Las Vegas History You Don't Know - December's "Untold Stories"

Think you know Las Vegas History?

Well, if you have been attending "Untold Stories" you do know a lot of Las Vegas History.  However, there is a great deal of arcane and little-known history that should be better known.

So, we are putting the focus on that type of history with December's "Untold Stories".  Here's your chance to learn more about street names around the Valley, the more colorful side of shall we say, Block 16 type businesses as well as the social history of Las Vegas from the 1930s to the 1950s.  From living with no air-conditioning to stories about Helen J. Stewart, Queho and more, "Las Vegas History You Don't Know" will be a fun and entertaining way to learn more about the place we all call home.

Also, there will be  "Stump the Panel" where you can ask them questions about arcane Las Vegas history that you know.  Will they be able to add to your knowledge or will you have the stories they don't know.

Join us on Thursday, December 3rd to find out!

Panelists include:

Dr. Michael Green, Professor of History at the College of Southern Nevada.  Dr. Mike is one of the premiere Southern Nevadan historians.

Mark Hall-Patton, director of Clark County Museums and a local author.

Donna and Gail Andress, they have lived in Las Vegas since 1932 when both arrived as children.  They have helped Las Vegas grow from a dusty railroad town into the Entertainment Capital of the World.  In addition, they are both local historians.

Thursday, December 3rd

Las Vegas Springs Preserve

Desert Learning Center

6:30 pm

Admission $9.00 (buy a three-class series pass and get a discount!)

See you there!

RTC Transit finds its future in Las Vegas' past

The RTC is going neon.  Well along the new bus routes anyways.  Seems they are teaming with the Neon Museum and others to restore neon signs from our collective past and use as transit markers on their new routes.

From the Review-Journal:

Downtown Las Vegas has developed into a hip place to hang out and now the Regional Transportation Commission is hoping to play off the newly chic neighborhoods.

Like downtown, the transit agency aims to reinvent itself; it's working to shake the stigma attached to hopping on a public bus. The latest effort comes in the form of neon signs -- some dug out from the old neon boneyard and others newly built. They adorn three stops along the agency's trendy new ACE transit line.

 

In the Arts District, a massive sign reading "18b" shadows the transit stop. For those of us who aren't as cool as we think we are, 18b means 1800 block, which is how the artsy crowd refers to that area. Down the street is the retro sign from the 5th Street Liquor store and, across from the Las Vegas Convention Center, stands the original Landmark casino sign -- reborn on the same spot of the old establishment.

"It's an interpretive, artistic way to illuminate the route for the ACE," said Jacob Snow, general manager of the commission. "We want to make it cool looking and make it a positive experience."

Downtown once had a reputation for prostitution, cheap shrimp cocktails, homeless people and cheesy casino giveaways. It has re-emerged as a gathering spot for the younger crowd with trendy bars that offer no gambling.

The redevelopment has even surprised Las Vegas natives such as Snow. Now, Snow is doing the same with the bus system.

Over the years, the agency has gradually faded out its purple and green, exhaust-billowing Citizens Area Transit buses, replacing them with the gold single and double-deck RTC vehicles. In March, the transportation agency will unveil the new ACE system.

Passengers purchase their tickets at the stops, which, combined with the bus-level curbs, will allow a more convenient and quicker boarding process. The new vehicles are the closest Las Vegas will have to light-rail.

And the vehicles themselves?

"This is not your grandfather's bus; this is not a toaster on wheels," Snow said.

So in introducing this new line that will primarily serve downtown and the Strip, why not draw more attention to it with the old-school signs?

"They add native history," Snow said. "We don't have a lot in terms of keeping our history."

In addition to the neon bus stop demarcations, the agency has chosen a handful of artists to create pieces that will be installed on each bus shelter's eight panels.

The idea to install cool signs was actually born years before downtown became popular again.

Snow credits former Clark County Parks and Recreation Director Pat Marchese, who suggested raiding the boneyard for signs that could be erected in the rights of way of a planned light-rail system. The light-rail fell to the wayside, but that didn't mean the RTC should do the same with the signs, Snow said.

