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City Cast Las Vegas

As you look through the many images of the 1999 Pride Parade in historian Dennis McBride’s voluminous and invaluable archive of LGBTQIA material at UNLV, it’s clear that (a) attendance was a bit, let’s say, sparse, back then, but (b) the ebullience of the participants wasn’t diminished.

Twelve years later, due in part to the Vegas heat, the 2011 parade and many Pride Month functions 

 — though there has been plenty of recognition this month, and local LGBTQIA leaders say that, in fact, they stage Pride events all year. And more attention is being paid:

Time warp: “Rocky Horror Picture Show” represents at the 1999 Pride Parade near Sunset Park. 

Every day is a holiday, if you know where to look (next month’s 

 include International Skeptics Day, Howl at the Moon Day and Night, and Wear Something Gaudy Day). But tomorrow, Sept. 30, holds a special place in my heart: It’s International Podcast Day.

The podcast isn’t very old as media goes. Named for the iPod, the portable audio player launched in 2001, the podcast was 

 when a software developer created a program that allowed audio bloggers to syndicate their episodes on iPods. A journalist in the Guardian coined the term “podcast,” and today there are more than 2 million podcasts out in the wild.

The simplest way to describe podcasts is probably “radio on demand.” But what I love most about podcasts is how they keep me curious about the world. There’s a podcast for everything: I can learn about the work of 

 while driving to the grocery store, the 

And, of course, the podcast I work on keeps me curious about the city I love: 

. We talk about public art we hate, pizza we love, our water woes, and the industries that keep our economy thrumming. So this International Podcast Day, I have a two-part challenge for you: (1) Tune in to a new podcast you’ve never heard before, and (2) share your favorite podcast with a friend who isn’t a listener. (And I’m not saying it has to be City Cast Las Vegas … but I’m not NOT saying that either 😉)

An appreciation of the podcast form — and a challenge.

Why You Should Give Podcasts A Try

Lend an Ear to Podcast Day

The Appreciation Index

Got a full plate of food news this week …

, right? Winner of that ballyhooed Dapper Co. competition for a built-out location in the Huntridge Shopping Center? If that seems like 10,000 news cycles ago, well, the opening’s finally getting closer — and 

 Candidates to work as line cooks and sous chef should apply online ahead of time; selected applicants will be emailed with details about where to take the culinary skills exam on these days.

 Applicants for all other positions can visit a hiring fair at the diner. Prior online application is encouraged, but walk-ins will be accepted from 1-2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, and 6-7 p.m. Monday; bring resume, ID, and current health district card.

Food historian Sarah Lohman teams up with Arts District restaurant Main Street Provisions next Thursday for a presentation called “

: Tasting Las Vegas Food History.” It’s part of the Neon Museum’s “Duck Duck Shed” program honoring local culture. Here, 

 by food journalist Johnathan L. Wright. [Review-Journal]

Pour a little out for the latest additions to 2023’s list of 

These readers have suggested a few additions to this newsletter’s roundup of great coffee joints beyond downtown. Adding each to my sip list.

 in Henderson has the best coffee in town. They have it shipped in directly from Hawaii. I actually drive from Summerlin to Henderson to treat myself.”

 on West Charleston has some of the best coffee in town. The beans are roasted on-site and you can chat with the roaster while he brews your coffee to order.”

We've got a full plate of food news this week …

What Does Vegas Food History Taste Like?

Winning Diner Staffs Up, the Taste of Old Vegas, and More

Food & Drink

Sometimes a person just wants to observe the pageantry of modern humanity strolling by — maybe you want to feel less alone, or triangulate your own position in the human parade, or just get judgy about other people’s fashion choices. Here are five places to do it:

🚶🚶🏻‍♀️🚶🏾 Fremont Street: 

The second-floor window seats at this Binion’s bar offer a fishbowl view of the cavalcade of human variety — tourists, buskers, every denomination of person in between — that is the Fremont Street Experience.

