Page 8 - Summer 2014 magazine

In the early 1960s the Las Vegas public began organizational efforts to protect Red Rock Canyon and provide outdoor recreation
facilities. There were many individuals who championed the cause and in 1964 the League of Women Voters conducted a survey
that generated over 3,500 responses to help determine the public interest. That same year the Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
placed 10,000 acres of Red Rock in protective withdraw status. By 1966 the Nevada Commission of State Parks passed a motion to
enter an agreement with the BLM to cooperatively operate a park and recreation complex in Red Rock Canyon. In May the Red
Rock Archaeological Association (later to become Archaeo-Nevada) held its first meeting. By year end the BLM would recommend
that Red Rock Canyon become a National Recreation Area. But other individuals felt the land should be used for other activities,
none more bizarre than happenings at Sandstone Quarry in June the following year.

Dennis Hess, Las Vegas District Manager for the to her by members of the Sierra Club.

Bureau of Land Management, most likely enjoyed his Hess sent staff to investigate. They found a posted
job and appears to have been an experienced manager. mining claim; soil stripped from the sandstone; a
In October 1967 he would be heavily involved with
trench approximately 100 feet long, 10
the dedication of Red Rock Canyon National Recrea-
feet wide and 10 feet deep; plus two
tion Area. However, he was not having very much fun shafts, one 70 feet deep. The personnel
in June of that year. Jean Ford, President of the working the claim said they were probing
League of Women Voters, called Mr. Hess on June 13
for an underground cavern believed to
about an-
contain buried treasure and that this loca-
other mat- tion was chosen based on physical fea-
ter and tures in the area.
casually
asked BLM staff checked courthouse records
what a and found that a claim had been recorded
bulldozer the previous February by Terrestrial Mon-

was doing arch. The BLM staff determined that the
in the vi- claim was not valid and returned to the
cinity of site delivering a notice that the company
Sandstone was operating without proper authority.
Quarry. It The company agreed to fill in the cut and
had been stopped all other operations except deep-
UNLV Archives—Jean Ford Collection reported ening one six-foot square shaft. UNLV Archives—Jean Ford Collection
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