The ACE project is still under its $60 million budget, which means Snow and his associates may head back down to the boneyard, a Las Vegas Boulevard property where the signs are stored. He figures he might be able to afford three more signs that would be installed on the Grand Central Parkway stretch of the ACE route.

"This is going to be a lot of fun," Snow said.

And if his strategy works, Las Vegans might think the same about riding the bus.

Mark Hall-Patton on the role of Museums in Las Vegas

Mark Hall-Patton, or HP as we like to call him, is the director of Clark County Museums (yes, museums as in more than one).  He oversees the Clark County Museum on Boulder Highway, the Howard Cannon Aviation Museum at McCarran Airport and the Searchlight Museum.

In addition, he is a local historian, author and the moderator of the monthly County Centennial panel discussions that are held on First Friday at 6:00 pm in the Commission Chambers (and broadcast throughout the month on Channel 4).

Our pal, Kristen Peterson, sat down with HP for an interview:

With budgets pared to bare essentials, museums are feeling the pressure.

Mark Hall-Patton, administrator of the Clark County Museum and the Howard W. Cannon Aviation Museum, and president of the Nevada Museums Association, discussed the museums’ purpose.

How did museums originate?

Museums came out of what were called cabinets of curiosities in the Renaissance. People would collect odd little items — metals, sea shells, relics from the saints. These showed how erudite you were. In the 18th century, collections of kings and queens became open to the public. Eventually there was the idea that materials of value could be held on behalf of someone.

Why a museum?

The role of the museums is to tell the story you’re empowered to tell. It’s not a museum unless it’s held in the public trust for the public. The collection here is held by the county for the people. There is a requirement to care for it to the best of your ability. There are a lot of laws that affect museum collections and how you deal with them. My job is to keep up with those laws.

What about when people say museums are a waste of public money?

I’ve never heard that. I’ve had people ask what we do with the money and if we need that much money. I don’t know that anybody has ever said, “You’re wasting money on your institution.”

We’re taking care of things. We’re an informational repository. We understand the value of the artifact in teaching.

What’s your role here?

We make a mistake if we think that people come to Southern Nevada to go to museums. What bothers me is when I hear someone who has been here 20 or 30 years say, “We have a county museum?”

What drives museum workers?

Folks who get into museum work do it because they are called to it. For many, at some point in their young lives, they made a connection with a thing that helped them understand the world around them. When I was 8 I used to build museums on my patio. I would set up everything old that was in the house and give tours to my friends.

Will museums in Nevada survive this economy?

We’ll get through it. I’ve been through this before.

More info on Berkley Square in West Las Vegas!

I found this piece by Courtney Mooney on the history of Berkley Square.  Lots of info about the first subdivision for African-Americans in Las Vegas:

Rediscovering a Las Vegas Neighborhood’s African American Roots

by Courtney Mooney

Survey and inventory of historic resources should be an integral part of every city’s redevelopment process. This type of research is not only a valuable economic planning tool but also an exciting opportunity to unearth valuable gems, as was the case with a study of West Las Vegas, a historic, predominantly African American, area of Las Vegas, Nevada. The City of Las Vegas’s Historic Preservation Plan calls for the ongoing documentation of historic neighborhoods and properties. Each year, the City of Las Vegas Planning and Development Department applies for grant money from the National Park Service’s Historic Preservation Fund for survey and inventory through the State Historic Preservation Office. In 2002, the award funded the research of the “Historic Westside” area.

The rediscovery of the origins of the Berkley Square neighborhood in West Las Vegas, a post-World War II subdivision marketed to African Americans, began with a chance newspaper research find during this 2002 survey. (Figure 1) Two newspaper articles published in December 1949 announced the opening of a new subdivision named “Westside Park,” with 155 tract houses designed by a “famed” African American architect, Paul Revere Williams.(1) Because the development site was outside the 2002 survey boundaries in an area now called Berkley Square, this information became a side note in the historic context statement.

In 2004, discussions about moving the La Concha Motel’s mid-century, free-form concrete lobby again raised the name of architect Paul R. Williams. (Figure 2) Williams was well known for his movie-star homes and public buildings in Los Angeles, such as Frank Sinatra’s Trousdale estate and the Los Angeles County Courthouse. With the potential connection to the West Las Vegas subdivision in mind, the City of Las Vegas Historic Preservation Commission began discussing Berkley Square as a possible survey area for the 2004 National Park Service grant.

