Vanishing Village

Vanishing Village author Evan Blythin will be at the Spring Mountain Ranch, November 4th at 6 p.m., speaking on a topic near and dear to his heart, the global village. If you’ve never visited the ranch, fall is an especially beautiful time of year to experience it, and if you have been there before, here’s a perfect excuse to go again! There is a $7 entry fee to park at gate, but the program is free.

Spring Mountain Ranch is located within the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, beneath the colorful cliffs of the magnificent Wilson Range. The many springs in these mountains provided water for Paiute Indians and later brought mountain men and early settlers to the area. Past owners of this 520 acre oasis include some colorful and mysterious celebrities: Chester Lauck of the comedy team “Lum & Abner,” German actress Vera Krupp, and millionaire Howard Hughes.

Preserving a sense of community

Mark Smith

Pahrump Valley Times

How do you maintain a village so it remains a village?

Had a good talk Saturday morning with Evan Blythin, who recently published Vanishing Village: The Struggle for Community in the New West  C ityLife Books, Las Vegas.

He was in town at the community library Saturday morning, chatting with interested residents and signing and selling his book.

Evan is a sculptor and musician who holds a doctorate from University of Colorado and retired after 30 years as a communications studies professor at University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

His book considers the plight of the small town that faces growing stress due to the anonymous urban life that looms over the horizon. In brief, where people in a small rural community know each other’s names and recognize the faces of their neighbors, the same cannot be said for those who live in, say, Summerlin or Centennial or Sunrise Manor.

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Author to speak on Vanishing Village

By NISHELLE ROBBINS

Special to the PVT

So you think Pahrump is a small town? Try the town of Blue Diamond.

Blue Diamond had 282 residents as of the 2000 census, and according to Evan Blythin, that number probably doesn’t change too much.

Blythin is the author of Vanishing Village: The Struggle for Community in the New West. This book describes the lives of the people who make up the small town. His book covers every topic important to this town, from community service to recreation to law enforcement.

There are even a few more comically titled but serious chapters about such matters as public urination.

Blythin describes how the small town remains small, despite sitting 25 miles outside of one of the biggest tourist cities in the world: Las Vegas. The main way the town stays small is its care in accepting outsiders. Blythin experienced this when he first moved to the town, and his experiences going through “initiation” are some of the most interesting writing in the book.

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Retired UNLV professor’s book about Blue Diamond laments vanishing way of life.
By Jack Bulavsky, Special to VIEW

Photo credit: Jerry Henkel

Evan Blythin has lived in Blue Diamond for 32 years. For a number of those years, he knew he would one day write a book about his rural home. That ambition was realized when Vanishing Village: The Struggle for Community in the New West hit bookstores this month.

Bythin, 67, a retired UNLV professor of communications studies, said the book is a universal story.

“The whole world has moved from rural sensitivities to more of an urban-industrial kind of sensitivity, and what I write about can be discussed in any community,” he said. “Blue Diamond has changed dramatically, but so has the rest of the world. I don’t long for the old days, but we need to keep an eye on what we’re losing.”

Read the full article here.

Las Vegas CityLife ~ by Amy Kingsley

Author, Evan Blythin. Photo credit: Bill Hughes

Evan Blythin is not a cranky old fart. But the 30-year resident of Blue Diamond does have a thing or two to say about village life, modern technology and the real meaning of community, which he lays out in Vanishing Village, published by CityLife Books. In it, he explains why actual reality is better than the virtual kind, and why you should work out problems with neighbors instead of calling the cops. CityLife talked with Blythin about what he’s learned from living at the lip of Red Rock Canyon.

CityLife: How did you originally find out about the community?

Evan Blythin: I was raised rural. My wife was raised urban. We started circling Vegas to find a spot that I would feel more comfortable in, and that was as far out as she would go and as close in as I wanted to go.

CL: Was there anything that provoked you to want to write about Blue Diamond?

EB: Well, I think there’s been a nagging dissatisfaction with some of the changes that have occurred, not necessarily with the physical changes, the new houses, the upgrades, but rather the type of mentality that I was beginning to see more and more. Urbanized, used to government taking care of everything, not too much into actual physical work, which had been sort of the backbone of the community.

CL: So what was driving these changes you were seeing?

EB: I believe that on a very large level, the whole world has moved to an economy of scale. Everything has gotten big. I call it — it’s a kind of urbanization, but it has more to do with scale and size and the distance now. I mean, we’re really close now with e-mail and Facebook and Twitter and all of that. We’re closer, but we’re also further. Too many damn people to deal with. I don’t think you can do it right. It needs to break up somehow.

Read the full interview here.

Vanishing Village: The Struggle for Community in the New West, the third title from CityLife Books, will debut Saturday, June 5th at the Borders in Summerlin (10950 W. Charleston).

The event will take place from 2-4PM. Readers will have the chance to meet and greet with author Evan Blythin who will be present to sign copies of his nonfiction title.

Thought-provoking and honest, Vanishing Village offers an alternative to the urban angst that plagues so many Las Vegans. Blythin, a retired UNLV professor, explores the history and folkways of his longtime home — Blue Diamond, NV, illuminating the enduring values and pastimes of small-town living. A lifestyle, Blythin reveals, that is at risk of extinction.

By Geoff Schumacher

Vanishing Village, by Evan Blythin, the third title from CityLife Books, is set to be released June 1.

Blythin, a retired communications professor from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, has written an insightful and entertaining book about the community in which he has lived for several decades, Blue Diamond, Nevada. Here is a summary:

“Just a few miles beyond the bright lights of the Las Vegas Strip and the surrounding suburbs, a quiet village vigorously resists the insistent pull of the metropolis. The villagers believe the modern way, the urban way is not necessarily the best way. They want to make their own rules and set their own standards, insisting that one size does not fit all. In Vanishing Village, Evan Blythin explores the history and folkways of his longtime home, illuminating the enduring values and pastimes of small-town living. But this lifestyle, Blythin reveals, is at risk of extinction, as the villager fends off relentless demands to conform and moderrnize.”

Rep. Dina Titus of Nevada had this to say about Vanishing Village:

“Simultaneously entertaining and informative, Vanishing Village is a hard book to put down. Blythin reminds us of the value of connecting with our fellow man if we hope to maintain our sanity, our humanity even, in the disappearing village.”

After publishing two works of fiction, Restless City and Blue Vegas, CityLife Books is releasing its first nonfiction title. A mash-up of memoir, journalism and sociology, Vanishing Village offers an enlightening vision of an alternative to the urban/suburban angst that nags at so many Las Vegans.