👩‍🦽🚶🏽‍♀️🚶🏿‍♀️ Town Square: 

Hey, you don’t just want to people-watch the tourists — from this grog shop’s patio you have a casual overlook onto the mall’s play area, where families pause for a few minutes between shopping and eating.

Lotta foot traffic here. Buy a coffee, find a bench, and take in the endless parade of international visitors bringing varied fashion and converging languages to the echoing walkways.

🚶🏾🚶🏼🚶🏽‍♀️ Arts District: 

Grab a seat in the boat out front and observe the wide taxonomy of downtown hepcats, hungry suburbanites drawn by the hype for 1228 Main or Good Pie, and hardy tourists looking for a break from the Strip.

Weather permitting, the corner patio of this java joint in the Summerlin-adjacent mega-strip mall should present you with the squires of suburbia as they engage in their natural habits — shopping and walking while scrolling.

There's nothing odd about enjoying the human parade.

5 Great People-Watching Spots in Las Vegas

5 Great People-Watching Spots

Las Vegas' Best

Yes. The law is very clear. NRS 171.126 provides that any citizen can arrest a person for a misdemeanor (or larger offense) committed in their presence or any felony whether it is witnessed or not, as long as there's reasonable cause to believe the person did the crime. In making the arrest, the person can't use any more force than is necessary and reasonable under the circumstances — and certainly not deadly force unless it's in self-defense.

 That's the tricky part. There are no clear guidelines as to how to conduct a citizen's arrest, and when it 

 been used, it's usually just detaining the person until the police arrive.

 NRS 171.134 says “the person from whose custody he or she escaped … may immediately pursue and retake the person at any time and in any place within the state.”

 The obvious concern involves the person who's not happy to be citizen-arrested and gets physical. Also, what if the citizen is wrong? The person arrested could sue for things like false imprisonment or assault with a deadly weapon (if you use one to detain the person). The better course is the obvious one: Get as much information as you can and relay it to cops.

You can, but it's probably not your best move.

Can You Make a Citizen's Arrest in Las Vegas?

Las Vegas Life Hacks

Ubiquitous in the local desert thanks to its drought tolerance, the mesquite has long been a versatile, useful plant in the Southwest. The bark could be used to weave baskets. Its pods can be turned into flour, and the tree was a key source of protein for desert-faring Indigenous peoples. Its flowers can be boiled into tea, while its sap has been put to a variety of medicinal uses, whether applied directly to a wound or turned into a gargle for sore throats.

They’re hardy survivors, mesquite trees, with roots that can reach 100 feet or more into the earth in search of moisture. It’s said that during especially dry periods, the seeds can sit dormant for decades waiting for sufficient water.

Thanks to the mesquite’s versatility and climate adaptability, there are those who think that the tree could serve as the foundation of a 

 that might help alleviate poverty in drying Southwestern areas. In terms of food provided for water used, ecologist Gary Nabhan says, “I don’t know any desert crop that beats mesquite in terms of productivity.”

Mesquite trees are a versatile, durable resource in the desert.

Mesquite Trees Are a Versatile, Durable Resource in the Desert

The Durable, Versatile Mesquite Tree

Urban Almanac

Author and UNLV journalism professor Michael Easter is 

. His first book, 2021’s “The Comfort Crisis,” showed how to unlock the power of discomfort to upgrade your life. His new book, published today, is “

Scarcity Brain: Fix Your Craving Mindset & Rewire Your Habits to Thrive with Enough

Everyone knows everything is fine in moderation. But why are we so bad at it? Why don't we ever feel like we have enough? Most behaviors we do in excess now helped our ancient ancestors survive. But we still have our ancient brains that push us into more food, stuff, status-seeking, information binging, etc.

One big revelation from the book is that I discovered what I call the scarcity loop. It's a three-part behavior loop that evolved to help us obsessively repeat behaviors that kept us alive, like finding food. But it's now being applied to technologies that can hurt us. It was actually revived right here in Las Vegas, in the 1980s, in slot machines. But it's now what powers social media, dating apps, online gaming, sports betting, online streaming, and even our food system.

