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In July of 1955, Joanne Molen's husband was offered a job at Nellis Air Force Base, so they moved from Alturas, California, to Las Vegas. Joanne had worked for Citizens Utilities in Alturas as a Western Union teletype operator, so she got a job with the Southern Nevada Telephone Company. She was the only woman to hold some of the positions she held. She worked for the telephone company, which became Sprint, for more than forty years, ending up as a main engineer.

Thalia Dondero was born January 23, 1921 in Greeley, Colorado. She lived in Colorado and Wyoming before her family settled in Bakersfield, California. Dondero moved to Las Vegas in 1943 when her employer took a job with Basic Magnesium, Inc., and asked that she follow him. She married Harvey Dondero, who taught English and journalism for local high schools, in 1946.

Kenneth Epstein was born in 1941 in Chicago, Illinois. When he was 15 years old, Epstein’s family moved to Las Vegas, Nevada. Three years later, he began to work in the gaming industry. His mentor was Jackie Gaughan, then-owner of the El Cortez Hotel and Casino, whom he met in Lake Tahoe in 1956. In 1975, Epstein became Gaughan’s business partner in the operation of the El Cortez. He also helped Gaughan and his son open the Barbary Coast on the Las Vegas Strip in 1979.

Judith Lee Johnson Jones was born September 13, 1940 and spent her childhood in Oklahoma and Texas. In 1958, she was one of the winners of the Houston’s Chronicle contest that added the Texas Copa Girls to perform at the Sands Hotel and Casino. For Jones, the experience was a period of fun-filled freedom, followed by relentless encouragement from others to attend college, which she reluctantly did. To her surprise, she embraced college life, took her studies seriously, and received an education degree. She also became Miss Houston.

Kaku Makino, the King of Japanese Buffet, was born in 1943 and raised in Tokyo, Japan, in a traditional, wealthy family. After surviving mumps at age four, he suffered a severe hearing loss. His father encouraged Kaku to play baseball, and he excelled. But his father died when Kaku was twenty years old, and, the oldest of four sons, he had to support the family, and he became a chef--an occupation he followed for twenty years in Tokyo before following his younger brothers to the U.S. in 1989.

"Cassius Smith's art began in rebellion with graffiti and transitioned into a winning clothing line. He grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota and moved to Newark, New Jersey so he could be near New York where fashion is king. Smith began to sketch items of clothing in elementary school and years later a serendipitous encounter on the train in New York where a man bumped into him spilling soda on his clothing led to a fulfillment of his fashion dreams. That man worked with the guys at FUBU. Smith worked for FUBU and other design houses for the next10 years.

William W. Sullivan was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. He completed his doctorate over a twelve year period at University of Utah. He helped open the Minority Center there, and was eventually recruited to teach in Missoula, Montana, where he stayed for three years.