Best offer for historic Bell ranch $650,000 at auction

Monday, Nov. 20, 2000 | noon

The bids are in on the historic Walking Box Ranch, but there still is some dickering to be done to determine whether the property will be sold to the highest bidder, a civil and structural engineer who wants to retire there.

George Brizendine, who has been buying and selling real estate in Southern Nevada since the mid-1960s, had the high bid of $650,000 at Saturday's auction of the former cattle ranch home that was built in 1931 by husband and wife actors Rex Bell and Clara Bow.

Realtor David Boyer, representing the ranch's owner, Viceroy Resource Corp. and Viceroy Gold Corp. of British Columbia, said a counter-offer is pending from the Canadian gold mining company, which purchased the property in 1989 to build a 15-mile roadway to its Castle Mountain gold mines in California.

"The bid was not terribly far from my client's pain threshold," said Boyer, a longtime Las Vegan who has known Brizendine for more than 20 years through their membership in the Las Vegas Rotary Club. "George has been informed of this and knows we will be coming back with a counter-offer."

The original asking price for the home and 38.5-acre parcel was $3 million. It was dropped to $2.5 million. Because it is located so far from Las Vegas -- 60 miles south of the city -- Boyer said there have been difficulties selling it.

With his winning bid, Brizendine did not gain exclusivity to buy the Spanish-style home. However, Boyer said, he currently is the only one Viceroy is dealing with to purchase the property. Boyer said the deal could be finalized as early as the end of next week.

The Saturday auction at the home once frequented by movie stars -- among them Clark Gable, Carol Lombard and Errol Flynn -- drew 45 to 50 people, and the bidding started at $500,000, Boyer said.

Viceroy, which spent about $750,000 to restore the house to its former glory, put the property up for sale because the mines near the ranch house, which was used by its executives for meetings and retreats, are about mined out.

An open house on Nov. 12 drew about 225 people to check out the property, which includes a ranch house, corrals, a barn, a swimming pool and a tennis court. It can no longer be used as a cattle ranch because the area is now a protected desert tortoise habitat. Horses, however, are permitted.

The ranch once spread across 350,000 acres. Most of the property was sold in the late 1940s. Bell in 1950 sold the ranch to Karl Weikel, who renamed it the YKL Ranch. He operated it for 39 years before selling it to Viceroy.

Bell, who was Nevada lieutenant governor in the late 1950s and early '60s, is the father of former Clark County District Attorney Rex Bell, who grew up on the ranch with his brother George.

The ranch got its name from a cattle brand the elder Bell created while doodling. The brand is a derivative of the Box K brand, flipped one-quarter turn to the right so that the arms of the "K" form the legs upon which the box walks.