Historic Treasures Donated To OLSHACS

The Old Logandale School Historical And Cultural Society (OLSHACS) received a donation, last week, of important historical items to add to the Society’s large archive collection. The items were donated on Friday, June 19 by Loretta Bowman Hunt and Lola Stiborek, both of Las Vegas, Nevada.

The two women are the daughters of Elmer and Elizabeth Bowman who were early residents of the Moapa Valley. Both of the sisters grew up in Moapa Valley and both graduated from the Moapa Valley School; Loretta in 1937 and Lola in 1942.

Loretta and Lola remembered the days before the Bowman Reservoir was first built as a storage facility for irrigation water. Before the reservoir, the area was owned by their father and was planted in fields of feed corn, maize and other crops. Lola recalled long, hot days of hard work weeding in those fields.

“A lot of people have come to think of the Bowman Reservoir as a fun place,” Lola said with a smile. “But there aren’t fun memories there for me. My memories are more of a forced labor camp, long days of hard work in the field.”

Loretta Bowman worked for Clark County for most of her professional life: 52 years. “I started there as a temp,” she said. “But then they never let me leave.”

Loretta was appointed to the position of Clark County Clerk in 1965. She served in that position for 34 years. She remembers a Las Vegas of much simpler times. “I remember when Las Vegas was a town with only one stoplight,” she said. “It was right there at Main and Fremont street.”

Loretta saw a lot of change in the County government during her tenure and, at her retirement in 1999, she was recognized as the longest working county employee.

As part of her donation to OLSHACS, Loretta brought memorabilia and documents from her tenure with the County. There are several volumes of scrapbooks filled with old newspaper clippings, photos and campaign materials. There are boxes of photos of her with state and county elected officials and judges. There are numerous certificates, awards and proclamations that feature her achievements.

“I’m excited to have all of this as part of our collection,” said OLSHACS Director Beezy Tobiasson. “I love these kinds of things. I’ll be up all night now going through all this stuff.”

Lola’s donation to the collection was a single relic that is even more specific to Moapa Valley history. It is a beautifully fashioned old quilt that was made by the ladies of the LDS Relief Society in the Moapa Valley back in 1938. The quilt was all hand stitched right there in the Old Logandale School building.

It was made as a fundraiser for the church women’s organization and was auctioned off at a community bazaar. It was purchased for $10 by Elmer Bowman for his wife Elizabeth who was the Relief Society President at the time. She passed it on to her daughter, Lola, who has had it for many years. Lola recently found it stored in a linen closet in her home and decided to donate it to OLSHACS.

The quilt bears the names of all of the women who helped make it, in their own hand-stitched signatures. There are 38 names on the quilt including such local pioneer family names as Jones, Whipple, Bowler, Lytle, Mills, Jorgensen, Waite, Hannig, Bowman, Wells, Barnum, Adams, Perkins, Robison, Marshall, Lewis, Lyman, Sprague, Cooper and Tobiasson.

This beautiful piece of Moapa Valley history is now safely stored by the OLSHACS organization and can be seen by appointment at the Old Logandale School.