An Interview with Dorothy Lee

AN INTERVIEW WITH DOROTHY LEE An Oral History Conducted by Claytee D. White The Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project Oral History Research Center at UNLV University Libraries University of Nevada Las Vegas ©The Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project University of Nevada Las Vegas, 2012 Produced by: The Oral History Research Center at UNLV – University Libraries Director: Claytee D. White Editors: Maggie Lopes, Stefani Evans, Franklin Howard Transcriber: Kristin Hicks Interviewers and Project Assistants: Barbara Tabach and Claytee D. White i The recorded interview and transcript have been made possible through the generosity of Dr. Harold Boyer. The Oral History Research Center enables students and staff to work together with community members to generate this selection of first-person narratives. The participants in this project thank the university for the support given that allowed an idea the opportunity to flourish. The transcript received minimal editing that includes the elimination of fragments, false starts, and repetitions in order to enhance the reader’s understanding of the material. All measures have been taken to preserve the style and language of the narrator. In several cases photographic sources accompany the individual interviews. The following interview is part of a series of interviews conducted under the auspices of the Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project. Claytee D. White, Project Director Director, Oral History Research Center University Libraries University Nevada, Las Vegas ii PREFACE Dorothy Ann Lee (née Damrow) was born in 1941 in New Jersey. Her family came to Las Vegas, Nevada in 1946 in an effort to improve her father’s health but chose to stay after she and her sister contracted chicken pox during the trip. She attended John S. Park Elementary School and Las Vegas High School. She moved around the city of Las Vegas a number of times during her childhood before settling in the Huntridge neighborhood with her mother in 1950. She worked for the Huntridge Theater during her high school years. She was also a member of the Rhythmettes, Las Vegas High School’s dance troupe, for three years and performed all over the United States during her time with them. After high school, Lee attended the University of Illinois until she met her future husband and dropped out. She lived in Chicago for six months before she and Danny Lee moved back to Las Vegas to get married. They married in 1960 at the Little Church of the West. The couple had four children together. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Interview with Dorothy Lee June 2, 2016 in Las Vegas, Nevada Conducted by Claytee D. White Preface…………………………………………………………………………………………..iii Dorothy remembers her parents; moved to Las Vegas; describes her childhood home; moved to Paradise Valley in Las Vegas; describes how she traveled to school; describes her neighborhood in the 1940s; remembers the teachers of the John S. Park elementary school; her parents divorced; moved to the Huntridge neighborhood; describes the Huntridge neighborhood and the house she lived in; worked at the Huntridge Theater; saw premieres at the Huntridge Theater; worked as an elevator operator at the Riviera Hotel…………………………………………..1-10 Auditioned for the Rhythmettes; remembers Evelyn Stuckey and the beginnings of the Rhythmettes; describes the uniforms, how they were made, and how members obtained them; performed with the Rhytmettes; traveled with the Rhythmettes; performed for the Helldorado Parade; describes the honor of being a Rhythmette; rehearsed with the Rhymettes; remembers the Rhymette Reviews; describes her relationship with Evelyn Stuckey; left the Rhythmettes due to internal tensions......………………………………………………………………………..10-17 Remembers her mother; describes the advertising in the Rhythmette Review booklets; attended the University of Illinois; returned to Las Vegas and worked in restaurants; married at the Little Church of the West; moved to Chicago; returned to Las Vegas; describes her children’s education; remembers entertainment in Las Vegas during the 1960s; bought a house; describes the house she bought with her husband; discusses Las Vegas’ reputation as a city………….17-27 Danny remembers the YMCA in Las Vegas; Danny describes creating a basketball league in Las Vegas and playing for a team; Danny discusses high school clubs like the Wildcat Lair and high school rivalries; Danny worked with the Boy Scouts of America in Las Vegas; Danny met General Dwight Eisenhower; Danny was elected president of the Nevada Library