Sun, Sin & Suburbia

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Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 0874179890
Total Pages : 470 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (741 download)

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Book Synopsis Sun, Sin & Suburbia by : Geoff Schumacher

Download or read book Sun, Sin & Suburbia written by Geoff Schumacher and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2015-09-01 with total page 470 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: More than forty million visitors per year travel to Sin City to visit the gambling mecca of the world. But gambling is only one part of the city’s story. In this carefully documented history, Geoff Schumacher tracks the rise of Las Vegas, including its vital role during World War II; the rise of the Strip in the 1950s; the explosive growth of the 1990s; and the colossal collapse triggered by the real estate bust and economic crisis of the mid-2000s. Schumacher surveys the history of the iconic casinos, debunking myths and highlighting key players such as Howard Hughes, Kirk Kerkorian, and Steve Wynn. Schumacher’s history also profiles the Las Vegas where more than two million people live. He explores the neighborhoods sprawling beyond the Strip’s neon gleam and uncovers a diverse community offering much more than table games, lounge acts, and organized crime. Schumacher discusses contemporary Las Vegas, charting its course from the nation’s fastest-growing metropolis to one of the Great Recession’s most battered victims. Sun, Sin & Suburbia will appeal to tourists looking to understand more than the glitz and glitter of Las Vegas and to newcomers who want to learn about their new hometown. It will also be an essential addition to any longtime Nevadan’s library of local history. First published in 2012 by Stephens Press, this paperback edition is now available from the University of Nevada Press.

Cult Vegas

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Publisher : Huntington Press Inc
ISBN 13 : 0929712714
Total Pages : 264 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (297 download)

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Book Synopsis Cult Vegas by : Mike Weatherford

Download or read book Cult Vegas written by Mike Weatherford and published by Huntington Press Inc. This book was released on 2001 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mike Weatherford resurrects the mystique of Vegas's Golden Age--the '60s of history and legend--bringing the hipster legacy to new Vegasphiles. Meet '50s and '60s lounge greats the Treniers, the Mary Kaye Trio, and Louis Prima and Keely Smith; comedy legends Joe E. Lewis, Shecky Greene, and Don Rickles; and Vegas babes Vampira, Lili St. Cyr, Ann-Margret, and Tempest Storm. Weatherford also covers nearly every offbeat movie ever made about Las Vegas, as well as Elvis and Frank's impact on the town. This gorgeous entertainment retrospective is packed with showroom esoterica, descriptions of near-forgotten corners of Vegas cult musicology, odd trivia, and unsung heroes of a bygone era. Cult Vegas chronicles the major moments--the camp, the extreme, the awful--in short, the magic of Las Vegas' half-century run as an entertainment mecca.

Broadway in the Box

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0190674032
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (96 download)

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Book Synopsis Broadway in the Box by : Kelly Kessler

Download or read book Broadway in the Box written by Kelly Kessler and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-04-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It was as if American television audiences discovered the musical in the early 21st century. In 2009 Glee took the Fox Network and American television by storm with the unexpected unification of primetime programming, awkward teens, and powerful voices spontaneously bursting into song. After raking in the highest rating for a new show in the 2009-2010 season, Glee would continue to cultivate rabid fans, tie-in soundtracks and merchandising, and a spinoff reality competition show until its conclusion in 2015. Alongside Glee, NBC and Fox would crank up musical visibility with the nighttime drama Smash and a string of live musical productions. Then came ABC's comedic fantasy musical series Galavant and the CW's surprise Golden Globe darling Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. Television and the musical appeared to be a perfect match. But, as author Kelly Kessler illustrates, television had at that point been carrying on a sixty-year, symbiotic love affair with the musical. From Rodgers and Hammerstein's appearance on the first Toast of the Town telecast and Mary Martin's iconic Peter Pan airings to Barbra Streisand's 1960s CBS specials, The Carol Burnett Show, Cop Rock, Great Performances, and a string of one-off musical episodes of sitcoms, nighttime soaps, fantasy shows, and soap operas, television has always embraced the musical. Kessler shows how the form is written across the history of American television and how its various incarnations tell the stories of shifting American culture and changing television, film, and theatrical landscapes. She recounts and explores this rich, decades-long history by traversing musicals, stars, and sounds from film, Broadway, and Las Vegas to the small screen.

