Like to go over to the meeting of the City of Las Vegas Historic Preservation Commission for October 22nd, 2025.

Will the clerk please uh begin the roll call and determine if we have a quorum and if any commissioners on the telephone.

Yes, Commissioner Hotchkiss is on the phone.

Chair Stotel.

Present.

Vice Chair Laramie.

Present.

Commissioner Levine?

Present.

Commissioner Hotchkiss.

You're on the phone.

Commissioner Sarapas.

Commissioner Cosgrove?

Here.

Commissioner Palacios?

Here.

Commissioner Moody?

Here.

Commissioner Perdue?

Here.

Commissioner Grimmer?

Here.

Commissioner Harper.

Here.

Commissioner Seabrant?

Here.

Commissioner Gillespie?

Here.

Thank you.

We do have a quorum.

Great.

For the record, uh, are we in compliance with the Nevada State Open Meeting Law NRS two forty-one point zero two zero?

Yes, we are in compliance.

Thank you.

Item three on the agenda is public comment, comment during this portion of the agenda must be limited to matters on the agenda for action.

If you wish to be heard, come forward and give your name for the record.

The amount of discussion as well as the amount of time any single speaker is allowed may be limited.

Would anybody like to speak at this point?

Seeing none, we'll move on to item number four, which is chair announcements that are relative to the historic preservation commission.

Uh over the last couple of months, I've had uh uh an opportunity to view a few seminars, uh webinars.

Um, and several of them are by I think have been report important.

Staff has as mentioned those.

There's another seminar that's coming up on October the 30th.

It sounds very interesting.

Uh and that's from the National Alliance of Preservation Commission.

And they are putting on uh they're working with the American Planning Association this month to present a special webinar, integrating preservation into municipal and planning processes.

Uh that sounds like an interesting title.

That's October the 30th.

Uh, about 11 o'clock Pacific time, and I sure staff will send out a note already has, and maybe I've missed it, but that sounds like a great seminar.

So C Burn for the record, because everybody should be receiving those emails from the National Alliance.

You should have received that, but if you haven't, uh let us know.

Great, thank you.

Next item uh on on the announcements.

Uh there was a story in the Las Vegas Review Journal this past weekend regarding the the high school, Las Vegas High School, the historic one in downtown Las Vegas.

It's an interesting article.

Uh and it's just interesting to read, and we'll just we'll just leave it at that point.

The last announcement I got a release from the city of Las Vegas regarding uh their accepting announcements for uh the Heldorado parade.

And we've had some opportunities over the past couple of years to have a uh entry into that parade, and I would hope this year the commissioners would support uh being involved in the 2026 parade.

So we've got plenty of time, but something to think about.

Item agenda number five uh for possible action, approve the final minutes by reference of the regular meeting of September the 24th, 2025.

Any changes, any uh thoughts, uh amendments, corrections in the minutes.

Commissioner Cosgrove motion to approve the minutes from our last meeting as presented.

We have a motion.

Uh any questions by the commission, general public seeing then all those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed.

Uh the chair is not voting as he was not in attendance, but the motion passed.

So the next item on the agenda is item six.

And I jump to item number seven and eight.

So we'll go to uh back to the agenda.

Ah, how could I miss that one?

The very important agenda item number six twenty-five-0489-hpc one report by Chris Dingell, Director of Real Property Management of the Clark County School District regarding a project update on the Las Vegas Academy of the Arts, which includes the historic Las Vegas High School at 3157th Street.

Dr.

C.

Brent, any uh any other thoughts or comments?

Uh, for the record, uh not at this time.

Welcome, both of you for the record.

Uh please uh announce uh who you are and what you do.

Yeah, welcome.

Uh uh, thank you for having us, Brandon McLaughlin, Chief Facilities for the Clark County School District.

Grateful to be here for today.

Good afternoon, Wade Simpson, Simpson Culture Studio Architects for um the first couple of phases.

Great.

Look forward, you want to go ahead with your presentation, and we'll have questions later from the commission.

Fantastic.

Well, this is an ongoing commitment the district has made um with with you, Mr.

Chairman, uh, and and others on this committee.

We presented an update and continued coordination to this committee last August, and then we just want to get on an annual cadence with this because this is a very long-term commitment the district has made to continuing the capital improvements at Las Vegas High School now, Las Vegas Academy of the Arts.

So we'll walk through here today just a very brief overview of the things we've completed since the last time we presented, and then the things we have coming up on the horizon, as well as forecasting what we see over the next couple of years.

Um grateful you uh mentioned the article that came out on Sunday.

Um we too saw that, and it was a great capture of some of the progress to date.

There's been a lot of it today.

So we'll just progress through the phases, and again, this should look very familiar because this is a result of a very intensive community-driven process in 2019 into 20 or 2018 into 2019 regarding a long-term facility master plan of this campus to honor the legacy and be a future forward look for how we best educate performing arts in Las Vegas.

Just a quick reminder for the for the commissioners.

There's two buildings that uh we have some oversight on.

They were uh uh listed in the two thousand uh at the city's historic property register in 2003 at the request of the school district, and that provides some protection under the uh city of Las Vegas uh ordinance 19.10.150.

Uh those two buildings are also on the national register, uh, which provide some guidelines for restoration.

But these two buildings uh uh out of the other historic buildings are ones that this commission has some some oversight to.

Thank you.

Absolutely.

