Las Vegas High School alumni design, build float for Helldorado Parade

Photos by F. Andrew Taylor/ViewLeft, Alice Van Der Meer, chairwoman of the Las Vegas High School Alumni Association Scholarship Committee, works on the ear of the wildcat float that the association is building for the 75th Anniversary Helldorado Parade. Right, Van Der Meer applies a fiberglass compound to the wildcat float while Alumni Association Vice President Bruce Langson looks on. Langson designed and is supervising the construction of the float. Photos by F. Andrew Taylor/ViewLeft, Alice Van Der Meer, chairwoman of the Las Vegas High School Alumni Association Scholarship Committee, works on the ear of the wildcat float that the association is building for the 75th Anniversary Helldorado Parade. Right, Van Der Meer applies a fiberglass compound to the wildcat float while Alumni Association Vice President Bruce Langson looks on. Langson designed and is supervising the construction of the float. Advertisement

The beast lurks in a quiet industrial building on an out-of-the-way side street in downtown Las Vegas. It's wide-open mouth holds teeth hard as steel. Its claws curl menacingly from a paw bigger than a man's head.

Fortunately, the giant wildcat is only the star of a float being built by the Las Vegas High School Alumni Association for the 75th Anniversary Helldorado Parade.

For a long time, Las Vegas High School was the valley's only high school.

"This was the only high school until 1956. I was in the class of '56, and that was the last year all the seniors in Las Vegas graduated from the same high school," said Las Vegas High School Alumni Association secretary-treasurer Patty Haack. "There were a couple other schools that had started before that, but their first graduating class was '57."

In 1930, the massive-for-its-time LVHS campus was built way out of town, a fact many residents complained about. Way out for that time was the corner of Bridger Avenue and 7th Street. The old LVHS was repurposed as the Las Vegas Academy of International Studies, Performing and Visual Arts in 1993. Las Vegas High School's students were moved to a new campus at what is, once again, what some people would consider to be the edge of town at 6500 E. Sahara Ave.

Despite the change in location, as far as the alumni members are concerned, it's still Las Vegas High School, and they still long to make a connection with the current students.

"The important thing to do is connect the new students to the old students and Nevada and Las Vegas business and politics and help them with their careers, get them ushered into college at UNLV," said Bruce Langson, class of '65, who is the association's vice president.

To that end, the association is offering two new scholarships to current Las Vegas High School students. The recipients will be announced in mid-May.

But the alumni hope to connect with the students in a more direct manner, as well. Over the months they've been working on the Wildcat float, they've had current students working alongside them.

Although Langson is quick to point out that the project is a group effort, it's clear that he's the go-to guy on the construction. He showed off a sheaf of what amounted to blueprints of the massive undertaking with cross sections at multiple angles and overlays upon overlays.

"We found a real stuffed wildcat, and he based it on that," Haack said.

It is a sturdy thing. A welded steel tube frame is attached to plywood cross-section pieces. Layers of fiberglass round out the body with a final hand-textured coat of fiberglass to provide the look of fur. Steel teeth sit menacingly in the huge mouth, and the claws, although formidable looking, are rubber.

"It'll be sturdy enough to sit on and last for years," Langson said. "Hopefully, we'll be able to use it for a lot of events, like homecomings and other parades."

The project has been under way for a few months, with several people coming in to help out on weekends, while a few people were able to put in time during the weekdays.

"I'm a real estate developer, so I've got time," Langson said. "I've got no art background. I've done a lot of things in my life. I've been lucky enough to bring a lot of the oddball things that I've done in my life together in this project."

Although the alumni have been meeting annually for decades at Wildcat reunions, the Alumni Association has been around only two years. Those reunions were begun by Bill "Wildcat" Morris, an alumni and longtime booster of the school. For a time, he owned the Landmark Casino, and some of the early reunions were held there.

A few years ago, those reunions were in danger of being discontinued, and Haack took over the event. At the same time, she founded the Las Vegas High School Alumni Association with Rollie Gibbs, class of '54, who is the first and current president of the association. The group boasts about 200 members including their most senior member, Violet Tracht from the class of 1928.

The float is being built on Gibbs' A Street property, on land his parents originally owned, which he lived on for many years and where he currently operates his crane service.

"My folks brought this property in 1940," Gibbs said. "Five acres for 12,000 bucks."

Gibbs has been associated with Helldorado since he was an infant, attending the first Helldorado parades.

"My father had teams of mules and horses," Gibbs said. "Our teams would sometime pull five wagons each.The parade was so long and the route was short enough that we'd pull a wagon through the parade, drop it off and go back to the beginning of the parade to pick up another one, and so on.

"When I was in second grade, my dad got a hold of a great big goat and we hooked him to a little buggy and I drove him through the parade representing the Old West Side Grammar School," Gibbs said. "When I got older, I used to drive what we called the County Dads back then through the parades. These days, we call them the County Commissioners."

Gibbs remembers when the rodeo was held on the corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Bonanza Road. He used to pass it on his way to grammar school and see all the horses and cattle waiting for the rodeo.

'It was very exciting," Gibbs said. "As a kid, I was deathly afraid of the bulls and I'd go hide out, but after I got out of high school, I started riding bulls. I loved to do that. Then I started steer wresting. There was more money in that."

Eventually, Gibbs became involved in organizing the annual Helldorado events.

The Helldorado Parade will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. May 16. The Las Vegas High School Alumni Association will unveil its float for the parade, and a handful of alumni members will get to ride along with it, while others will march beside it. The current Las Vegas High School marching band is expected to march nearby, providing musical accompaniment.

The alumni association's next big event after that will be the Wildcat reunion held in September at Sam's Town. Parties interested in attending that event or joining the association can contact Patty Haack at 876-6660.

Contact Sunrise and Whitney View reporter F. Andrew Taylor at ataylor@viewnews.com or 380-4532.