Humans evolved in a world where what we needed to survive was scarce. So we're built to crave. But we now have an abundance of everything we're built to crave. And we still keep accumulating. Anthropologists call this an "evolutionary mismatch."

For example, even a couple hundred years ago, the average American owned a handful of clothes and tools. Now the average home has 10,000-plus items and most homes are in some form of debt. Food used to be scarce — now we throw out about one-third of our food, and 40% of Americans are obese. A person in one day today takes in more information than a person 700 years ago took in during their entire life.

That has changed us, oftentimes not for the better.

In “Scarcity Brain” I identify three key ways to get out of the scarcity loop. It's the only scientific way to stop any bad habit. And this is very important. As a person who's studied physical and mental health my entire life, I've noticed that people want to develop good new habits. But the problem is that it's our bad habits that hold us back most. Fix your worst habits and your life improves instantly.

How do our primitive cravings shape our modern lives?

Las Vegas Author Talks About Impact of Ancient 'Scarcity Brain'

Author Michael Easter on How Your Ancient Drives Shape Your Life

3 Questions With

When Dr. Lynn Comella joined the faculty at UNLV, her office was in a space that had once been a bedroom. “It’s funny to think about that now,” she says. It was on the second floor of 

, a fascinating campus anomaly. Amid the school’s toybox of large architectural showpieces, Houssels House was once, as its name makes clear, a residence — a 1933 Tudor revival located on Sixth Street near Charleston.

The original owner, lawyer Harley A. Harmon — you’ve probably driven on the street that bears his name — sold it in 1936 to J. Kell Houssels Sr., one of Nevada’s first gaming licensees. Lotta history in 

 handshake! Both Houssels and his son, J. Kell Houssels Jr., went on to play big roles at joints like the Showboat and Tropicana, and Jr.'s wife, Nancy, was primarily responsible for Nevada Ballet Theatre. “The Houssels family did a lot to build the community,” says UNLV history department chair Michael Green, “and in my mind they don’t get enough credit for it.”

 in 1983. Once off the flatbed, it became the campus’ oldest building.

Over the years Houssels House contained programs as varied as architecture and consciousness studies. “It was where the women's studies department was housed when I started at UNLV in 2007,” says Comella, now chair of the school’s department of interdisciplinary, gender, and ethnic studies. “Houssels House was a real hub of activity then.” These days it headquarters a campus multicultural center.

The point of all this being, you gotta love a place that pulls so much local history onto a campus populated by structures that were born on-site, a building that literalizes the notion of the school’s connection to the community.

 Which UNLV structure was mentioned in our “

A small building on campus with big local history vibes.

Let's Hear It for the Old Las Vegas House at UNLV!

Let's Hear It for the Old House at UNLV!

One of the joys and cringes of being a Las Vegan is seeing how your city of global interest is portrayed in the national media. Here are five of our favorite recent stories:

The lefty journal The Baffler devoted much of an issue to our city. Contents include a dismissive take on the “nostalgia-tripping cash grab” of the Punk Rock Museum; a look at the Teamsters-mob relationship in building the city; and an expansive appreciation of sign artist Betty Willis.

‘How Usher Became the New King of Vegas’

 in Las Vegas, like someone who saw the glamorous first hour of ‘Casino’ but not the subsequent stressful two hours of ‘Casino.’ For Usher, Vegas is a place of renewal, a place of rebirth.”

 on a news roundup. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]

‘The First Magician on the Vegas Strip’

The New Yorker wrote about Las Vegas more than once this year, whether 

 of “Learning from Las Vegas” or tracking 

 surviving the summer of 2023. But we like this piece about vintage performer Gloria Dea.

The cosmopolitan weekly newsletter Airmail retells the sordid downfall of Sara King, the so-called “slot whisperer” of Las Vegas, who ran through a lot of other people’s money.

‘Sphere can be bizarre and sublime — or just an ad. That’s what makes it so Vegas’

The L.A. Times offers a thinky take on our big orb, and its mingling of the worlds of art, commerce, and spectacle.

With stories from the New Yorker, GQ, the L.A. Times, and more.