So the upper left image of this, that is what you should have seen prior to 2023, and it's the result again of that 2018-2019 campus master plan.

All the red buildings were eventually the areas we will be removing from that campus, and the blue areas will be getting modernized and interior renovations completed.

Um, so we'll walk through uh going to phase one B.

Um that was a building of a new athletic gymnasium and a new parking garage on the on the site.

So we're now completed with those as of this summer, and those open to our our students and are now actively using them.

Uh phase one C was also completed.

That was the restoration of the turf area and the restoration of the tennis courts for our continued student use.

And you see in the far or the bottom right image, uh, some construction images of that activity as it went progressed.

We then proceed into phase two of this master plan that we presented last year.

Um we're now underway with phase two, which the first of it was phase two A, which is merely just to get some of the mechanical systems intertwined for continued operation of our buildings that will remain.

Um was completed over the summer, and then now we are underway with um post hall, the locker rooms, and some portables being removed from the campus, and then active construction on the new student union building, which is predominantly the cafeteria multipurpose room, and many, many classrooms on the upper stories of that campus.

Um I say many, but it's also only three stories, so I'll just preface that.

Again, some continued uh construction photos in the lower right of this image.

So the phases after that, and this will be into 2027, 2028.

Obviously, we'll have multiple touch bases with this committee uh before those occur where we start getting to the meat of some of the historic buildings chair still uh covered is we'll start removing the cafeteria building and the gymnasium addition onto the historic gymnasium.

That will make way for phase two B, which will be restoration of the Fraser main and old gymnasium or uh historic gymnasium building into their modern educational spaces.

And so those are 27, 28 um construction projects, and then last of the phase two sequences will be the demolition of Knapp Hall, and that's the workhorse of our classrooms currently, uh, which allows us to be maneuvering throughout the campus as we progress with this long-term um plan.

The last phase I'll walk through again.

This should look very familiar because there has been no change on these.

These are you see 27 through 2030 into the future.

So the plan is still to remove many of the visual arts um ground level parking and some of the uh additions made to uh Loudoun and the um vocational building on the far east side.

Um so those will all come down and those will make way for uh multi-story editions um of the theater arts and performing arts um genre as we enter 2030.

So you get to what does this thing look like in perpetuity?

And again, you have all the yellow is the intended new buildings vertical up, and then the blue is restoration of what remains, but just in modern educational parameters on the interior of the building.

So at this point in time, I'll turn it over to Mr.

Wade Simpson.

Thank you.

So just to run um, good seeing you again this year, as Brandon mentioned, uh hopefully a yearly occurrence.

Um funny thing, those those additions that will be removed later.

Our firm actually did those additions back in the early 90s, and um, and we came in front of this committee then, and that was good.

That worked out, anyways.

We love the investment that's that's happening here.

Um, I have personal history of my parents both attending this campus back in the 50s, and um just great um stories and everything that happened at this campus.

This um is an image of from Clark Street, the six-story parking garage.

This was able to um offer 556 parking stalls to the faculty and staff, and is in use now.

And then we want to show you this.

Is over on 7th Street.

This is that new gymnasium.

Once again, it's a little bit shorter in height than Maine, um, but has some of those those elements.

And then that's so that's from seventh, and then this is the south um elevation of it, carrying that banding around and the fenestration.

The um, and then the new field and new courts in the foreground.

The um new parking garages over on the right side of that image.

And then under construction currently is this um phase two B.

We call it the three-story um class mainly classroom building, but the student activity centers at the ground level and some administrative uses are also at the ground level.

It is supporting along an access, just um to hearken back to the master plan and some of the elements is there's uh an entrance at Fraser Hall on the north side, and we'll I'll show you that in a minute.

This is from the northeast corner looking back at the campus.

One of the renderings.

This is from the southeast corner looking back.

Once again, there's main in the background there, and Fraser Hall is over behind the building.

The building will be um will have solar panels and be modern.

It will be we will be using the um terracotta panels.

Just wanted to hit on that, and some of the his heritage color palette is being used on this here's from that um western edge of the building.

Um so the the main entrance from the campus from the parking garage has a stair and elevator core that aligns with a campus side entrance of Fraser Hall, and this building supports that access.

So the pedestrians, all the students internally are always able to hearken back to that historic entrance of Fraser.

And just wanted to show you how this building supports that idea as well.

You can see kind of in the middle, almost to the middle of the building, there's an opening in it.

And you saw over on the east side is where the buses will come through and drop off off from Bridger, and then they'll exit down either seventh or exit out Clark.

But there's an opening in the building here, and it aligns with the east entrance to the historic gymnasium that will remain.

So just a couple of things the new building does to help support um the connection back to the existing campus.

This is over on the northeast edge of the new building, and that will have a we'll have a new plaza, which we have to use for uh fire truck uh access and turnaround, but the new plaza will support that, but also there's a a stage below that large white box.

For me, I kind of lost where where is this building located?

It's over just south of Frasier and on the east edge of campus.

Gotcha, right?

So um, yep.

Yep.

The um, oh I want to call it um the old uh Baptist Church is just to the east of of this building.

It does have some elements to if you squeeze squint a little bit of Fraser.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And supporting Frasier, and yes, some of the rhythms and the proportions, absolutely.

Yeah, great.

And the terracotta panels as well.

Yep.

So that was oops, sorry about that.

Well, I'll just finish with uh this image.

