Reno Gazette-Journal from Reno, Nevada • Page 36

1 6A NEVADA LOOKS AHEAD -March 27, 1976 1 Reno Evening Gazette-Nevada State Journal i History of Reno (Continued from page 15) building on Valley Road late in 1965. While a study w1 assembled to decide the future of Stead Air Force Ba PJOT. ma phases of the $10 million Park Lane Shopping Centre at Plumb Lanejuia South Virginia Street were completed. The second phase of oppen Square, also at Plumb Land and South Virginia, was completed by we Casazza family in 1965. ot Work started late in 1965 on a $3 million discount store atOddie Boulevard and Sullivan Lane in Sparks.

The Piazzo brothers, Che ana Link, who earlier started the trend sending shoppers from storesw i downtown area Into outlying districts by developing the Plaza Shopping Center at Fourth and Vine streets, had built Lakeside Shopping center ai West Plumb Lane and Lakeside Drive. Proliferation of the shopping centers had drawn away much of tnewoi traffic and purchasing power from downtown Reno. A study ways in which the downtown area could be improved resulted in me commissioning of a redevelopment plan in 1969 under the uue "RENOvatlon." 4U Hospital faculties underwent a tremendous upgrading in the ntfdcue 1960s. Beds and facilities were added by St. Mary's Hospital.

Work started on the new multi-million dollar Washoe Medical Center addition. And then there was the airport, lifeline for development of area tourism. Air service came to Reno in 1920 at a hastily constructed flying field on Plumas Street. The former field is now occupied by the fifth fairway of the Washoe County Golf Course. The first airport was named Blanchf leld, honoring the memory of William Blanchfield, a pioneer pilot who had been killed in a crash while dropping a wreath on the grave of a fellow pilot.

The U.S. Post Office Department organized the first air mail service. Pilot Bert Acosta with World War I hero Capt. Eddie Rickenbacker aboard, landed the first air mail plane at Blanchfield Aug. 4, 1920 after a flight from Cheyenne, Wyo.

The first air moil planes Reno citizens greeted the arrival of the first air mail planes with the same enthusiasm they had shown when the first transcontinental trains arrived years They reserved their heartiest greeting for "Lin-dy." Wore than 6,000 congregated at Blanchfield Sept. 19, 1927, to welcome Charles A. Lindbergh on his cross-country tour following his solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean in his plane, "Spirit of St. Blanchfield was phased out after United Air Lines built its own field, Hubbard Field. By 1941 United was pressing the City of Reno, or Washoe County, or both, to buy Hubbard Field and operate it.

Vast improvements were needed at the field to keep up with the larger and heavier aircraft, serving more and more passengers. Government funds were available but funds could not be granted to a private concern like United. The City of Reno took over operation of Hubbard Field Dec. 1, 1953, first on a lease, then bought the property outright. Four years later, the first passenger landed at a sparkling new terminal built by the city.

The new terminal, opened with pomp and ceremony Sept. 27, 1959, cost Reno approximately $3.5 million for buildings, land acquisition and landing field upgrading. The Nevada Air National Guard moved in from Stead to occupy the old terminal area and spent more than $2 million for hangars, office space, sewer facilities and lengthening and expansion of the runways. Reno's airport gained international status in January, 1960 as the entry port for thousands of athletes and spectators headed for the VIII Winter Olympic Games at Squaw Valley. Later the airport was designated a Port of Entry, enhancing the facility's worth and increasing the area's warehousing stature.

United Air Lines served Reno for more than 18 years on a monopoly basis. Bonanza Airlines started service between Reno and Las Vegas in 1946 with a leased DCS airplane. After expanding its service routes, Bonanza merged with Pacific and West Coast air lines under the banner of Air West. Howard Hughes acquired the airline in July, 1969 and named the service Hughes Airwest. Western Airlines Inc.

had started serving Reno in 1955. Figures assembled by the Greater Reno Chamber of Commerce show that in the first six months of 1975, 253,005 passengers arrived at Reno-International Airport and 244,189 passengers departed. Most of the takeoffs were San Francisco bound. A Reno-Portland-Seattle passenger trend was developing as more efforts were made to attract visitors from the Northwest and Canada. An $11 million runway expansion program was near completion early in 1976.