Our Favorite Glimpses of Las Vegas in the Media

Our Favorite Glimpses of Vegas in the Media

Looking through the many images of the 1999 Pride Parade in historian Dennis McBride’s archive of LGBTQIA material at UNLV.

Las Vegas Pride, Then and Now

People, places, and scenes from Las Vegas' past.

Las Vegas History

Just looking at these photos you can feel a foundational aspect of Las Vegas’ lore clicking into place — the louche glamor and freewheeling approach to good times that the Rat Pack injected into the city’s DNA. (Fun fact: Frank Sinatra preferred “The Clan” to “The Rat Pack.”) “With due respect to Elvis, Liberace, and countless other superstars,” writes local author Steve Bornfeld, “it was these guys who turned this town into THE TOWN.”

The Rat Pack, already famous for their gigs at The Sands, kicked their legend up a notch with the August 1960 release of “Ocean’s 11,” the plot of which you already know from the (cinematically superior) remake, and which hardly matters. The point here was the charm and sing-all-night, film-all-day vibe of its stars, set against the vibrant backdrop of Las Vegas. “In any other town,” the film’s tagline went, “they’d be the bad guys!”

That energy crackles in these shots from the downtown Las Vegas premiere of the movie — ordinary folks lit up by the combined wattage of Sin City neon, Hollywood klieg lighting, and pure celebrity. Everyone’s well-dressed, well-behaved — the social, political, and racial turbulence of the 1960’s are still beyond the far horizon.

Plenty of the Rat Pack’s shtick wouldn’t pass the cringe test now, of course. Nonetheless, this is classic Vegas — the effortlessly cool older sibling of that other strain of pop Vegas mythology, the wild bender as personified by “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” and “The Hangover” — and it’s what people usually mean when they lament the long lost ring-a-ding-ding of the Vegas that used to be.

 for Desert Companion is an insanely entertaining compilation of “Ocean’s 11” trivia, perspectives, and insights.

Just looking at these photos you can feel a foundational aspect of Las Vegas’ lore clicking into place.

Remembering the Original 'Ocean's 11' in Las Vegas, with the Rat Pack

Remembering the Original 'Ocean's 11' in Las Vegas

Remember Rosie the Riveter, the badass icon who represented the working women of World War II? Did you know that Nevada had its own version? Her name is 

 and she’s a symbol of the strength of Nevada women during wartime.

Sending a great number of men abroad to fight the war meant an increased demand for people to fill vacant jobs. That’s where the women of Nevada stepped in. The term “Magnesium Maggie” was coined by Irene Rostine, 

. The term pays tribute to the women in the southern Nevada workforce, the majority of whom worked at a magnesium plant in Henderson.

Like her sister Rosie the Riveter, Magnesium Maggie is born out of gender politics in wartime America, and here in Henderson, many of the working women enjoyed something that has been denied to them across the country for most of its history: the same pay as their male counterparts. While many industries took advantage of the loopholes in federal equal pay laws, companies like Basic Magnesium Industries paid women the same $.90 per hour that they paid men.

Do you have a Magnesium Maggie story you’d like to share?

Share a Magnesium Maggie Story

Magnesium Maggie: Nevada's Version of Rosie the Riveter

City Cast Las Vegas lead producer Sonja Cho Swanson drops some knowledge on a piece of Nevada history.

Nevada has hundreds of ghost towns (more ghost towns 

, in fact), but only one of them is underwater — at least until 

: The town of St. Thomas, a former Mormon settlement founded in 1865 on the route between L.A. and Salt Lake City. 

At its peak, St. Thomas had 500 residents, a post office, and even an 

. In September 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt formally dedicated Boulder Dam, and Lake Mead began to fill up. By 1938, when this photo was taken, the Lake still hadn’t reached capacity — it would take seven years to fill. 

Well in advance of dam construction, the federal government told the residents of St. Thomas that they would need to move and would be reimbursed for their homes. The government-owned most of the town by 1932. But 

: Hugh Lord, who owned a garage, waited until the waters were high enough for him to step into his boat from the front door. Then he set fire to his house and left.

