's general counsel; Larry, who is the company's president; and a daughter who now oversees the store's design and merchandising.
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Transcript of interview with Greg Goussak by Barbara Tabach, May 19, 2015
Date
Archival Collection
Description
Interview with Greg Goussak by Barbara Tabach on May 19, 2015. In this interview Goussak discusses his upbringing in Las Vegas, including his education in the Clark County School District and his experience with bussing to Sixth Grade Centers as the school district attempted to desegregate. As a teenager, he became involved with the B'nai B'rith Youth Organization through Temple Beth Sholom. Goussak talks about his mother's involvement with the Albert Einstein Hebrew Day School, which later moved and became the Dr. Miriam and Sheldon Adelson Educational Campus, and the kidnapping of Cary Sayegh. He then discusses finding his niche in accounting through taking an accounting course at UNLV as a high school student. Goussak talks about his education, career path as a controller in the gaming industry and public works projects, and becoming a professor.
Greg Goussak is a Las Vegas native, born January 1961, just after his parents moved to the city for his father's work as an accountant. His mother was a dedicated educator, who served throughout the city as a teacher and principal, including as the director of the Hebrew Day School in the 1970s. Greg's childhood was shaped by experiences with Las Vegas' sixth grade centers, challenges with scoliosis, and especially, involvement with B'nai B'rith Youth Organization (BBYO). In 1974, Greg helped start the city's new Aleph Zadik Aleph (AZA) chapter for BBYO, and his involvement with this youth organization became a formative part of his junior high and high school years. During this time, he became very involved with AZA at the regional, district and national levels, and made lifelong friends. As a high school student, Greg participated in UNLV's Early Studies Program, earning him college credit, and there he discovered his aptitude for accounting. He began tutoring fellow high school students in accounting, and thus, simultaneously discovered his passion for teaching. After earning his bachelor's degree in hospitality administration from UNLV in 1984, Greg got a job at Dunes Hotel and Casino, then under the leadership of Moe Shenker, working as an operations analyst. Over the next decade, Greg worked as a controller at several properties around town, including Nevada Palace, the Four Queens, Fitzgeralds, as well as a project on Boulder Highway. In 1992, seeking a reprieve from the gaming industry, Greg went back to UNLV to achieve his master's degree, in hotel administration. After graduating, he worked for Riviera Hotel and Casino, and established and oversaw their auditing department as well as box office. During this time, Greg met his wife Cynthia (Cindy) Riceberg, and the two were married in 1996. That same year, Greg took a position with Sigma Game, and soon after became Chief Financial Officer for Manpower Temporary Staffing. In 2002, deciding it was time to work for himself, he bought Haynes and Thomas Printers, which he owned and operated for the next eight years. Greg started teaching in 1989 as an adjunct professor in the William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration at UNLV. In 2010, having finished his doctorate the year before, Greg assumed his first fulltime faculty position as an assistant professor at the University of Southern Nevada. The next year he was hired as an assistant professor at Ashford University, where he continues to teach today in the Forbes School of Business. Greg and Cindy have two daughters: Ariel, who is seventeen years old, and Alyssa, who is fourteen years old.
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