Reno, Las Vegas, and the Strip

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Author :
Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 0874179564
Total Pages : 474 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (741 download)

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Book Synopsis Reno, Las Vegas, and the Strip by : Eugene P. Moehring

Download or read book Reno, Las Vegas, and the Strip written by Eugene P. Moehring and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2014-09-15 with total page 474 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eugene P. Moehring analyzes the development of Reno and Las Vegas since 1945 with special emphasis on the years after 1970. Major factors that shaped the development of both cities were the growth of corporate gaming and megaresorts and increased personal leisure and affluence. Moehring provides an engaging, informative, and readable history of the divergent paths that Reno and Las Vegas took over the past forty years. Reno, the nation’s gambling mecca in the 1950s, led the way, developing the successful tourist economy that Las Vegas later embraced. Through the 1970s the two cities resembled each other greatly, but Las Vegas grew to achieve global significance, while Reno slowly declined, searching for new industries to power its future. Moehring shows that the development of the Las Vegas Strip was crucial to southern Nevada’s success. The casinos, hotels, and entertainments of the Strip, and the workers they supported, formed a new urban center ringed by offices, residences, shopping, and a major university. In effect, it became a third metropolis, governed by county commissioners, larger than Reno and Las Vegas combined. Moehring brings the story of the three cities to the present day, examining lessons learned from the Great Recession and the efforts under way in all three metropolises to diversify their economies. Moehring makes an important contribution with the only current study of Nevada’s cities, focusing on urban development issues rather than social history or the gaming industry. As the service economy continues to grow, not only in Nevada but throughout the United States, Moehring’s work has many implications for urban studies and particularly the study of urban development in other metropolitan areas.

A Short History of Las Vegas

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Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 0874176433
Total Pages : 546 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (741 download)

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Book Synopsis A Short History of Las Vegas by : Barbara Land

Download or read book A Short History of Las Vegas written by Barbara Land and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2004-03-01 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today’s Las Vegas welcomes 35 million visitors a year and reigns as the world’s premier gaming mecca. But it is much more than a gambling paradise. In A Short History of Las Vegas, Barbara and Myrick Land reveal a fascinating history beyond the mobsters, casinos, and showgirls. The authors present a complete story, beginning with southern Nevada’s indigenous peoples and the earliest explorers to the first pioneers to settle in the area; from the importance of the railroad and the construction of Hoover Dam to the arrival of the Mob after World War II; from the first isolated resorts to appear in the dusty desert to the upscale, extravagant theme resorts of today. Las Vegas—and its history—is full of surprises. The second edition of this lively history includes details of the latest developments and describes the growing anticipation surrounding the Las Vegas centennial celebration in 2005. New chapters focus on the recent implosions of famous old structures and the construction of glamorous new developments, headline-making mergers and multibillion-dollar deals involving famous Strip properties, and a concluding look at what life is like for the nearly two million residents who call Las Vegas home.

Played Out on the Strip

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Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 1943859035
Total Pages : 232 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (438 download)

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Book Synopsis Played Out on the Strip by : Janis L. McKay

Download or read book Played Out on the Strip written by Janis L. McKay and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2016-04-12 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From 1940 to 1989, nearly every hotel on the Las Vegas Strip employed a full-time band or orchestra. After the late 1980s, when control of the casinos changed hands from independent owners to corporations, almost all of these musicians found themselves unemployed. Played Out on the Strip traces this major shift in the music industry through extensive interviews with former musicians. In 1989, these soon-to-be unemployed musicians went on strike. Janis McKay charts the factors behind this strike, which was precipitated by several corporate hotel owners moving to replace live musicians with synthesizers and taped music, a strategic decision made in order to save money. The results of this transitional period in Las Vegas history were both long-lasting and far-reaching for the entertainment industry. With its numerous oral history interviews and personal perspectives from the era, this book will appeal to readers interested in Las Vegas history, music history, and labor issues.

The Moulin Rouge and Black Rights in Las Vegas

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Author :
Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 078645251X
Total Pages : 227 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (864 download)

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Book Synopsis The Moulin Rouge and Black Rights in Las Vegas by : Earnest N. Bracey

Download or read book The Moulin Rouge and Black Rights in Las Vegas written by Earnest N. Bracey and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2009-01-22 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally opened in May 1955, the Moulin Rouge Hotel and Casino quickly rose in popularity as Las Vegas’ first racially-integrated hotel and casino. Sammy Davis, Jr., Louis Armstrong, and other A-list black singers and musicians performed at the Moulin Rouge on a regular basis, and for once they were allowed to spend the night in the same hotel where they performed. This book explains the important role that the hotel-casino played in early desegregation efforts in Las Vegas. With the Moulin Rouge as the backdrop, it provides an analysis of the evolution of race-relations in Las Vegas, including a detailed account of the landmark 1960 desegregation agreement. Finally, it examines recent efforts to rebuild and renovate the historic establishment.