There’s one more town that was covered by the rising waters of Lake Mead: An archaeological site near Overton called the 

, or sometimes the “Lost City,” a complex of homes, agricultural sites, salt caves, and larger buildings (one had 

). The site had been home to several successive groups of Native Americans, including the Anasazi, the Pueblo, and eventually the Paiutes. 

For unknown reasons, the site was abandoned hundreds of years ago, but archaeologists have been studying the site for the last 100+ years. In fact, they were working frantically until the last minute before Lake Mead’s waters covered the site. Today, the receding waters of the lake have revealed the site once again, now badly damaged by erosion, but 

 like drones and 3-D imaging to learn what they can about the Lost City.

The Creation of an Underwater Ghost Town

On Monday, Daniel Weinman of Georgia won $12.1 million in the World Series of Poker, the tournament’s biggest-ever payout; he topped the largest-ever field, 10,043 players. Both numbers would have been hard to imagine for the World Series players around the table above — this was sometime in the 1970s, when the series was still young. But if any of them might’ve pictured such a huge win, it would have been the unassuming-looking guy in black and gray. That’s 

, winner of the first-ever WSOP tourney in 1970, as well as the second and fifth — which paid him $160,000. (Curiously, in the first tournament, he was 

 winner by the other players.) He died in 1995.

Some of his exploits are legendary. Jon Bradshaw’s 1987 book about gamblers, 

 includes a gripping account of the 1973 WSOP tournament in which Moss lost to fellow icon Pug Pearson in a dramatic, back-and-forth match, after being saved several times by his last card. Moss appeared unflappable the whole time. “I never choke,” he told Bradshaw. “I play for the cash, and you don’t choke for the cash.”

A true hustler, Moss also claimed to have won (and lost) fortunes betting on golf and bowling — “What folks are bettin’ on, you learn to play,” he said — including a $100,000 golf match at the Desert Inn course. But it’s poker he’ll be remembered for; he was a charter member of the Poker Hall of Fame. “I’m a spender,” he said. “Most people are savers. Savin’s not in me.”

With the World Series of Poker just ended, we look back at gambling great Johnny Moss.

Remembering Las Vegas Poker Legend Johnny Moss

Remembering a Las Vegas Poker Legend

Eight years ago this week, President Obama created the Basin and Range National Monument a few hours north of Las Vegas. Along with the preservation of the area’s natural and Indigenous resources — and some political considerations — a major reason it came into being was to protect the massive work of land art you see just a part of in the photo above: “City,” by Nevada artist Michael Heizer.

Technically, I suppose, this photo isn’t “from the archive” — it’s much too recent. But in every other meaningful way, it’s 

 time. For instance, 50 years: That’s how long Heizer labored on what you see, beginning in 1972, when, at 27, he bought some cheap land and began moving dirt around according to his grand vision of a highly stylized, perfected, monumentally immersive landscape experience. For decades he labored on it pretty much by himself, running through his money and wrecking his health. Eventually donors and institutions pitched in.

But “City” is also about the experience of time — both the long hours necessary to explore it, as you can tell from the picture (it’s 1.5 miles long and half-a-mile wide), and in the texture of being there, isolated from any sense of what time period you’re in. This could be an ancient ruin, a secret annex of nearby Area 51, or some unknown thing beamed in from the future. It’s the eeriest, coolest damn feeling you can imagine.

I got to wander “City” a few weeks ago; I’m still dwelling on the experience. Some of my thoughts about it will be included in a couple of podcast projects I’ll hip you to next month. And if you think 

applications for the next visiting season

Eight years ago this week, President Obama created the Basin and Range National Monument; one major reason was to protect "City," a massive work of land art by Michael Heizer.

A Look at Michael Heizer's Earthwork Near Las Vegas, "City"

A Massive Complex — of Time

 hand drawn map of a shooting. Aided by a Metro officer, it was drawn by the girlfriend of Erik Scott after police officers shot him seven times on July 10, 2010, killing him. It tried in its way to capture the chaos that unfolded in the parking lot of a Summerlin Costco, in full public view.