Yeah, so at that point in time we're uh like I said, we're the district continues to be committed to presenting at least annual updates with you, if not more, and uh we're excited about the progress we've been able to make.

And hopefully uh we're happy to have any answer any questions.

Great question from the commission.

This side, please.

I'm curious about the parking.

You said the garage had 560 some odd spots.

You've got more students and teachers than that, so where will they be parking?

Random aloft for the record, uh, it's more parking stalls than we've ever had on that campus, and so rightfully so they're now onto the campus and off of the streets.

But um, we did quite a bit of analysis.

I know back in 2018-2019, and then again in 21, 22, 23, how many students are actually driving personal vehicles, and it was actually sub-556.

So we overbuilt it quite a little bit, but um a lot of these students are underclassmen and they take commutes or take buses from their home schools, their home campuses.

Um, and then just nationally, it's a trend that junior seniors are just not having as many licenses as as maybe before.

So we feel the 556 is is adequately addressing it at this point in time, but open to if there's other comments that maybe they're not.

Would there be on campus ground parking?

There is a few small pockets, yes.

Um up in the front area, so if parents are coming to have uh administrator meetings, there's a small parking lot at the ground in the end along that uh seventh side of front.

Questions here, please.

Uh my question is, and and maybe you all covered this in previous presentations before I got was appointed to the commission.

Um, are any are these structures any type of lead certification or any anything along those lines?

They're basically designed um energy-wise and with all the lead things, but not actually receiving any of the certifications.

Just a couple of questions.

One when you you the two buildings that that we have some oversight on, uh the the main building and the gymnasium.

When you use the word restoration, what does that mean to those buildings?

Uh and the second part of that, more important in some degree, is is funding already been allocated and already through the any of the bonding.

So by restoration, um we mean two things with that preserving it back to some of the historical legacy those buildings embody on the exterior, predominantly on the interior, more how do we make it in alignment with district standards of educational environments to better our students' outcomes?

So two sequences, one modernization.

Um, as far as funding, yes, this project is fully funded through what we've committed to in the presentation we shared.

And what's what is the actual plan for the that main building on 7th Street?

Uh uh you're gonna bring it up to date with communication and plumbing and air conditioning and all that.

What is it going to serve as a classrooms or do we know?

Uh so we're actually just beginning the that phase of design on it.

Um, but it'll be predominantly classrooms.

I think there will be a few small uh administrative functions, um, but predominantly classrooms, and the scope of work will be yes, very much in line with our low voltage, so that's our security cameras, fire alarms, um, intrusion detection, audio visual systems, and then yes, our H VAC and plumbing getting brought up to modern standards.

Right.

And uh the same sort of question for the gym.

What are the plans for what will it be as we move forward?

And I'm assuming the answer is we already have funding already allocated for that.

But what's the plan for it inside the building?

Yeah, so inside uh again the the full project is fully funded as a part of the current capital improvement program that I don't see that changing anytime soon.

Uh, what's intended for in that main uh former gymnasium is actually going to be converted to a large media center, so colloquially a uh library.

Um but libraries of today look nothing like libraries of tomorrow, right?

Go to like East Las Vegas Library is a good example here locally, it'll have a lot of the embodiments of that where it's a resource center media center for our students.

That's great.

Just as as a uh the Senator Senator Richard Bryan uh wanted to be here today, uh but over the over the years uh and this commission has oversight to some degree of the exterior.

One of the things that uh as he drives by each time, he is just in distress of the color of that.

So again, the world is not coming to an end, but if we do paint it in the future, uh it would be nice to do some research on on the what the and maybe over the last since 1930 it's been two or three different colors, but uh a little bit of research to determine what would really be the appropriate color.

My last question is really what's what's the plans?

Are there any plans for the performing arts?

Another historic building, but only within the district, I believe.

Um is that modernized?

Is any money uh uh uh allocated to that project?

Which projects are the the performing arts building, the one 1953?

Yeah, so that'll be part of our phase three uh portions.

So um those are the 27 through 2030 on page.

I realize we didn't put a page numbers on these, but probably six or seven.

Um where we get to that phase three um slide.

One two three four page four.

Here we go.

Right here, there's the package.

Yeah, yeah, so those two are the times we'll be renovating those two blue pieces in the far right, far upper right.

Gotcha, okay.

South east corner of campus.

But there are plans for that, and has money been approved for that, or we still need to go back to the bond.

Nope.

All like I said, all of this project is fully funded for and accounted for within our current CIP.

Right.

That's and you're referencing some documents that you're reading, page seven?

Just the presentation that you have in front of you.

Oh, okay, great.

Further comments, questions?

Uh Commissioner Harper for the record.

Uh, can you direct me where I can find the full LVA master plan for the for the campus?

Um yeah, absolutely.

Uh I can follow up with you, and I don't know that we've published the entirety of the book, but at least I can provide links to the final presentations, and then if we haven't made that book publicly, uh we might have shared it to this committee in the past, but I'm not certain.

So we'll provide it to the entire absolute.

Yes, out of curiosity, what's your projected maximum enrollment?

Um right now I believe they're 1700 approximately.

The intention when they get full build out in 2030 would be close to 2200 students.

So larger than the original campus.

Right.

Obviously.

Right.

But some of those are through optimizations, just better utilizing some of the spaces, like if you have a classroom that was only used for one period.

There's a lot of those kind of spaces within the buildings where we're just better utilizing the square footage that we're building to make some of those additional seats available.

