The Founding of Las Vegas (1905)

About

Long before the town existed, the springs and meadows of the Las Vegas Valley drew travellers across the desert. The Springs Preserve notes that Mexican scout Rafael Rivera reached the area in 1829 and that the name Las Vegas means "the meadows." In 1855 Mormon missionaries built an adobe fort beside the spring-fed creek, but they abandoned it in 1857. The site later became a ranch, run for nearly two decades by Helen J. Stewart after her husband Archibald was killed in 1884. By 1900, only about thirty people lived in the valley.

The town owes its existence to a railroad. Montana senator William A. Clark was racing Union Pacific to link Salt Lake City with Los Angeles. In 1902 he bought the 1,800-acre Stewart Ranch for $55,000, which gave him the Las Vegas Springs and a water stop for his trains. After a court fight and a compromise with Union Pacific, his San Pedro, Los Angeles & Salt Lake Railroad was completed at Jean, Nevada, on January 30, 1905. Regular service through Las Vegas began that May.

On Monday, May 15, 1905, the railroad's Las Vegas Land & Water Company auctioned lots in Clark's Las Vegas Townsite. More than 1,000 people stood in 110-degree heat around a tent just east of the depot. Lots along Fremont Street went first; three at Fremont and Main fetched $1,750 each. By the end of the second day the sale had raised about $265,000. Deeds banned liquor everywhere except Blocks 16 and 17, which became the town's saloon and red-light district.

The railroad shaped the town for years. By 1909 Clark's rail yard and repair shop employed 400 people, and that year the legislature created Clark County and named it after him. Voters chose to incorporate the City of Las Vegas on June 1, 1911, by 168 votes to 57. The city still celebrates May 15 as its birthday, and historians generally treat Clark's auction, rather than the smaller McWilliams Townsite sale earlier that year, as the start of Las Vegas.

What to expect

Old Las Vegas Mormon Fort State Historic Park, at 500 E. Washington Ave. in Downtown Las Vegas, preserves part of the original 1855 adobe fort, with a visitor center and exhibits on the site's history. Nevada State Parks lists hours of Tuesday to Saturday, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. (closed Sunday and Monday), and a $3 entrance fee, with children 12 and under free.

At the Springs Preserve, the 180-acre site the preserve calls the birthplace of Las Vegas, the Boomtown 1905 exhibit recreates the town's streetscape from 1905 to 1920, including four original railroad cottages moved from Downtown. The Nevada State Museum is also on the preserve grounds.

Before and after

• Hoover Dam Construction (1931-1936)

Good to know

• A second townsite, J. T. McWilliams's, put lots on sale west of the tracks in January 1905; that area is now part of the Historic Westside.
• The city's timeline describes the auctioned area as 110 acres bounded by Stewart Avenue, Garces Avenue, Main Street and Fifth Street (today's Las Vegas Boulevard).
• Liquor was allowed only on Blocks 16 and 17. The Springs Preserve's Boomtown 1905 recreates the Arizona Club, a Block 16 saloon.
• Helen J. Stewart, who sold the ranch to the railroad, became known as "The First Lady of Las Vegas," according to Nevada State Parks.
• The Mormon Fort site was bought by the City of Las Vegas in 1971 and transferred to Nevada State Parks in 1991.

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