Friday, Aug. 3, 2001 | 4:49 a.m.
In the rural town of Overton, past the "new" school (built in 1951) on Anderson Street, sits a brick-and-mortar symbol of American history.
Dignified and desolate, the Overton Gymnasium rests beneath towering cottonwood trees. Desert winds whistle through the building's arched windows.
"It holds a lot of memories for us," Katherine Hannig, an Overton native, Moapa High School graduate and former drill team instructor, said of the gym.
The 63-year-old gym was a sign of prosperity when it was built in 1938 during the Depression that particularly devastated the farming community and the nation. As part of President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal, the Works Projects Administration built the gymnasium for the then-sparse Overton population.
Halloween carnivals, sweetheart dances and state-championship games were held over the years within the hulking, square building.
Hannig remembers crepe-paper rainbows adorning the ceiling for proms and the cheers of family and friends at basketball games.
"It was just always here for us and we used it to death," Hannig said.
In 1991 the gym was condemned because of fire damage.
Today the crumbling walls, painted baby blue decades ago, house collapsed pingpong tables, and scattered school desks litter the warped wood floor. Moldy grey sweatshirts with Moapa High School emblazoned in dark blue letters on the back are heaped on the floor of what was once the music room.
Inside, graffiti is scrawled along the chalky, crumbling walls. Spray painted in large letters on one wall beneath declarations of love and school pride, a patriotic sentiment: "Iran Kiss My (expletive)" -- the only visible profanity painted on the old walls.
The townspeople had wished to wipe away years of neglect and return the gym to its previous state of usefulness and beauty.
It took 10 years, but a retired U.S. history teacher is working to make that happen.
On June 12 the first steps to preserve the building were completed when the Overton Gymnasium was placed on the State Register of Historic Places, Nevada's official list of cultural resources worthy of preservation.
Dr. Larry Moses spearheaded the town's efforts to save the gym.
Moses had always been drawn to the idea of small-town life. In 1990 after 30 years of teaching in Las Vegas, he was offered the job of principal of Moapa Valley High School. The high school serves the conjoined towns of Overton and Logandale, and other nearby rural areas.
He retired five years ago and is still considered a relatively new resident of the area. But when Logandale Elementary School, built in the early part of the last century, needed to be saved from the wrecking ball, the town turned to Moses.
He couldn't say no. Logandale Elementary is now a center for arts in the community.
After that success, Moses set his eyes on the gym, one of the last buildings on the Clark County School District's list to be torn down.
"That's where you and your kids played basketball. Championship games have been held, proms," Moses said. "There's just a whole lot of memories there."
Moses lobbied the school district, which owns the gym, to erase the building's name from its tear-down list and allow the town to repair the building. The district complied with Moses' impassioned pleas.
The renovations are expected to run about $800,000 and be completed by 2003. Moses will apply for grants and ask the community for funding.
He said he doesn't believe the town will turn him down.
"They've spent years trying to save this building," Moses said. "There has been absolutely no one who said, 'Let's tear it down.' "
The building is a rare gem on the state's list of historic architectural structures, Ron James, state historic preservation officer, said.
"It's a very elegant building," James said.
The tan-brick building was constructed in the Italian Renaissance Revival, a rare style in this country.
"It's not the kind of thing you run into when you are walking along the streets of Las Vegas," James said. "It is a fine example of a style of architecture that is not that common, then or now."
In rural communities such as Overton, a building such as the gym can be a remarkable remnant of the past, he said -- one that is not easily removed.
The thick, brick walls were built to last, James said. "It's a work of art. One would not want to throw away a large, imposing and useful piece of art."
To the townspeople, the gym's mystique is more than bricks and beauty.
Ora Mae May has lived across from the gym for nearly three decades. When the gym's roof caught fire in 1991, she stretched her garden hose to the edge of her wide yard and attempted to douse the flames.
"I couldn't do anything to stop it," May said. She eventually turned the hose on her own roof to protect her home from the growing flames across the street.
"After that, they shut it down," May said. "It had been a perfect place for the kids, ya know? So sad."
Lynn Bowler grew up playing on the cement steps of the gym and went on to win state championships on its basketball court.
Bowler's 85-year-old father, Grant, was the principal of the high school from 1942 to 1976. He shared memories of the gym's construction with his son.
After its completion the town opened wide its doors to celebrate. The doors were always open to the children of the community.
"That gym to me was the social place to be," Bowler said. "The town was proud of it."
Bowler remembers the summers during World War II when one night each week the gym was transformed into a game room with large bowls of homemade ice cream and table tennis tournaments. The war seemed far removed from the small town during those warm summer nights.
"Every Tuesday night every kid in the (Moapa) valley would go down there," Bowler, 67, said. "That was where it all happened."
As a teenager Bowler would climb the winding stairs at the front of the gym to a small room above the building's entrance. There he learned to appreciate classical music from a teacher who inspired him throughout his life.
"It holds very fond memories for a lot of us, and that is why we are working so hard to restore it," Bowler said. "For hundreds of students, that holds a special place."
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