Further questions.

If if not, thank you very much for the uh for the presentation for the information.

Um and hopefully we can see you before a year goes by.

Uh, if there's something in major that uh takes place, it would be nice to get an update uh specifically on the historic buildings that we have some oversight.

So again, thank you both for your details and your enthusiasm for this project.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Let's move on to agenda item number 725-0490-8 discussion for possible action regarding approval of the first draft of the historic report for the Floyd Land Park at Thule Springs, located at 9200 Thule Springs Road during the July 24th, 24 meeting of the commission, it approved funding to hire a resource uh cultural resource firm to create a narrative that details the evolution of the land from the 1800s to its relationship with the railroad, its operation as a working farm, as a ranch, as a dude ranch uh slash divorce ranch, and then its transfer transformation into its current uh public park.

Uh Dr.

C.

Brent, anything you want to add at this point?

Uh thank you, C Brent, for the record.

Yes, excuse me.

So everybody did receive this report, hopefully well in advance that everybody was able to read it.

Now I already did provide um Zoanne with my comments.

Um so if you do have comments, you can relay them to Zoanne at this meeting, or if you prefer to put them in writing, send them to me and Teresa, but make sure we get them by October 30th.

Yeah, yeah, I'll start.

Sorry, that was a little bit loud.

Um so I forwarded my my comments already.

Hopefully, you and Teresa received those this morning.

Yeah, yeah.

Um so as a neighbor and friend of the park, I waited for this report with baited breath, and uh for me it was almost like uh a read of a good book.

I I really enjoyed it.

Uh very informative.

I love the the photographs, the the graphics.

Um I really just had three comments to it.

Um in section 3.2.

Um the title of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints uh capital T to make it grammatically correct.

And then the next sentence, there was sugg the uh it reads they remained there until they returned to Utah, speaking of the early pioneer settlers as I as I read that the first time I thought remained there meant at Floyd Lamb.

So maybe just a clause uh, you know, that they remained in the valley until 1857.

Um you'll see in my notes just a lot of things that were interesting to me, not anything to call to you to your attention.

Um, but at the conclusion of the report, um, I I did have two uh comments that you can consider.

One were some protections that were put in place in 2023 to preserve the uh the wildlife and some of the historic natures uh of the park.

Um and then the other was just the addition of the service facility to the uh Haybarn that uh that was constructed just it was just finished a few months ago.

But uh really well done.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Please introduce yourself and uh if you want to respond.

Sure.

Uh Zoanne Campana from Calts Environmental Consultants for the record.

Um, thank you so much, Commissioner, for your comments.

Um, I do have a presentation prepared.

Did you want me to go through that before?

Yes, please.

Other comments?

Okay.

Um, well, thank you so much for having me.

Um this was a very fun project to work on.

Um interesting thing about this property, and it's great, but it also has its drawbacks is that it's probably one of the most heavily documented properties, historically speaking, um, in town.

There have been a lot of historical reports completed for Thule Springs.

And um, again, it's great, but it was also it presented a challenge in uh producing this report and researching this report.

Uh the two um original reports, the reports with the most original research were done in the 1970s.

So 45 years ago, and the two historians who wrote those reports are no longer with us.

Um, one is Dorothy Rittenauer Wright, who previously served on this commission.

Uh one was Paula Bagosian.

Um, and unfortunately, their research files for other projects are in repositories, but none of their research files for Thule Springs.

Um, even Paula Bagosian, she donated her whole collection to the Sacramento History Center.

And the I was so excited to find the Thule Springs file online.

And when they sent it to me, it's just the report.

It's the same thing we have.

So it's too bad because they both did um interviews with children of early ranch owners.

Um, and we don't have any sort of transcriptions or notes other than what they put in their reports.

Um, but I really tried to hunt them down.

Um of their citations were really great leads for my research, and of course, as it goes with a lot of reports, others weren't clear or were based on those personal interviews.

So there was a lot of sort of sussing out of um trying to find sources for um some of these facts.

So those are the early reports.

They're also later ones.

Um, some did original research, but also repeated accounts from previous reports.

Um, and so some of those did cite other documents, but a lot of uh the reports just sort of cited those original reports.

So it's kind of you know, going around in circles.

Um there are also groups, citizen groups like the Thule Springs Preservation Committee, which reformed into Cactus, the Citizens Action Committee for Thule Springs, and they did a ton of research to help with the interpretation of the park, um, but no complete files exist.

I was able to get in touch with some people who are still around, and they sent us everything that they still have.

So photographs, a couple oral histories, um, but again, they did this stuff 20 to 30 years ago.

So um some of the documentation is kind of scattered to the winds.

Okay, so that brings us to this report.

And the primary purpose is really to update the site history.

Um, because of all that previous documentation, it means this project involved a lot of sifting of different facts, what is documented, what can be verified.

And I really did my best in the report to note um any facts that I could not verify in the archival record or provide other clarifying information with footnotes just for future researchers.

Um, but this narrative does also bring us up to date.

So it doesn't just rehash um previous information, it also talks about the transition to the city, then the state, then back to the city as a park.

Um, and those previous reports didn't really cover that because being in the 70s, it had just become a state park.

So it was recent history, and um obviously it wasn't significant enough to focus on at the time.

Um, we also did a very, very brief survey just to identify the character-defining features of what is still standing at the park.