Association…………………………………………………………………………………...27-35 iv Today is June second, 2016. I am in Dorothy home's this morning here in Henderson. This is Claytee White. Dorothy, could you please give me your full name and spell it for me? Dorothy Ann Lee. My last name is Lee, my married name, L-E-E, and my maiden name was Damrow, D-A-M-R-O-W. I was born in Newark, New Jersey because that's where the hospital was, but I was raised in Mountain Lakes and Glen Ridge, New Jersey. My father had a business in Hoboken, New Jersey, called the Pie Pack Company. It was a paper pie pack. He invented the pie pack thing that pies are made in now where the plate and the overhead cover. Of course, it's been modernized with plastic and everything, but this was in 1940 when he did this. But because my father had a ruptured gallbladder in 1944, he had to sell his company in 1946 and move out here because of health reasons. My father went to Annapolis. He did not have to go into the service because he graduated in 1919, which was the end of World War I, and they said it was the war to end all wars. My mother was born in England, Maidstone, Kent, and she and my grandmother came over here, back and forth, back and forth. She was raised basically in Boston and then came out to California. We came out to Las Vegas in 1946. The only reason we stayed in Las Vegas was because my sister and I came down with the chicken pox. In those days there were only the Last Frontier and the El Rancho and there were some small motels. They would not let us stay because it was a contagious disease. So my father called down to California and they said, "If you can buy anything, get it because all the boys are coming home from the war." This was February 1946. So we bought the second house on Maryland Parkway and Oakey [Boulevard]. 1 If you are facing the Strip [Las Vegas Boulevard], it is on the left-hand side. Oakey then was a dead end street and Maryland Parkway was much larger, the island in the middle; we all played games in there. Now, I was only five and a half then. So is that near the circle? It's farther up. It's going toward Oakey, which now goes all the way through. Maryland Parkway goes all the way through. It was a dead end street. There were things past it, but Oakey stopped right there. There was a house right there on the end of Maryland Parkway and Oakey. We enrolled in John S. Park [Elementary School] then and that's when I had Ms. Hancock as my teacher. When we were there, my mother wouldn't even unpack because, of course, we had a beautiful home in New Jersey and she said, "I am not staying in this little two bit town." Because there was nothing. You have no idea. There was absolutely nothing here. And so we stayed in this little house on Maryland Parkway for maybe a half a year. Describe the house. It was just a small, little Huntridge home, probably two bedrooms, maybe, very tiny. I don't think it's changed much. If you drive by it, it's still there. It hasn't changed in size, I don't believe. Then my mother, who loved animals and horses, decided, well, maybe it wasn't too bad. So we bought five acres on West Charleston, which if you're going to it, it would be across from Southern Nevada Memorial Hospital, a little...one way or the other, and we had five acres there and we got into horses; we had five horses. My sister, who was five years older than me, who was Barbara, she and my mother rode the horses quite a bit. I never really cared for horseback riding, but I would get on and get off. My mother got into a group called the Frontier Riders and they rode in the Helldorado parade and on weekends they would all get together and ride their 2 horses and then have breakfast or something at each person's home, I guess. I can remember my mother making waffles or something for breakfast for everybody and they'd all come with their horses. Who were some of the women? I couldn't tell you. I was only six years old probably, seven at the most. So we still went to John S. Park. My sister rode horses with Rex Bell, who was called Tony in those days. They would ride down to the Helldorado Village. So I mean it was not a big thing to see people on horses around here. This is 1947 and it sounds very funny now when you think of it. Rex Bell, Jr.? Yes, Rex Bell, Jr., who was called Tony when she went to school with him. Then, of course, when he got older he took the name Rex. So we went to John S. Park. Then we moved out to Paradise Valley, probably 1947, beginning of 1948, and we bought sixty acres, which paralleled Tomiyasu's ranch and it was across from Kell Houssels's ranch, which was now Wayne Newton's ranch.

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