Vanishing Village

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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