Um, so I'm not gonna go into the full history because obviously that's in your report, and I think a lot of us know it pretty well.

Um, but I did want to just cover a couple things that have been reported about the property.

Um, there are so many different things, and just some of the things we tried to suss out, whether it's a myth or a fact.

So here's one.

This is the question of whether there was a hotel and a stop for travelers on the stage lines at Thule Springs in the early 1900s.

Um this would have been a really short window.

So the stage routes were established when gold was discovered in Goldfield, so early 1900s, and then the railroad um replaced a lot of the stage traffic in 1906 and bypassed Thule Springs.

So this was a short window.

And a lot of the previous documentation that talks about this hotel dates from uh the 40s to the 90s, basically, like nostalgic or historical newspaper articles, um, which aren't always accurate, and you know, they they don't always give us a firm accounting of their different sources.

Um in this case, what you're looking at is a photograph that was printed in 1948 in the newspaper.

Uh, this is a picture of the purported US hotel at Thule Springs.

It mentions the proprietor.

Um, they spell it Lewandowski.

Um, and conveniently, no name appears on the sign.

The caption explains that has to do with it fading from the sun.

We all live in Las Vegas and we see that happen.

Um, and also just the photography at the time meant that the faded lettering didn't show up.

I looked for the source photo everywhere.

Um, it also mentions uh Chris Brown, another early Las Vegan.

I looked for him, I looked for Lewandowski, Lewandowski.

I looked in Pop Squire's collection, thinking that this may have been one of his photographs.

Um I could not find this original photograph for the life of me, anywhere.

Um, and then there's also some quibbles in the early reports uh where they suggest that Thule Springs location being between Las Vegas and Corn Creek, pretty much, I mean, almost equidistant, would mean that it wouldn't make a great place for an overnight stop along that stage line.

But we were able to confirm the presence of a hotel with our research.

Um, which makes sense, right?

I mean, 15 miles on a stagecoach or by horse and wagon uh is a lot different than 15 miles in a car.

Um, and sometimes it's about 15 miles from my house to Thule Springs, and I'm about ready for a stop when I get there.

Um, we did find uh some contemporary newspaper sources uh dating from 1905 and 1906 that mention Tule Springs as having both eating and sleeping accommodations along that stage and well, along the road.

And another mentions Lewandowski from Tule Springs, and um not just him being from Thule Springs and visiting Las Vegas, but then later on, late 1905, early 1906, when he left Thule Springs to try his hand at the Potessee mine.

Um then finally we have an article from late May 1906 that talks about the abandoned state of the former accommodations at Thule Spring.

So this would have been once the railroad bypassed the spot.

Um and they mentioned, you know, the former eating house, uh the booze joint, and other institutions that were there that catered to the freight travelers, the stage travelers.

Um obviously wouldn't have been much, probably like the photos we see of Las Vegas in 1905, mostly tent houses.

Um, but just the fact that they're talking about them being abandoned by 1906 felt like a big research win.

What were the newspapers for those last two?

Um I can send them to you.

Okay, great.

Yeah.

Um, sort of related to this is this ongoing story that the old Adobe was associated with this stop along the stagecoach.

Umred Turner Nay, who's the daughter of Bert Nay in an oral history says that the old Adobe was used as a way station.

She reminds remembers her mother, uh serving people who traveled along the stage out of the old Adobe.

Um, but then Bert Nay's nephew says, no, the old Adobe was only ever used as a blacksmith shop and a storage shed.

Um the difference is uh Nay's nephew was a teenager working on the ranch.

Uh, Mildred was born in 1924.

So she was four years old when they left the ranch.

Um, and a lot of the information she got was from her older siblings.

Just, you know, of course, the road railroad bypassed Thule Springs in 1906.

Bert Nay arrived in 1914.

And when he made his water rights application, he said there were no improvements on the site.

The old Adobe was something that he built once he arrived.

Now there would have been still some road traffic that went by the ranch until the early 1920s.

By then the railroad had gone kaput, and the state of Nevada purchased that right of way to be incorporated into the highway to Tonopah.

So once that was built, Thule Springs was bypassed by the highway as well.

So there probably would have been travelers up until the early 1920s who occasionally stopped at Thule Springs.

But it's really inconclusive.

We certainly know that the old Adobe though was not used as a stop during Lewandowski's early period there.

And it probably comes from cactus research.

But one of them did tell me the story about uh Paul Huddleston and Cressman who were making liquor at Thule Springs, but behind the front of manufacturing brooms from the Thule that grew nearby.

Um the story goes that they stored their brooms on the second story uh of the house there, which may have been the house that Bert Nay built later, a wood-framed house that eventually burned down.

Um this was during the Hefner era.

So prohibition was 1919 to 1933.

The Hefners owned the ranch from 1928 to 1940.

Um, and according to their son, uh they rented the ranch to bootleggers.

So another sort of or you know, sort of oral history that's repeated uh decades later.

Um their main ranch was in town, so they didn't need Thule Springs, they rented it out.

Um Gilbert Hefner Jr.

says that the famous bootlegger Doc Russell had a still there.

We also have another oral history from Ellis LeFevre.

He was in Las Vegas working on the dam in the 30s.

Um, and he says that he bought rye whiskey that was made at Thule Springs by a man named Goober, he thinks from Utah.

Um I did try to search for Paul Huddleston and Cressman and um uh Doc Russell at Tulee Springs.

Um, also that man named Goobler from Utah.

