October 6, 2013

Blame it on the Neon Museum

You can blame it all on the Neon Museum.  This crazy interest I have in Las Vegas Strip history is their fault.

I visited the Neon Museum with my family in September, 2006.  At that time, the Neon Museum was difficult to visit.  The tour dates and times were limited, and there was no museum lobby.  If you didn’t plan your visit well in advance there was little chance of getting inside.  I had tried to book a tour on previous trips, with no luck.  But the stars aligned that September.

It was ever so hot, that blow dryer in the face kind of hot that seems to instantly sizzle your skin.  The tour was relatively quick but even so I thought I would melt and then evaporate right there in the Las Vegas sand, forever a part of Vegas history.

Nevertheless, seeing all of the old signs was exhilarating.  We toured two storage lots.  We got a little sign history, but mostly we just had an opportunity to wander around, take pictures, and reminisce about old Las Vegas.  The Silver Slipper, sad and worn, spoke to me.

I was instantly captivated.

There were memories sparked from my childhood that I just couldn’t shake.  While I am not a Las Vegas native, I felt like I spent almost every weekend in Las Vegas.  Of course, childhood memories are often skewed on the timescale and in reality we only drove to Las Vegas from Barstow a few times a year.

But every time we drove into Las Vegas, I distinctly remember the thrill when we arrived in town.  The lights.  The energy.  I loved driving down Fremont Street and seeing the “Howdy Pardn’r” – at least that is what we always called the infamous “Vegas Vic.”  The downtown casinos were wrapped in neon, and walking under the canopies of incandescent bulbs was spectacular.

I don’t recall ever staying at the big resorts on the Strip, but maybe we did.  I know we stayed in Las Vegas Boulevard motels a lot.  In the 60’s and 70’s, Las Vegas Boulevard was home to what seemed like hundreds of motels.  My family says that we frequently stayed at the Orbit Inn.  I do remember staying at the El Morocco, next to the La Concha Motel.   From that location, it was an easy trek to Circus Circus where I spent countless hours of my childhood.  At Circus Circus I played games on the midway, collected metal horses of various sizes as I won games like Fascination and that one where you shoot water into the clown’s mouth to blow up a balloon, watched the high-wire acts, and was mesmerized by the revolving cocktail lounge.

Escapism at its purest form.  Jay Sarno certainly hit the mark.

Headliners like Wayne Newton were very big in Las Vegas then.  Oh how sophisticated you felt sitting in a round, tufted booth to see his show. I was a bona fide Tomboy then, preferring climbing trees and chasing lizards to dressing up, but when I went to one of his Las Vegas shows I automatically felt glamorous.

The porte-cocheres of the big casinos were the biggest delight, driving under endless blinking lights to reach the front door of the casino.  I always felt like a star.  “All right Mr. DeMille.  I’m ready for my close-up.”

How is it possible that I was also nostalgic for a time in Las Vegas history that I never even lived through?  The 50’s, atomic tourism, the Mob, the Rat Pack.  They were all before my time, but thanks to the Neon Museum I was missing those times more than the ones I actually experienced.  I was missing those times the same way I am sentimental for Pixie Stix, drive-ins, and pong (the Atari kind, not the Beer kind).  My sentimentality doesn’t mean I want to relive those times, but it does mean I want to remember them fondly.

My memory bank flooded while I was at the Neon Museum and apparently activated a new or renewed passion for Las Vegas.  It started somewhat innocently right after that, reading a book or article here or there about Las Vegas history to satisfy my curiosity and refresh or enhance my childhood memories of the Las Vegas Strip in particular.  But it quickly blossomed into a research database of Strip hotel/casinos, articles, books, movies, etc.

I would pick up the research for a while, put it down tor months and months, pick it up again, put it down, etc.

When Las Vegas became a second home for me with the purchase of a condo, I had trouble containing my Las Vegas Strip interest.  As a window into the level of nerd-dom I had then entered, I was elated that I could get a seasonal resident identification card which in turn allowed me to get a library card.  It reminded me of a scene in The Breakfast Club where Andrew asks Brian what he needs a fake I.D. for.  “So I can vote.”  I got my id “so I can access the library.”   The truly exciting thing about getting that library card is that I could sit in the library for hours and scroll through old newspaper articles on microfilm, just absorbing the feel of Las Vegas through the years.

Still, my attention to Las Vegas history was sporadic and it frustrated me that I never put my interest and research to any good use.  That is, until now.

I moved to Las Vegas permanently in November, 2012.  I wanted to get involved in the community in some way, so started hunting for volunteer opportunities.  I ran across an advertisement for volunteer tour guides at the Neon Museum.  I had no experience working at a museum, no experience working as a docent, no formal education in history, no education in art, only focused research of Las Vegas Strip history, and I hadn’t been to the Neon Museum in six years.  Strangely, it never occurred to me that I was not qualified for the volunteer job.  Oh, and did I mention that I am shy in meeting new people and that I get nervous talking in front of crowds?

None of these complications even registered in my mind.  I wanted to be a part of the Neon Museum experience.  I wanted to share my interests with people from around the world, and hopefully enhance their visit to Las Vegas.

I did get the volunteer job, and after several weeks of training by shadowing the other guides I was let loose as an official volunteer tour guide.  Wow, what an experience.  I have nothing but love for the museum, all the wonderful people who work and volunteer there, and the amazing people who visit the museum daily.  I have learned from everyone:  staff, volunteers, and visitors.  Every question I get points me in a new direction for my research and allows me to add information to future tours.  The people I meet on every tour are very  special to me.

The stories I hear from the guests are what really make the museum unique.  You talk to locals whose families have worked in the casino industry since the beginning, visitors with deep ties to certain properties, and guests who worked in the neon industry.  One guest shared the story of his former company, Sylvania, purchasing Claude Neon in France, another who was overcome with emotion when sharing how much the Stardust meant to his grandmother, one gentleman who was a neon tube bender by trade but could no longer find work in the industry due to the reduced demand for neon, and a family from Chicago whose father had “connections” to the Vegas mob.  These guests are the history of Las Vegas and the neon industry.  They lived it.

So what am I going to do with all of my research?  Well, I will continue to use it to enhance the experiences for our guests.  And there is an idea floating in my head about a book or a series of articles focused on the Las Vegas Strip.  That is part of my bucket list.

I want to continue to learn the history of the Las Vegas Strip, marvel at the progression, and be baffled by the evolution.  Las Vegas is a living museum representing big thinkers, entertainers, businessmen, and most of all — ideas.  It is the imagination of men and women put into action.

But I have taken this side journey as a volunteer Neon Museum tour guide which has been more rewarding than years of research.  Where else can you discuss the convergence of signage, art, architecture, and Las Vegas history with truly extraordinary people from Las Vegas and around the world?