Orchard oasis: City to honor operator of longtime escape for city-weary Las Vegans

Wednesday, June 20, 2001 | 11:05 a.m.

Folks often ask Ted Gilcrease why, after 80 years of farming in Las Vegas, he doesn't sell his valuable land at a premium price and spend his remaining years enjoying wealth that has so long evaded him and his family.

"They ask why I don't buy a yacht and see the world," said Gilcrease, who turns 85 on June 29 and still spends his days supervising Gilcrease Orchards at 7800 N. Tenaya Way. He has lived in the same house for 80 years.

"I've visited Alaska, Hawaii and other places -- I've seen the world. But hundreds of people here have told me how important this (pick-and-pay) farm is to them and I've always been community-minded. It's more than just the fruit and vegetables I sell, it is recreation for them to come here with their children and get away from the city. I feel I have a purpose here."

Las Vegas City Councilman Michael Mack sponsored a proclamation honoring Gilcrease for presentation at today's City Council meeting.

"The Gilcrease family is an institution in this city," Mack said, referring also to Ted's 81-year-old brother, Bill, who operates the Gilcrease Bird Sanctuary adjacent to the orchards.

The proclamation reads in part: "Whereas in the 1960s, Ted Gilcrease began his now famous orchards where he grows 16,000 fruit trees (and) is still farming every day, bringing produce to the citizens of Las Vegas, we the undersigned mayor and City Council, do hereby take great pride in proclaiming June 29, 2001, 'Ted Gilcrease Day' in the city of Las Vegas."

Part of the orchards' long-term success has come from selling goods at two-thirds the cost of the same items in area supermarkets. But that and other forces have kept Gilcrease from becoming as wealthy as some of his affluent neighbors.

"The stock market crashed in 1929 and we were able to do all right for a year or so, but things got real bad and everybody eventually lost their land," Gilcrease said.

"I was able to buy back a lot of land at tax sales but it was tough because I was poor too. It was a struggle raising a few dollars to buy land. Eventually, I built it to 1,500 acres." His orchards today occupy about 100 acres.

When Ted was a teenager, his father, Leonard, an engineer for General Electric who grew up in California's Central Valley farmlands, left the family, leaving Ted's mother, Elda Gilcrease, to raise Ted and Bill.

"Mom did well for a city woman, keeping the farm going and the family together under what was the worst conditions possible," Ted said, noting that when the family arrived in Las Vegas the population barely topped 2,000.

As for his dad, Ted said he long ago accepted that Leonard, a high school valedictorian and overachiever, could not accept the potential life of a dirt-poor farmer, and thus moved on.

Ted noted that when he and his brother got older, their mother's comfort -- not material wealth -- became their overriding desire.

"We started selling off land at a couple hundred dollars an acre to give her as comfortable a life as possible," Ted said, noting that as time passed the land they sold so cheaply became some of the valley's most prime real estate.

When Elda died in 1968 at age 78, Ted was forced to sell off even more land at bargain prices to pay off inheritance taxes. But Ted by no means cries poverty. He considers himself lucky to have lived a long, fruitful life, though he admits he worked too hard, putting in too many 12-hour days.

"I used to haul 120-pound bails of hay on my back, not realizing the damage it was doing to my knees," said Gilcrease, who walks with the assistance of a crutch. "I worked too hard at times."

Gilcrease jokes that he never had time for a wife -- "what woman wants a man who works so many hours for so little money?" -- but he seriously reflects that one of his few regrets in life is that he did not father children. His brother also did not marry or have children.

The Gilcrease farm started as a huge alfalfa producer to feed cattle on slow trains en route from the big Salt Lake City ranches to the Los Angeles slaughter houses.

Starting as a farmer at age 4, Ted helped care for the farm's 1,600 chickens.

In 1932, the family got indoor running water from a gravity-fed tank, but the first indoor toilet was not installed until the 1940s.

Electricity was brought to the property in 1950, though the family had long used propane-generated lamps and energy from a small power plant on the property. The house was long cooled by a swamp cooler, but today has central air-conditioning.

Today, Gilcrease's farm produces, among other products, figs, apples, squash, tomatoes, cantaloupe, apricots, cucumbers, zucchini, watermelon, pecans, English walnuts, peaches, plums, corn and peppers.

Because he once considered becoming an architect, Gilcrease says he admires the megaresorts that today dominate the valley's landscape. But don't expect to find Ted in a casino.

"A farmer does enough gambling with his farm -- it's a gamble every day just to keep it going," he said.

Ted did not plan to linger at City Hall after today's ceremony.

"I'm coming back here. I've got to close down the (fruit and vegetable) stand at noon like we do every day."