I couldn't find a record of any of them.

Of course, it doesn't mean they weren't there, there wasn't bootlegging happening at the ranch.

It would have made sense as a location, it's a lot of good pure, you know, plentiful water.

Um, also a remote area, but still near enough to Las Vegas to have provided a market.

Um, but we really just don't know.

I only found one item that linked a suspected bootlegger to Thule Springs, um, and that is a 1929 article about a murder trial of a man named T.

C.

Horsefly Williams.

Um, and it was reported that during the summer of 1929, he was sleeping in a tree at Thule Springs as an alleged bootlegger.

But that's really the only contemporaneous uh information we have that links those two things.

And then finally, we have um Thule Springs Ranch as a divorce ranch.

So of course, Nevada had the most liberal divorce laws in the country with the six-week residency period.

Um that was from the 30s to the 50s.

Uh, and so a bunch of lodgings popped up in response to that to accommodate divorce seekers.

And uh while Reno had earlier dude ranches in the 30s around Las Vegas, they turned up more like in the post-World War II period.

We do know for a fact that Thule Springs opened to paying guests in the early 1950s by 1952 at the latest.

Um, but was it a divorce ranch?

So we know it was definitely a guest ranch.

Um, and at least one divorce seeker stayed there.

And at least one divorce seeker stayed there.

But there were some challenges in researching this.

So, first of all, ranches and other lodgings could not explicitly advertise their association with the divorce industry or say they were, you know, specifically soliciting divorce seekers.

Nobody could say we have a divorce ranch.

There was one ranch locally who would advertise their special six week rate.

But other than that, you know, no one was advertising it.

And Thule Springs certainly was not.

We do have the account of Terry Moore, she's an actress staying at Thule Springs while seeking a divorce from Glenn Davis and also while having an affair with Howard Hughes, who, according to her, booked the entire ranch, which makes sense for privacy.

It was the most remote guest ranch that was also close to Las Vegas.

And Terry Moore, she mentions this in her memoir.

She has a whole accounting of her time there.

She also revisited the ranch in the early 2000s, and Cactus documented that.

She pointed out the duplex where she stayed, shared some memories.

So we have that.

Margot Goumond also stated in an interview with Paula Bagosian, so in the late 70s, that ranch workers would testify at divorce hearings to confirm the residency of their guests.

But we didn't really find any hard archival data.

There's no guest book for the ranch that we were able to locate.

Margot Goumond is gone.

She didn't have any children.

Her records do not seem to be anywhere.

And there are some records at the Las Vegas family court, but they generally restrict access and only offer scans of documents if you can give them the names of the divorce seekers and the year they divorced, which we couldn't do for Terry Moore because she and her husband ultimately did not divorce in Nevada.

But again, if we had gone to the court archive, we would have been sifting through thousands of records, which really just was not the best, sort of out of scope as far as our budget and this project went.

Okay, but we were able to locate a lot of new historical photos from different places.

Don White of Cactus sent us everything he had.

He sent us a bunch of great scans.

And most of them date to the Goumand period, but some of them do include photos of the Nay family.

Most of what you see in this presentation are photographs from Mr.

White.

And we also found some in the LVC VA archive.

Although their archivists did admit they have like millions of photos, and they have not processed all of them, so there may be more in the archive that just haven't been found yet.

The city of Las Vegas donated their Thule Springs collection to the Nevada State Museum at the Springs Preserve.

So we found some good original photographs in there too.

Also some correspondence from later years when the city owned the park.

That's how I found the members of Cactus because some of their meeting minutes are in there.

And that was an unprocessed collection when I first started searching.

And Cassidy was kind enough to process that by the time we were ready to write this report.

So that was pretty cool.

So in addition to sort of setting the record straight on the ranch's history, or you know, not setting it straight necessarily for everything, but adding some context and you know, nuance of the facts, everything that was found.

Of course, it also brought the documentation up to date to the present.

But it also offers a couple opportunities.

So one would be to update the National Register nomination.

The original nomination was written in 1980, listed in 81, and there's not a whole lot of information about contributing buildings.

It's not entirely clear what is and is not contributing.

You really have to dig through it.

And there are some important agricultural buildings that date to the Goumand period that were left out of the district.

And based on some of the documentation, it seems like it was because the state of Nevada was thinking about maybe demolishing a couple of those buildings.

So they just kind of left it, left him out.

They're chicken coops, hog houses.

Since all of this has been done.

Okay, and just quickly I wanted to show you this.

These are the forms that we made.

Well, our recommendation on whether it would be contributing or not.

And it also gives you a short description.

And then just maps of where they're located and photographs.

Okay.

So finally, I do have, I don't know if I can use this to play it.

It's a three-minute video clip of Thule Springs Ranch from 1953.

Okay.

Can you play that video for us, please?

You can simply hit the button, it'll work.

I can hit the button.

Yes, you can.

All right.

A number of ranchers attract the more energetic visitors who prefer to spend their time in the atmosphere of the old West.

On a ranch near Las Vegas, the cowboy's job is a lot easier than life on the range.

The big moment of the day comes with the saddling of the horses and the start of the morning ride into the desert.

That's Margo.

It usually takes the visitors from the cities a little while to get accustomed to being a cow hand.

But on the corral fence, the dudes look almost as authentic as the real thing, outside Las Vegas, there is no problem about finding a good place to ride.

