Ruthe Deskin Elementary School

Our Namesake

Ruthe V. Deskin

Ruthe Deskin was an award-winning chronicler of life in Las Vegas and assistant to the publisher of the Las Vegas Sun for 50 years. In her column that ran for a half-century, Mrs. Deskin championed the arts, care for abused and neglected children, treatment of drug addicts, hospice for seniors and homes for abandoned animals. "Ruthe Deskin represented not only the conscience of the Las Vegas Sun, but for 50 years, the conscience of Las Vegas,"said Sun Editor and President Brian Greenspun. "No one will ever replace Ruthe in the Sun Newsroom," said Governor Kenny Guinn. "She touched countless lives during her journalism career."

Mrs. Deskin worked on the school newspaper at the University of Nevada, and graduated in 1937. She was women's section editor of the Reno Evening Gazette before moving to Las Vegas in 1950. Among her many honors were awards for the Nevada Press Association, Faith Lutheran High School, the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce, the Southern Nevada Association for the Handicapped, the Nevada Woman's Political Caucus and Hadassah. Mrs. Deskin was an inductee of the Yerington High School Graduate Hall of Fame. An elementary school in Las Vegas and an activities center at Clark County's Child Haven home for displaced children bear her name. The daughter of a pioneer mother and mining engineer-feed store owner father, she became an accomplished amateur bowler.

ASSOCIATED PRESS Posted 2/16/2004