Our Researcher Profile series highlights researchers who have used resources in Special Collections & Archives for a variety of projects ranging from articles and books to exhibits and documentaries and more.
This week's post focuses on the work of Jeffrey Carlson, better known to Las Vegas history buffs for presenting a colorful window on the past of Sin City with his website and social media accounts Vintage Las Vegas. A life-long lover of libraries, Carlson's first job was in a public library, and he proudly declares that he has "seven library cards in two states." He notes that one of the reasons he started Vintage Las Vegas was "as a conscious effort to give myself an excuse to go to the library often."
Tell us a little bit about the project (book, exhibit, article, documentary, report) you researched in Special Collections & Archives.
Vintage Las Vegas is what I call the project, a website I started some years ago. The site was originally intended as my own personal reference place. I aimed to piece together enough historic Las Vegas photos to help me understand the timeline of the development of downtown and the Strip. This was a casual side project that I figured would occupy me for a few months. As the months turned into a couple years, I started visiting Special Collections to research the accumulating unanswered questions. Now many years have passed and I’m still scratching the surface.
How did you become interested in the topic
Three groups of Las Vegas photos caught my attention at around the same time: those of architect Denise Scott Brown from the 1960s, Loomis Dean of LIFE magazine’s photos from 1955, and some photos from the 40s found online in what turned out to be Special Collections website, the L. F. Manis Photograph Collection (PH-00100).
I have always been interested in historic photos that show American cities developing like New York, L.A., and San Francisco. New Orleans has the Vieux Carré Digital Survey by The Historic New Orleans Collection, a block-by-block history of the French Quarter. What fascinated me about the Las Vegas photos is that these three collections had incredibly diverse images and almost no overlap with one another, and places that are totally gone, despite this being a young city. I couldn’t understand the timeline, or even the geography.
How did you hear about Special Collections & Archives?
Through a simple web search. The gallery “Dreaming the Skyline: Resort Architecture and the New Urban Space” is what first brought me to the Special Collections & Archives website, it was my personal gateway to all the other treasures.
What resources, collections or materials from Special Collections & Archives were (or have been) most impactful for your research?
Access to the digitized Las Vegas Age (1905-1947) was a breakthrough, speeding up some research that would take hours or days into minutes. But it’s the overall scope of Special Collections that I find incredible. Items in different collections fit together like puzzle pieces. I have found details in the Las Vegas City Commission Records (MS-00237) that helped to date and contextualize photos found in other collections, for example.
What surprised you the most about your research in Special Collections & Archives?
The oral histories. The purpose of much of my research is looking into cold facts and dates of places and things, but the oral histories convey a human experience. From the interview conducted in the 1990s of the people connected with the Moulin Rouge in 1955, I got a sense of what performers were feeling and thinking when first came to town, and the things they saw and thought about when they walked a few blocks to work. Who knew showgirls walked to work? Things I find in these oral histories are nowhere to be found in the pop culture stories of Las Vegas, so many of which inevitably get hung up on mob folklore and Elvis to the expense of everything else.
Some of my favorite photo collections are the opposite of what originally drew me to Special Collections. The Maggie Mancuso Collection of Film Locations (MS-00504) has thousands of photos of sometimes mundane and ugly places most photographers were purposely avoiding, or everyday things that no one but a location scout would stop to photograph. The Clinton Wright Photographs (PH-00379) is unique in his focus on the Westside community. The Arthur G. Grant Photograph Collection (PH-00398) is a small collection by a non-professional. Grant was a partner in a small Fremont St. casino in the 50s. His photos are friends, family, customers, employees. Like the Wright photos, it’s a rare perspective.
What advice would you give to other authors/researchers using Special Collections & Archives? (Otherwise known as what I wish someone had told me before I visited Special Collections & Archives)
Ask a librarian. I realize this is an obvious and cliché answer, but Special Collections seems to be too big to be known by any visitor. I’ve learned plenty by asking the stewards, and it’s always a pleasure to talk to someone who loves what they’re doing.