So that gives you a little taste of what it would have been like to stay at the Thule Springs Ranch in 1953.

Do we have any sense who the guitar player was?

I do not know.

Does he look familiar?

He looks a little bit like Kuzma, but I don't think Guzman was played the guitar.

Adam please.

I don't know.

Just curious where that film was why that film was made.

Was that part of a TV show, a documentary?

Uh yeah, that was part of the March of Time television series.

It was short-lived.

Um I don't, it was like a miracle that I found this.

Um, but the whole episode is on archive.org, and it basically takes you through Las Vegas in 1953.

Uh they watch an atomic bomb test, uh, they go to the pool, basically all the Vegas high notes.

We get a link to that.

Yeah, absolutely.

Um today, how large is the existing Floyd Lamb Tully Springs Park?

Oh how many acres?

Uh I don't I don't know off the top of my head.

But it's much smaller than uh what Gumond had brought it up to during his ownership.

It's no longer a nice square rectangle or triangle, it's a bunch of little residential areas that were sold over the years.

But yeah.

Did you send them today?

Well, we'll take a half an hour and go through them right now.

Well, could you just send them to me again?

Uh well, let me ask you just a couple of questions.

Um are just small little little footnotes, for example, on page five Wheeler's reconnaissance survey.

I think that needs one more sentence to put into some some sort of context.

Um the bigger question though is is the period of significance.

And while I don't disagree exactly with the period of significance here, if we list it as Guzman's ownership, so to speak.

But to me, uh and that was for a period, I think just over a decade.

Nineteen forty one or forty, I think nineteen forty-one.

41 to I think when she sold it.

Fifty five.

To me, uh, the the first period of significance is when they had it.

That was an official farm, and he was there for a period of of uh more than a decade.

Uh and there's the the nay name is is a famous name in in the Southwest, I think.

And and we are allowed to have more than one period of significance.

So I would recommend that we have a second period of recognize that ranch, that excuse me, that farm in in the beginning.

One of the other comments I had is in reading some of the reports of the freight score to Goldfield and in central Nevada, is that they would start uh later in the afternoon to avoid the heat, and that would give them time to stop at uh and then get an early morning, early morning start.

So that's not documented anywhere other than that's the reality what the freights did.

So that's uh a minor point on page six footnote squire's broadcast would have taken someplace between 1940 and when he died in 58 at Keno Radio.

I think he gave his speech on KGI X.

Oh, which was our first radio station in 29, and it only lasted, I think, for a year, year and a half.

But I think Squires was one of the regular go-to people, so it's possible that it that he did that.

Um I'll send uh Dr.

Seabrand, I'll send you the the notes rather than bore everybody, but it does bring up the question about how we handle things like changing the period or adding the period of significance.

Um and the official legal title, Dr.

Siebran is Ploydland Park at Thule Springs.

That's the actual legal title.

Correct, yes.

Okay.

I suggest that we put that on the on the cover is rather than just the way it is, and maybe there's some points we can establish that through, just remind folks what what that is.

Um I think you answered one of the questions.

Should the nomination be updated, and you agree with that if it should be Dr.

Seaban, how do we move forward with the various suggestions that have been made by the commissioners?

So what we'll do is we were waiting for the report, and we have the two items of the uh signage, the information signs that we do want to um update with the correct information and images, as well as the national register um update.

So we can put those on um either December or January for um vote items.

SHIPO is going to be sending out uh hopefully next month.

Um they do still have some FY24 funding left that we can apply to one of these or both of these projects once I do get some information as far as the costs of them, and I think these would both be very good for um doing a fairly quick and um significant project with uh the funding that we still can get.

Well, the uh this commission has a strong record of updating uh historic register.

So what would be a proper motion for today?

So for today it's to accept the report with a what whatever comments, edits, or um feedback that we can give to to so to Zoanne.

You can do that, it is accepted or approved.

Um, and can we put on there that we want to add those two items as a result of the report to add the the update for the national register and update the interpretive signs or information signs at the park itself?

And what about the period of significance?

Yeah, we can add the period.

So you want to add the period significance for the nay farm?

Yes, I have that noted.

Uh by sure.

Yeah, Commissioner Laramie for the record, and this might be what you're suggesting, Dr.

Seabrant.

But um my comment was that um from reading the report, and I'm glad you included it in your presentation.

I wasn't really clear what the recommendations or next steps were, so I do think it would be helpful to maybe just in the end when you talk about the integrity um to include an high-level overview of what your recommendations are so that we can have that in the report too.

Okay, look for a motion to approve with the uh the additional changes and updates.

Um commissioner Larry, may I motion to approve?

For the discussion by the commission, general public hearing none.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed?

That's just a phone.

Those opposed motion carries unanimously with the chair.

This is an outstanding report.

Just extraordinary.

And I think as one commissioner, maybe we should publish it as a book.

I mean, a whole book could be written about the ranch.

Thank you so much and look forward to uh the updates as we move forward.

Great thank you for your work.

Thank you.

Agenda item eight, 25-0491, HPC one discussion regarding approval of the 2026 Historic Preservation Commission meeting schedule.

Dr.

Siebrent.

Sieben for the record.

Uh so we do have the um 2026 um calendar.

And we don't do we have sorry, we have one change.

No, no changes.

So we should be meeting every um Wednesday, fourth Wednesday of the month, except for of course November, and the change of date in December.

So we just need a vote to approve this so that we can post it on the website.

