Collage about Las Vegas

At its origin Las Vegas had a tremendous challenge to identify itself to people who knew nothing about a city that, for most purposes, did not exist until the present. Vegas publicists made heroic efforts to invent excuses to place the Las Vegas name in photos that might run as cheesecake gags in newspapers from coast to coast.

The only other available mass media tool to publicize Vegas was postcards. There was no expectation that they should be technically accurate. Postcard producers spent a lot of time in photo labs adding pizazz to their work. I felt like my adding new technology to the process was a measure of respect for the tradition.