Kiel Ranch: Oldest Adobe in the Valley

Long before Las Vegas was a city, this spot in North Las Vegas was one of only two major ranches in the entire valley. Conrad Kiel founded it in eighteen seventy-five, drawn by a natural spring that made the desert bloom. The two hundred fifty acres produced hay, fruit, and vegetables, and Kiel sold food and wine to miners passing through.

The ranch also attracted violence: neighboring rancher Archibald Stewart was killed in a gunfight here in eighteen eighty-four, and two of Kiel's sons were found murdered on the property in nineteen hundred. The original adobe structure, one of the oldest buildings in Las Vegas, still stands. In nineteen seventy-four, North Las Vegas set aside twenty-six acres of the original ranch as a historic park, preserving the ancient spring and the story of the valley before the neon arrived.