Any questions?

If not, look for a motion.

Commissioner Larry, may I motion to approve?

For the discussion, general public.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed?

Motion carries unanimously with the chair voting in favor.

So according to my notes, we are on agenda item nine.

And this is HP.

This is uh 25-0492-HPC 1 report by the community development department regarding the historic and archaeological resources in the local media.

Oh okay, so sorry.

So it sounds like number 11 was read into the record, but we need to go back up to 9 and 10.

I'm sorry, I thought I just did nine.

Yes, but um I believe you read number 11.

So we'll need can you please reread nine.

So eight is well.

So eight was the calendar.

Um nine is the report by the community development director.

Correct.

Commissioner Laramie, I think the confusion is that in the packet, this item actually has the same number as number 11.

Okay, no problem.

So on the we'll clarify that then.

So the item number nine on the public agenda is report by the director, and I feel like after all this fanfare, I should have an update, but I don't I don't have an update, so I'm gonna I'm gonna say we've done number nine.

Well, we're gonna ask you again on 11.

We can cut yeah, so I so then 10 on the public agenda is uh the report by Diane regarding the project update list.

So I'll turn that one over to her.

Okay.

Okay, so sorry about that.

I'm not sure what happened.

Apologies.

Um, so seabermore for the record.

So now do you did you read in 100?

We are at uh item 10, a report by the community development department regarding project update list.

Dr.

Siebrand.

Okay, I think we're all on the same page now.

So we just have our three updates.

Uh the old Mormon Fort, that um national register update is on the December 5th, uh, the state board meeting.

Uh Cliff May Holmes.

Um, Chairman, we're still waiting for your any final comments.

If you had any more, I did see some of them.

If you had any more, if you could get those to us, please, and then we'll have that final report also at our at our December meeting, and then the second draft with the um edits that were uh given to Zoanne today, that will be the second draft at our December meeting as well.

So um you'll have some reading to do for the Cliff Mays and Floyd Land Park, and as always, we'll get to those well in advance.

And then the only um other update we have are a couple of reminders.

Remember, we do not meet in November, so no need to come here in November next month, but because of that and the holidays, our December meeting is moved up to December 10th.

Take note of that, please.

That um it is changed from the fourth Wednesday uh to um December 10th, and then at our December 10th meeting, we will do our chair and vice chair elections.

Um both um Chairman Stodal and Vice Chair Laramie have both um exhausted their uh four-year terms.

Um so we will the commission will need to think about who they will vote in as a new chair and a new vice chair.

And a quick question, uh quick statement.

Uh the vice chair is term limited as vice chair, but would be eligible for chair.

Yes, that is correct.

It's just the vice chair is not eligible for vice chair again and chairs not eligible for chair again.

Great.

All right, and that's a very simple process.

We'll take nominations uh at that meeting and then vote at that meeting for both the vice chair and the chair.

Right, and this is just to give everybody the heads up to you know thinking about it.

Now, according to my agenda, back to you, but uh let's uh for the public record the it it is on the agenda, and that's 25-492-8 PC one report by the community development department.

That is the uh uh the same as item number nine, correct, and so it's just uh a duplication of of that record.

On to item 12 discussion regarding topics for future agenda items.

Excuse me, you skip number 11, which is archaeological I'm sorry.

This is a number number 11 is re uh T.

Yes, 25-0492-8 PC one as a report by the community.

No, it's not.

Oh, yes, it is community development department regarding historic and archaeological resources in the local media.

Community development department, would you like to report?

No, so this is the um document that's in everybody is that's in the backup that we put the news items in there that everybody can click on those links and read those news items.

And there's always a couple of good articles in here that uh uh are worth reading.

Now are we on item 12?

Discussion regarding topics for future agenda items.

Comments made during this portion of the agenda by individual members shall refer solely to proposals for future agenda items, and any discussion shall be limited as to whether or not the proposed items are within the purview of this commission, and or whether or not such proposed items shall be placed on the future agenda.

No discussion regarding the substance of any such proposed topic shall occur, and no action shall be taken.

Commissioner, any item we'd like to see on a future agenda.

Commissioner Harper for the record, please.

Uh, considering what's going on at the at the national level in historic preservation, I'd be curious to hear about historically what the HPC has done for violations uh for demolitions or alterations that were unapproved.

I'd be curious to hear about historically how the HBC is dealt with those, how the city has dealt with those.

Thanks.

Well, I think uh yes, there's no discussion on this, but there was uh at our last meeting a couple of no two meetings ago.

There was a downtown Las Vegas historic residential area.

There was a very important decision.

So and Mr.

Chairman Seth Floyd for the record, I believe, and it was probably uh Commissioner Harper before you were on the commission, so it's we're probably due for an update.

I think we did do a similar uh present, but it's been a long time, so we're probably due to have that conversation again.

So we'll put something together.

Right.

All right, with that we have agenda item 13, and this is public comment.

And seeing no members of the public uh in the audience, uh, should I read it anyway?

All right, item 13 citizen participation.

Public comment during this portion of the agenda must be limited to matters within the jurisdiction of the commission.

No subject may be acted upon by the commission unless that subject is on the agenda and a schedule for action.

If you wish to be heard, come forward and give your name for the record.

The amount of discussion on any single subject as well as the amount of time any single speaker is allowed may be limited.

Any comments?

Seeing none, we are formally adjourned.

Did we have stickers for the machine out?