The map was among the pieces of evidence presented in the coroner’s inquest a few months later. A coroner’s inquest was the procedure used to evaluate police shootings, then either exonerate or hold accountable the officer(s) involved. Actually, I shouldn’t use 

; at the time of this proceeding, the inquest’s box score was beyond lopsided: In more than 200 inquests, only 

 had a cop not been cleared. That was in 1976. They were cleared this time, too.

 shooting, one of two high-profile instances that year (the other involved the troubling death of 21-year-old Trevon Cole in a botched drug raid; Metro had to 

). It eventually prompted broader considerations of Metro’s use of force, including 

, “Deadly Force.” Certainly, Scott’s family, which 

And it led to an attempt by Clark County to 

 into more of a fact-finding review, a move opposed by police, some of whom sued to stop it. Eventually, the reformed process was watered down and implemented. Though, as my colleague, City Cast Las Vegas co-host Dayvid Figler, a longtime Las Vegas defense attorney, says, “It isn’t any better.” As KTNV reported after a police shooting a couple of years ago, at the time there had been more than 80 reviews, and none found police at fault.

A 2010 shooting in Las Vegas prompted reforms — did they work?

2010 Police Shooting in Las Vegas Shows Difficulty of Change

A 2010 Shooting and the Difficulty of Change

what the man on the right was listening to; sadly, that antique donkeygram technology has been lost since this photo was taken, on July 4, 1909. (It was probably something about his donkey’s extended warranty.) I do know this: Just three days earlier, July 1, Clark County had been officially established. It was named after Sen. William Andrews Clark, who brought the trains to town.

So these folks had plenty to celebrate. They had Independence Day off — but only because it fell on a Sunday that year, as July 4 didn’t become a paid federal holiday until 1938 — and their county had taken an important step toward the future.

Obviously, more has changed in 114 years than just hat styles (though listening to asses is still regrettably common). The county’s population was 

 then. Now, at 2.3 million, Clark is the nation’s 11th most populous county, accounting for 73% of Nevada’s population, yet just 7% of its land. The county government is the second largest in the state, after, well, the state. 

On July 1, 1909, Clark County was officially established. It was named after Sen. William Andrews Clark, who brought the trains to town.

Happy Birthday, Clark County, Nevada

Happy Birthday, Clark County

opened as a movie theater in 1944, often hosting box office premieres with celebrities in attendance. If you’ve traveled along the west coast and this building looks familiar, that’s because it was designed by S. Charles Lee — the same guy that dreamt up Fox Theater in Beverly Hills and The Hollywood Melrose Hotel.

Standing tall at the corner of Charleston Boulevard and Maryland Parkway, the establishment has exchanged hands several times and was converted into a music venue in 1992. It shuttered its doors in 2004 and has been dormant until a recent renovation project.

Developer J Dapper purchased the theater in 2021 and has since undertaken a massive renovation projected to cost north of $10 million. After a 20-year hiatus, the theater hosted a 

 on April 7, the newly illuminated marquee symbolizing the return of a historic Las Vegas landmark. Renovations will take around two years to complete.

I want to hear about your favorite Las Vegas landmark.

Las Vegas History

Las Vegas Pride, Then and Now

Las Vegas History

Remembering the Original 'Ocean's 11' in Las Vegas

Magnesium Maggie: Nevada's Version of Rosie the Riveter

The Creation of an Underwater Ghost Town

Remembering a Las Vegas Poker Legend

A Massive Complex — of Time

A 2010 Shooting and the Difficulty of Change

Happy Birthday, Clark County

A Look Back at the Huntridge Theater

The latest in Las Vegas

Lend an Ear to Podcast Day

Winning Diner Staffs Up, the Taste of Old Vegas, and More

5 Great People-Watching Spots

Can You Make a Citizen's Arrest in Las Vegas?

The Durable, Versatile Mesquite Tree

Author Michael Easter on How Your Ancient Drives Shape Your Life

Let's Hear It for the Old House at UNLV!

Our Favorite Glimpses of Vegas in the Media