Several issues complicated the decision to survey this area. The 1949 articles referred to a development called Westside Park, but the subdivision was now called Berkley Square, with county assessor information showing construction dates of 1954-55. What happened between 1949 and 1954? Were the Berkley Square homes actually designed by Williams? All the Historic Preservation Commission had to go by were documents describing a land sale and a current photograph of a house that resembled the architect’s sketch accompanying the 1949 articles. The Commission voted to include Berkley Square in the 2004 survey and hired a historic preservation consultant, Diana Painter of Painter Preservation and Planning, to document the neighborhood and solve the mystery.

Painter began by documenting and photographing all buildings within the neighborhood, providing a Nevada State Historic Resource Inventory Form for each. A historic context statement was prepared to help assess the importance of the properties within the contexts of Las Vegas history and mid-century residential design. In addition, research was conducted at the historical society, local libraries and museums, and the Environmental Design Library at the University of California at Berkeley. Painter also used information from a previous interview with Karen Hudson, Williams’s granddaughter. From this research, she was able to stitch together compelling arguments for a probable link to the Los Angeles architect as well as for eligibility for listing on the National Register of Historic Places.

Besides attracting a famous clientele and important public commissions, Williams was the first black architect to become a member of the American Institute of Architects and served on the California Housing Commission and the California Redevelopment Commission. He published two pattern books on small houses, Small Home of Tomorrow (1945) and New Homes for Today (1946).(2) By 1949, he had won three national competitions for small home design, and he would eventually design military housing and other housing stock for subdivisions. According to his granddaughter, the modernized ranch house became his specialty.

Williams’s design for Berkley Square filled a desperate need for adequate housing in West Las Vegas. Platted by surveyor J.T. McWilliams in 1905, settlement began as a wayside for miners. It was hoped that the arrival of the railroad would bring prosperity, but these hopes were unrealized. The railroad company owned most of the land east of the completed tracks, as well as all of the water rights, effectively controlling development for decades.

During the 1930s, McWilliams’s Townsite, now called “the Westside,” had few permanent buildings, but blacks were free to own businesses and live on the east side of town. Subsequent segregation practices in Las Vegas forced most of the black families to relocate to the Westside. Well into the 1940s, the area lacked basic amenities such as sewer and paved streets, with sometimes two or more families living in small, one-room wood shacks. Low-income minorities and whites continued to find refuge here, with the black population having the strongest cultural presence. A community of churches, businesses, and nightclubs was formed using the residents’ own resources and ingenuity. Adequate housing lagged far behind, however, especially during and after World War II, when many black soldiers returned home or residents lost their jobs at the local Air Force base or military industrial plants.

Westside Park/Berkley Square was the result of “four years of planning, designing and negotiating with government officials, by a group of local businessmen endeavoring to make the first real contribution to improvement of conditions on the city’s Westside.”(3) It was sorely needed in 1947, when the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) began discussions with the City of Las Vegas to develop a “new 2-bedroom project for colored people…with Federal Housing insured loans.”(4) The property changed hands several times, but finally in 1954 with new owners, Edward A. Freeman and J.J. Byrnes, the subdivision was recorded as Berkley Square with 148 lots on 22 acres.

The new “Berkley Square” name came from Thomas L. Berkley, of Oakland, California. Berkley was a distinguished African American attorney, media owner, developer, civil rights advocate, and a frequent guest at the White House during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. It was in his civil rights capacity that he became partial financier of Berkley Square. An article in the Las Vegas Review Journal from April 1954 stated that Berkley Square was “the first minority group subdivision to be approved for construction in the state of Nevada.”(5)

Painter’s report established Berkley Square’s eligibility for nomination to the National Register of Historic Places as the first subdivision in Nevada built by and for African Americans. The subdivision contributed to improved living conditions for the community and represented the progress of local civil rights activism. In addition, Berkley Square is significant for its association with attorney Berkley and architect Williams. The neighborhood of suburban one-story ranch houses also retains much of its architectural integrity