Expansion of terminal facilities made the airport a more comfortable place for passengers. The fight for additional air service to Reno went on. During the mid-1960s, work started on a convention center on South Virginia Street. Centennial Coliseum could accommodate as many as 8,000 persons for everything from conventions, to the ice follies, to rodeos, basketball games, hockey matches, the Shrine Circus and the Pacific Loggers Conference. Reno also felt the need for another facility in the downtown area which could double as a convention site and a place to hold local events such as concerts and social functions.

The answer was Pioneer Theater Auditorium. Both the Coliseum and the Pioneer Theater Auditorium were built by room tax funds administered by the Washoe County Fair and Recreation Board. Room tax funds pay for maintenance needs. With two of the finest convention facilities in the West, Reno could host close to 300 conventions a year although 90 per cent of the groups would be small, with 50 to 250 delegates. After the two auditoriums were built, Reno still needed places to house the delegates.

The Mapes Hotel, built in the 1940s, the Riverside, Golden and Overland hotels, and smaller hotels and motels couldn't begin to meet the need. Norman Biltz and his associates erected the Holiday Hotel at South Center and Mill streets. The Ponderosa Hotel was built at South Virginia Street and California Avenue. Reno still needed large hotels with facilities for all meetings under one roof and with 750 to 1,000 rooms. William Harrah put up his 24-story, 326-room hotel with convention facilities.

The Sundowner, completed in 1975 by Cal-Nevada Development Corp. and HKM Corp. costing $16 million at Arlington Avenue off West Fourth Street, provided 349 rooms in 11 stories. The Holiday Inn on East Sixth Street opened in 1974 with 300 rooms in 13 stories at a cost of $5 million. The eight-story Howard Johnson Motor Lodge opened in 1974 on Mc-Carran Boulevard in Sparks, at a cost of $5.1 million, with 224 rooms.

The Reef Resort Hotel came into being in 1974 with 112 rooms in 12 stories. The Kings Inn on West Third Street opening in 1974 provided 168 rooms. Members of the old time Carano family built the Eldorado Hotel costing $6 million, with 282 rooms, north of the tracks on North Virginia Street in 1973. Lincoln Fitzgerald started construction of his Fitzgerald's Hotel in 1975. Scheduled to open in June, 1976, Fitzgerald's 16-story, $12 million hotel casino will provide convention facilities and 347 rooms.

One of Reno's biggest boosts convention-wise was the announcement that Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer would build a hotel-casino with convention facilities and room for expansion. The Del Webb which acquired the Ernest Primm holdings consisting of the Primadonna Club and other property, also indicated interest in building the size of hotel Reno would need to emphasize the convention business. Del Webb Corp. also acquired the once proud McKissick Opera House and tore it down late in 1975. Late in 1975, Reno could provide 9,986 rooms in 190 hotels.

Sparks offered 1,255 rooms in 29 hotels and motels. Incline Village, Lake Tahoe could accommodate 1,850 guests in 15 facilities. Visitors who filled the spaces in the various hostelries in 1975 were far removed from the fortune seekers of the 1860s. Modern day tourists poured $193.2 million into the Reno and North Lake Tahoe economy in 1975. They helped Nevada to a record $1.3 billion in gross gaming revenues, bringing $58.4 million in tax revenues for the 12-month period, plus city and county license fees.

A strong year for growth Establishments catering to gamblers and tourists in general were expanding. So were other businesses. The year 1965 was one of Reno's strongest in this respect. High rise and shopping center construction proceeded at an unprecedented rate, after First National Bank of Nevada built its 16-story building in 1962-63. Builders took out city permits for construction valued at $64,801,489.

Each new project reflected faith in Reno's future. Groups such as Western Industrial Nevada (WIN) persuaded industrialists from coast to coast that the area was meeting the challenge of growth and brought in new industries. The high rise Park Towers apartments went up at Arlington and Island avenues. The Cavanaugh family built the 22-story Arlington Towers at First Street and Arlington Avenue. An adjoining building to the east, Arlington Plaza, would rise some five years later.

Sierra Pacific Power Company completed a handsome new headquarters building at South Virginia Street and Moana Lane early in the spring of 1966. Bell of Nevada erected a new building at First and Center streets to increase its service facilities and moved into a new main office building on East Plumb Lane. A new Federal Building on Booth Street, completed in 1965, shifted most of the federal offices from their downtown location. City Hall occupied a new building at Stewart and Center streets. The Reno Police Department, which had been organized in 1902, had moved into a new city jail on East Second Street.

