Saturday, July 1, 2000 | 2:41 a.m.
When Ruthe Deskin, the assistant to the publisher of the Sun, talks to groups of young women in the media today, she muses: "I had it a lot better than you when I started because I didn't have as much competition."
When Deskin joined the Sun in 1954, there were few women in the field of journalism. Still, there were enough for the Nevada State Press Association to have an award for best story written by a woman -- an honor nabbed by Deskin in 1959.
Although blatantly sexist in today's politically correct world, the award, Deskin said, "was not meant as a put-down" -- it recognized the accomplishments of women in what was then a male-dominated field.
"There were important women's issues that had to be written about, and Sun women reporters wrote those stories and won that award several times," she said.
Deskin, 84, said she never experienced sex discrimination in the workplace because her philosophy simply was to do the best job in whatever task she took on.
"I never felt that being a woman was a drawback in anything I ever did," she said. "I always got things done by being 'a woman' -- I never tried to be one of the boys. I pulled my weight and had a good work ethic.
"Many women have experienced sex discrimination in the workplace, and whenever I knew of it happening anywhere, I stood up against it. It just never happened to me."
In 1966 Deskin became only the second woman elected president of the press association. It was one of many honors that has been bestowed upon the native Nevadan, who has a school named after her as well as the activity center at Child Haven, the county's home for displaced children, where she has been active.
"Ruthe has been my idol since I was 14 years old and best friends with her daughter Nancy at Las Vegas High in the 1950s," Clark County Commissioner Mary Kincaid said. "She has been an inspiration to me and so many other young women.
"Ruthe did things that women of the 1950s just didn't do and also raised a family. Like Ruthe, I too never felt I was discriminated against for being a woman because of the things I learned from her."
Kincaid, who raised eight children and was a North Las Vegas councilwoman for 17 years, was so impressed with Deskin she even thought about becoming a newspaperwoman. So much so, she earned an associate's degree in journalism at a junior college in Burbank, Calif.
For all of the acclaim Deskin has received, she remains a down-to-earth individual who modestly thinks of herself as just one of the cogs in the Sun's machinery. But 46 years ago, that almost didn't happen.
Sun career starts
Deskin, who got her start in the news business as women's editor of the Reno Evening Gazette in the late 1940s, came to Las Vegas about the time the Sun was born and initially worked at KENO radio and for an advertising firm.
"I was earning $65 a week at the radio station and the Sun offered me $50, so I turned it down," Deskin said. "When the Sun decided to start its Sunday edition in June 1954, I was approached to be the Sunday editor, and I said I wanted $100 a week. I thought that was the last I'd hear from them. The next thing I knew I was hired."
Soon after, she was promoted to assistant to Publisher Hank Greenspun, a position she still holds, only now she assists Hank's widow, Barbara Greenspun. For many years Deskin wrote the front-page "Memo to Hank" column and today she writes the Back and Forth column in the Accent section of the paper.
Youth champion
Over the years, Deskin, a mother of two, grandmother of two and great-grandmother of three, became a champion for youth causes.
She has served as a member of the Clark County Juvenile Probation Committee, was instrumental in the development of the Child Haven shelter for abused and neglected children and helped start both the Sun Youth Forum for high school students and the Sun Camp Fund for underprivileged youths.
"The work Ruthe has done for the youth in our community has been tremendous," said Thalia Dondero, a former Clark County commissioner and current member of the university Board of Regents.
"She is a true-blue Nevadan with a great pioneering spirit, and she is a plain-spoken person you can always count on."
Dondero's late husband, Harvey, worked with Deskin and Hank Greenspun to start the Sun Youth Forum, giving local high school students a voice in the community.
The longtime annual event addresses issues vital to today's youth. Representatives of various discussion groups write columns about what they and others learn from spirited debates, and those columns are published in the Sun.
Deskin has many warm memories of her years with the Youth Forum. One involved a student who approached her during the lunch break and reminded her that she had spoken to him a couple of years earlier and it had helped him through troubled times.
"I had talked to him during a visit to the Spring Mountain Youth Camp (correctional facility)," Deskin said. "And now, here he was, back at school and on the right track. It was great to see such a turnaround in a once-troubled young life."
The Sun Youth Forum has won numerous honors, including the National Golden Press Award for America's top youth program.
Deskin says that despite all of the bad things written about today's youth -- gangs, school shootings, etc. -- she still has faith that the future is in good hands.
