The Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce is formed. Its first meeting is held on July 18 on the second floor meeting room of the old opera house. It is here that officers are elected and bylaws are first created, with Dr. Roy Martin serving as the first chairman.
Railroad repair shops are completed in town. With this completion, the railroad announces that it intends to boost the Las Vegas work force from 175 to 400 men, providing a new stimulus for growth and development. A new surge of housing and artesian drilling soon follows. At the center of the railroad's boom is local railroad agent and Chamber leader Walter Bracken.
Chamber chairman Dr. Roy Martin conducts the first remodel of the city's only hospital. The facility contains electricity, fans, and an x-ray machine, and is regarded as a top-of-the-line medical building. By the 1930s, Dr. Martin is acknowledged as having delivered most of the city's population.
Peter Buol, a businessman who had made his name through real estate, mining, and banking ventures, is elected to office as Las Vegas' first mayor. One of his first orders of business is discussing ordinances to issue business licenses. Buol is elected in a slim margin of only about a dozen votes.
The Chamber exhibits Las Vegas' attractions and possibilities at the Land and Products Exposition in Los Angeles, in one of the first major tourism drives to the area.
The Chamber releases a promotional postcard of one of the largest artisan wells in the world to encourage growth through population increases.
With the Chamber's support, two bills are put through the state Senate: one that provides funding to build a road from Mesquite (just inside the Arizona state line) to Las Vegas and onto Jean; the other authorizes a road beginning in Goldfield, heading southeast to Beatty, then following an old roadbed to Las Vegas. This is the first time Las Vegas is linked directly to the Reno-Carson City area. A major player in getting these bills to pass is E.W. Griffith, a Chamber pioneer and one of Las Vegas' most recognizable businessmen.