Beyond the Glimmering Lights

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Publisher : Stephens PressLlc
ISBN 13 : 9781932173475
Total Pages : 171 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (734 download)

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Book Synopsis Beyond the Glimmering Lights by : Trish Geran

Download or read book Beyond the Glimmering Lights written by Trish Geran and published by Stephens PressLlc. This book was released on 2006 with total page 171 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beyond the Glimmering Lights relates the struggles, pains, and victories of black residents and entertainers during the most racially unjust period in the history of Las Vegas. Told through the eyes of author and native Las Vegan Trish Geran, she narrates her Aunt Magnolia's life and times in Las Vegas, experiences that occurred from 1942 to 1960 and stories passed on by early settlers. While searching in her aunt's garden, Trish discovers the evidence that proves what she constantly heard while growing up in Las Vegas, that black people played a major role in the development of Las Vegas. Trish Geran, writes a historical saga that is part history and part journey of discovery. She describes the race relations in the city, the unfair treatment in the workplace, the indecent housing conditions and how the black residents developed their own community and Strip.

Elvis in Vegas

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Author :
Publisher : Simon & Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1501151207
Total Pages : 304 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (11 download)

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Book Synopsis Elvis in Vegas by : Richard Zoglin

Download or read book Elvis in Vegas written by Richard Zoglin and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2020-11-10 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Outstanding pop-culture history.” —Newsday The “smart and zippy account” (The Wall Street Journal) of how Las Vegas saved Elvis and Elvis saved Las Vegas in the greatest musical comeback of all time. Elvis’s 1969 opening night in Vegas was his first time back on a live stage in more than eight years. His career had gone sour—bad movies, mediocre pop songs that no longer made the charts—and he’d been dismissed by most critics as over-the-hill. But in Vegas he played the biggest showroom in the biggest hotel in the city, drawing more people for his four-week engagement than any other show in Vegas history. His performance got rave reviews; “Suspicious Minds,” the song he introduced there, gave him his first number-one hit in seven years; and Elvis became Vegas’s biggest star. Over the next seven years, he performed more than 600 shows there, and sold out every one. Las Vegas was changed, too. By the end of the ‘60s, Vegas’ golden age—when the Rat Pack led a glittering array of stars who made it the nation’s premier live-entertainment center—was losing its luster. Elvis created a new kind of Vegas show: an over-the-top, rock-concert extravaganza. He set a new bar for Vegas performers, with the biggest salary, the biggest musical production, and the biggest promotion campaign the city had ever seen. He opened the door to a new generation of pop/rock artists and brought a new audience to Vegas—not the traditional well-heeled older gamblers, but a mass audience from Middle America that Vegas depends on for its success to this day. At once “a fascinating history of Vegas as gambling capital, celebrity playground, mob hangout, [and] entertainment Valhalla” (Rolling Stone) and the incredible “tale of how the King got his groove back” (Associated Press), Elvis in Vegas is a classic feel-good story for the ages.

Picturing Las Vegas

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Author :
Publisher : Gibbs Smith
ISBN 13 : 1423604881
Total Pages : 209 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (236 download)

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Book Synopsis Picturing Las Vegas by : Linda Chase

Download or read book Picturing Las Vegas written by Linda Chase and published by Gibbs Smith. This book was released on 2009 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through colorful photogra phs and firsthand narrative detail, Picturing Las Vegas tells the story of a city whose history mirrors that of America itself: a tale of the frontier, of corruption and greed, of beauty and loss and ineffable hope. From its hardscrabble origins, to the Golden Age of the Rat Pack, to today's mind-blowing theme-park casinos, Las Vegas is the city that has it all. Mobsters. Mormons. Elvis and Wayne Newton, Siegfried and Roy. It's a place where change is the one constant, and where the pursuit of happiness is the only law. In the words of writer Chuck Palahniuk, it's the place that "looks the way you'd imagine heaven must look at night." Linda Chase is the author of Surfing Women of the Waves and grew up in Las Vegas. She lives in California. Explores the fascinating story of Sin City, from its origins as a desert outpost to today's eye-popping fantasyland

Las Vegas

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Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 0874176476
Total Pages : 377 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (741 download)

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Book Synopsis Las Vegas by : Eugene P. Moehring

