With pride in past and faith in future, Sun turns 50

Friday, June 30, 2000 | 11:33 a.m.

Harry Truman was president and the first atomic bomb blast at the Nevada Test Site was seven months away when Hank Greenspun bought a tri-weekly newspaper called the Free Press and renamed it the Las Vegas Morning Sun.

The rest is history.

And it's yours for the reading as the locally owned Sun publishes a 34-page special edition Sunday commemorating a half-century of newspapering in Las Vegas.

The 50th anniversary edition will appear in addition to the Sun's regular Sunday news section. Both sections will be inserted into the combined Las Vegas Review-Journal/Las Vegas Sun.

The complete section will appear on the Sun's website, http:// www.lasvegassun.com, on Sunday.

A cover story on Hank Greenspun, who founded the Sun and served as its publisher until his death in 1989, tells why the proverbial adjective "legendary" is almost an understatement for this man who greatly influenced Southern Nevada's history and whose reach spanned the country and overseas.

Why did Sen. Joseph McCarthy, R-Wis., at the height of his powers, with the whole country afraid of him, wilt at the sight of Hank Greenspun striding toward him during an anti-Greenspun rally in Las Vegas in 1952?

Why did a True magazine cover story in 1955 say Greenspun "rocked Las Vegas and the entire state of Nevada like an A-bomb set off at Yucca flat"?

Why did Hank lose his U.S. civil rights but later earn a pardon from President John Kennedy and the undying gratitude of Israel?

How did Hank deflect the intimidating tactics of IRS agents who visited him in his office?

The Sun's 50th anniversary edition tells these stories and many more that have earned the Sun a national reputation over the past half-century.

The edition contains a profile of Barbara Greenspun, Hank's widow, who is now publisher of the Sun.

Readers will find out where the Sun is going in an interview with Brian Greenspun, president and editor of the Sun. Greenspun talks about both the Sun's legacy and the road ahead.

Danny Greenspun, vice president of the Sun, president of the Greenspun Media Group and Hank's youngest son, expounds upon the next 50 years. In a definitive summary, he says, "The Sun will be here."

Mike O'Callaghan, former two-term Nevada governor and executive editor of the Sun, shares his philosophy of newspapering and what he considers to be the greatest honor ever bestowed upon him.

A profile of Ruthe Deskin, longtime assistant to the publisher, tells why her name is synonymous with the Sun and community service.

Favorite memories of ex-Sun reporters, photographers and editors are recalled. Historic pages are reproduced. Five decades are visually capsulized in a timeline spanning four pages.

It's yours for the reading. Sunday.