"I still believe most kids are good -- you just don't read about the many good ones," she said. "But today kids are more violent. When I started, the worst we had were truants and joyriders. More than ever, we need to instill in children the virtues of honesty, integrity and morality. And we need more parental involvement."
Inspiration
Deskin was born in the mining and agricultural community of Yerington and was educated in a two-story schoolhouse that today is a state landmark. Her father was a mining engineer who also ran a feed store that he lost because of the Depression.
Early on, Deskin worked as a newspaper girl, loading up her wagon and delivering the Reno Evening Gazette to homes. She graduated from Yerington High School, where she was all-state in basketball, and from the University of Nevada, Reno.
During World War II Deskin worked as employee relations director for the Army's Herlong Ordnance Depot, earning the Extra-Meritorious Civilian Service Medal. She was one of only a handful of women in the United States to receive that honor.
Deskin has had many moments as an inspirational leader at the Sun. After the November 1963 fire that destroyed the newspaper plant, she temporarily turned her home into the Sun's offices and supervised the operation to keep the paper publishing. Editors and reporters occupied every room from her kitchen to her garage.
"We had reporters waiting in line to use the only phone line we had," Deskin said. "There were editors working on the coffee table, the floor -- papers everywhere. It was a ball getting the newspaper out under such difficult conditions."
In March 1980 Deskin earned the coveted Distinguished Nevadan Award, and later that year, on Oct. 12, "Ruthe Deskin Day" was proclaimed in Nevada. But it also marked a sad turning point for Deskin -- the trip down from her peak.
"As the Sun has grown, my own participation and duties have lessened to an extent that I don't feel quite as necessary to the paper, especially in recent years," Deskin said, referring to a heart condition that has caused her to scale back her work hours.
"But that doesn't bother me because as you get older you realize that you've had your turn and it is time to stand back and watch younger people have the same ambitions and make the same mistakes you made."
'Premier journalist'
But the downhill run also has been a rewarding one. On June 12, 1984, then-Rep. Harry Reid, D-Nev., gave a tribute to Deskin on the floor of the House, calling her a "premier journalist and communicator." That year, she won the Nevada Press Association's top award, the Silver Make-up Rule.
In 1987 the Clark County School District announced that Ruthe Deskin Elementary would be built near Lone Mountain Road and Tenaya Way. In 1994 the activity center at Child Haven was named for Deskin.
The funny thing is that Deskin has long believed that buildings should not be named after living individuals.
"I never asked for any building to be named for me, and I've sat though those ceremonies laughing to friends that I don't believe in this," she said. "What if I go out and murder somebody, then what are they going to do?"
Deskin said she decided not to make a big issue about the buildings being named after her because she did not want to hurt the feelings of those who were honoring her.
But in her prime Deskin could wage a battle of words over important matters with the best of them -- and that included the outspoken Hank Greenspun.
"What I liked about working for Hank was that when he asked me my opinion about something, he wanted an honest opinion -- not the answer I thought he wanted to hear," Deskin said. "Because of that, we had some real good arguments."
But despite his stubbornness, Deskin admired her boss: "I respected Hank for his great knowledge on so many subjects. And there were a lot of times he was a lot of fun to be around. I really miss him."
In a May 18, 1980, Where I Stand column, Hank wrote of Deskin: "In an industry filled with prima donnas and deep-enders, Ruthe is the balance wheel that keeps the stories in proper focus with objectivity and responsibility. And ... she is probably the only (one who) keeps this editor quasi-rational and under some restraint."
Since Hank's death in 1989, Deskin has flirted many times with retirement, noting that the main reason she still works is because she enjoys being around the Sun staff.
Loving work
The Sun has always been a second family to Deskin, especially since 1983 when her husband, Jim Deskin, former executive director of the Nevada State Athletic Commission and past president of the World Boxing Association, died.
"Jim was always so supportive of anything I ever did," Ruthe said. "I always had a sense of security because of his confidence in my ability."
The Deskins also became top area bowlers. She is a member of the Las Vegas Women's Bowling Hall of Fame.
"I found bowling to be a great challenge -- and it was a great nighttime activity, especially after a busy day at the newspaper," Ruthe said.
As for the future of the Sun, Deskin says she would like to see the Greenspun family buy the Review-Journal.
"That was Hank's dream," she said. "I think it can happen one day."
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