Download or read book Las Vegas written by Eugene P. Moehring and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2005-03-16 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The meteoric rise of Las Vegas from a remote Mormon outpost to an international entertainment center was never a sure thing. In its first decades, the town languished, but when Nevada legalized casino gambling in 1931, Las Vegas met its destiny. This act—combined with the growing popularity of the automobile, cheap land and electricity, and changing national attitudes toward gambling—led to the fantastic casinos and opulent resorts that became the trademark industry of the city and created the ambiance that has made Las Vegas an icon of pleasure. This volume celebrates the city’s unparalleled growth, examining both the development of its gaming industry and the creation of an urban complex that over two million people proudly call home. Here are the colorful characters who shaped the city as well as the political, business, and civic decisions that influenced its growth. The story extends chronologically from the first Paiute people to the construction of the latest megaresorts, and geographically far beyond the original township to include the several municipalities that make up today’s vast metropolitan Las Vegas area.

Cities and Nature

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1136244956
Total Pages : 545 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (362 download)

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Book Synopsis Cities and Nature by : Lisa Benton-Short

Download or read book Cities and Nature written by Lisa Benton-Short and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-29 with total page 545 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cities and Nature connects environmental processes with social and political actions. The book reconnects science and social science to demonstrate how the city is part of the environment and how it is subject to environmental constraints and opportunities. This second edition has been extensively revised and updated with in-depth examination of theory and critical themes. Greater discussion is given to urbanization trends and megacities; the post-industrial city and global economic changes; developing cities and slums; urban political ecology; the role of the city in climate change; and sustainability. The book explores the historical relationship between cities and nature, contemporary challenges to this relationship, and attempts taken to create more sustainable cities. The historical context situates urban development and its impact on the environment, and in turn the environmental impact on people in cities. This provides a foundation from which to understand contemporary issues, such as urban political ecology, hazards and disasters, water quality and supply, air pollution and climate change. The book then considers sustainability and how it has been informed by different theoretical approaches. Issues of environmental justice and the role of gender and race are explored. The final chapter examines the ways in which cities are practicing sustainability, from light "greening" efforts such as planting trees, to more comprehensive sustainability plans that integrate the multiple dimensions of sustainability. The text contains case studies from around the globe, with many drawn from cities in the developing world, as well as reviews of recent research, updated and expanded further reading to highlight relevant films, websites and journal articles. This book is an asset to students and researchers in geography, environmental studies, urban studies and planning and sustainability.

Becoming America's Playground

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Publisher : University of Oklahoma Press
ISBN 13 : 0806165855
Total Pages : 291 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (61 download)

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Book Synopsis Becoming America's Playground by : Larry D. Gragg

Download or read book Becoming America's Playground written by Larry D. Gragg and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2019-08-29 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1950 Las Vegas saw a million tourists. In 1960 it attracted ten million. The city entered the fifties as a regional destination where prosperous postwar Americans could enjoy vices largely forbidden elsewhere, and it emerged in the sixties as a national hotspot, the glitzy resort city that lights up the American West today. Becoming America’s Playground chronicles the vice and the toil that gave Las Vegas its worldwide reputation in those transformative years. Las Vegas’s rise was no happy accident. After World War II, vacationing Americans traveled the country in record numbers, making tourism a top industry in such states as California and Florida. The Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce saw its chance and developed a plan to capitalize on the town’s burgeoning reputation for leisure. Las Vegas pinned its hopes for the future on Americans’ need for escape. Transforming a vice city financed largely by the mob into a family vacation spot was not easy. Hotel and casino publicists closely monitored media representations of the city and took every opportunity to stage images of good, clean fun for the public—posing even the atomic bomb tests conducted just miles away as an attraction. The racism and sexism common in the rest of the nation in the era prevailed in Las Vegas too. The wild success of Frank Sinatra’s Rat Pack performances at the Sands Hotel in 1960 demonstrated the city’s slow progress toward equality. Women couldn’t work as dealers in Las Vegas until the 1970s, yet they found more opportunities for well-paying jobs there than many American women could find elsewhere. Gragg shows how a place like the Las Vegas Strip—with its glitz and vast wealth and its wildly public consumption of vice—rose to prominence in the 1950s, a decade of Cold War anxiety and civil rights conflict. Becoming America’s Playground brings this pivotal decade in Las Vegas into sharp focus for the first time.