The Washoe County Courthouse was remodeled. A Sparks branch of the Washoe County Library moved out of its old quarters on Street into a new building. The new Washoe County Library Building, which won a national prize as the "most beautif ul' was ready for occupancy in the spring of 1966. The Young Women's Christian Association took over a sparkling new "Reno Is the hub of the West, store your Goods here," farsighted local industrialists advised. They built the first of nundreds of warehouses.

The Legislature passed a Freeport Law which favored the Eastern manufacturers. An amendment to the state Constitution provided further protection. Tourism promotion assumed many facets in Reno over the years. Easy divorce, quick marriage, prizefighting, a free and easy atmosphere, free flowing booze, wide opefl gambling and accessibility all helped put Reno on the map. Everything a tourist might want was available, most of it on a 24-hour, around-the-clock basis.

Outside of the downtown clubs, Reno could offer such enticements as visits to the University of Nevada campus, the Nevada Historical Society museum, the AtmospneriumPlanetarium close by the Desert Research Institute, art galleries, Harrah's Automobile Collection, parks, swimming, golf, tennis, trapshooting and horseback riding. Desert scenery, ghost towns Reno was the jumping off place for desert scenery and ghost towns. Pyramid Lake with its boating and fishing was 30 miles away. Lake Tahoe in the Sierra was easily and quickly reached, the state Capitol and State Museum in Carson City were close by, and then there was all that snow! Snow falls in the Sierra, just west of Reno, from late November until early April, and in great quantities. The ratio is one day of snowfall for every four days of sunshine.

Average snowpack is 20 feet. Skiing became a way of life for early mountain settlers, some of whom negotiated the snowy fields on barrel staves. Usually there was no other way to maintain communications. Snowshoe Thompson carried the mail from Virginia City to Placerville and back over the Sierra in 1856. University of Nevada classics professor Dr.

J.E. Church devised a method of measuring snow depths in order to predict the amount of stream flow for next summer's irrigation purposes and his snow survey crews were among the early Sierra skiers. Years later it was discovered skiing could be fun. Devotees to the sport In both Nevada and California started swarming over the Sierra. Ski resorts were built to rest and feed them.

Russell Poulsen of a pioneer Reno family and a ski devotee since Reno High School and University of Nevada days, acquired land in Squaw Valley. While Poulsen wasn't piloting Pan America Airlines planes across the Pacific he was skiing and developing a ski complex. Alex Cushing had property nearby. "The winter Olympic games? Why not?" Cushing sold the Squaw Valley site to the Olympics organizing committee with the blessing of Reno sports promoters, for the VIII Winter Olympic Games in I960. Squaw Valley, 15 years after the Olympics, was one of 25 ski resorts within easy reach of Reno, the world's largest and best skiing area.

Development of skiing helped swell Reno's tourism volume which would see more than 12 million visitors pouring into the area each year during the early 1970s. Another field could be tapped. Boosters went after conventions, a natural complement to tourism. The chamber of commerce developed a bureau to sell Reno to organizations looking for a place to meet. Convention business, especially as applied to major conventions, takes time to develop.

Sites are approved five and more years in advance. Competition is fierce. The selling job had to be solid. To the average convention site selection committee member, Reno had many faces, some not too favorable. The easy divorce-quick marriage aspect didn't set too well in some quarters.

Gaming tables would keep delegates away from meetings. "Try us, you'll like us! and organizations did, not in large numbers at first, but on an increasing scale. Lions Clubs sent 5,000 for their District Four convention one year in the mid 1950s. The Lions taught Reno another lesson. The civic auditorium in the County Library Building was too small.

There weren't enough facilities to feed that many people, nor to house them. The Lions were taken care of, after an all-out effort. It would take much more to serve larger conventions in the future. Reno needed a big auditorium for crowds, bigger than even the recently completed University of Nevada gymnasium with its 3,500 seating capacity could accommodate. Reno needed more hotel and motel rooms.

Reno responded. Development of the Reno airport was a boost for Reno's tourism and convention business but it didn't help the core area downtown. The core had a way of becoming deserted as the outlying shopping areas developed. Two major stores, Sears and Montgomery Ward, moved from Sierra Street Sears to Park Lane Centre and Montgomery Ward to Continued on next page) AWE TAME MOTTO for nature lovers and natural lovers RESORT HOTEL I CASINO AT INCLINE VILLAGE Nevada's Newest Hotel at Incline Village A Touch of Hyatt incorporating good old Nevada hospitality. Hyatt Lake Tahoe Resort and Casino 500 beautiful guest rooms and suites overlook take Tahoe, and the 24 lakeside suites have fireplaces.

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