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December 3, 2009

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Scenes of early Las Vegas displayed on website

Rebecca Malone

Friday, Aug. 10, 2001 | 10:56 a.m.

A website created by UNLV shows what Las Vegas used to look like, in the old days before casinos and theme parks and rooftops stretched to the hills.

It includes a look at the housing for early railroad workers -- 64 cottages, 12 of which are still standing but face destruction or removal to another site owing to development pressure.

The "Early Las Vegas Digital Project" is a collection of photographs and documentation from when the city was first established in 1905.

"Las Vegas was just a simple town," said Joe Thomson, primary author of the website, referring to the pre-1930s Las Vegas before gambling became legal in the state.

Wanting to show the public how Las Vegas came to be, Thomson focused the site on the role of the railroad in creating the city. The railroad connected Las Vegas to Utah and California.

The site has four sections that look into the construction of the San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake railroad companies, the railroad depot, the railroad cottages and then-and-now pictures.

"The key thing about this website is that it will include photographs, blueprints and original letters," Thomson said.

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