Encyclopedia of Politics of the American West

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Publisher : CQ Press
ISBN 13 : 1452276064
Total Pages : 825 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (522 download)

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Book Synopsis Encyclopedia of Politics of the American West by : Steven L. Danver

Download or read book Encyclopedia of Politics of the American West written by Steven L. Danver and published by CQ Press. This book was released on 2013-04-25 with total page 825 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Encyclopedia of Politics in the American West is an A to Z reference work on the political development of one of America’s most politically distinct, not to mention its fastest growing, region. This work will cover not only the significant events and actors of Western politics, but also deal with key institutional, historical, environmental, and sociopolitical themes and concepts that are important to more fully understanding the politics of the West over the last century.

Feeling Lucky

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Publisher : Springer Nature
ISBN 13 : 3031330951
Total Pages : 264 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (313 download)

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Book Synopsis Feeling Lucky by : Paul Franke

Download or read book Feeling Lucky written by Paul Franke and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2023-07-13 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Monte Carlo and Las Vegas have become synonymous with casino gambling. Both destinations featured it as part of a broad variety of leisure and consumption opportunities that normalized games of chance and created emotional atmospheres that supported the hedonistic aspects of gambling. Urban spaces and architecture were carefully designed to enable a rapid growth of the casino industry and produce experiences on previous unimaginable scale. Feeling Lucky, is a “making of story,” about cities which acquired a strange and captivating allure of mystery around them. It is more than a mere descriptive account, however. Combining urban history, the history of consumption, and sociological approaches it presents a compelling comparative history of Monte Carlo and the Las Vegas Strip between the 1860s and 1970s. Paul Franke takes the reader on a journey from arriving at the cities, through the carefully planned urban environments and into the famous casinos. The analysis follows the paths contemporary gamblers would have taken, right to the gambling tables and to the shifting gambling practices across a century. Franke shows that casino entrepreneurs succeeded in producing and selling gambling experiences by controlling spaces, adapt leisure practices and appeal to specific markets. Gamblers on the other hand regarded Monte Carlo and Las Vegas as places to engage in games of chance that would allow them to preserve their political, cultural, and moral identities.

Homeless in Las Vegas

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Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 0874178398
Total Pages : 337 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (741 download)

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Book Synopsis Homeless in Las Vegas by : Kurt Borchard

Download or read book Homeless in Las Vegas written by Kurt Borchard and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2011-04-28 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The homeless men and women represented in this book speak candidly about their plight, its origins, and the many obstacles to escaping it. They discuss the unique challenges and opportunities that Las Vegas’s focus on tourism, indulgence, and diversion offers its homeless residents. This compelling and emotionally charged ethnography counters many of the stereotypes of homeless men and women, revealing the remarkable diversity of their circumstances. It also offers their perspectives on social services and civic attitudes toward homelessness.

Howard Hughes

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Author :
Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 1948908611
Total Pages : 325 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (489 download)

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Book Synopsis Howard Hughes by : Geoff Schumacher

Download or read book Howard Hughes written by Geoff Schumacher and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2020-03-11 with total page 325 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This newly revised and expanded edition of Howard Hughes chronicles the life and legacies of one of the most intriguing and accomplished Americans of the twentieth century. Hughes, born into wealth thanks to his father’s innovative drill bit that transformed the oil industry, put his inheritance to work in multiple ways, from producing big-budget Hollywood movies to building the world’s fastest and largest airplanes. Hughes set air speed records and traveled around the world in record time, earning ticker-tape parades in three cities in 1938. Later, he moved to Las Vegas and invested heavily in casinos. He bought seven resorts, in each case helping to loosen organized crime’s grip on Nevada’s lifeblood industry. Although the public viewed Hughes as a heroic and independent-minded trailblazer, behind closed doors he suffered from germophobia, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and an addiction to painkillers. He became paranoid and reclusive, surrounding himself with a small cadre of loyal caretakers. As executives battled each other over his empire, Hughes’ physical and mental health deteriorated to the point where he lost control of his business affairs. This second edition includes more insider details on Hughes’ personal interactions with actresses, journalists, and employees. New chapters provide insights into Hughes’s involvement with the mob, his ownership and struggles as the majority shareholder of TWA and the wide-ranging activities of Hughes Aircraft Company, Hughes’s critical role in the Glomar Explorer CIA project (a deep-sea drillship platform built to recover the Soviet submarine K-129), and more. Based on in-depth interviews with individuals who knew and worked with Hughes, this fascinating biography provides a colorful and comprehensive look at Hughes—from his life and career to his final years and lasting influence. This penetrating depiction of the man behind the curtain demonstrates Hughes’s legacy, and enduring impact on popular culture.