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Wednesday, May 08, 2002
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Census: Blue Diamond Nevada's divorce capital

Las Vegas might be the marriage capital of the world, but people in the tiny hamlet of Blue Diamond a few miles away have a distinction of their own: divorce capital of Nevada.

Blue Diamond, a place where wild burros and horses munch on lawn grass and wander in the streets, has a divorce rate of 35 percent, the highest in the state, according to new 2000 U.S. Census Bureau figures released Tuesday.

The state's divorce rate is 14 percent, same as in Las Vegas. The Reno area, which historically had billed itself as the state's divorce capital, only showed a rate of 15 percent. Nationally the divorce rate is just about 10 percent.

People in Blue Diamond can't seem to make sense of the numbers. Everyone librarian Nina Mata knows is married. She is too, for 16 years.

"That seems really high," she says, shaking her head. "If anything it's more of a nurturing community."

Among counties, Mineral County in west-central Nevada has the highest percentage of divorced people with nearly two of every 10 residents having opted to end their marriages. The divorce rate jumped to 19 percent from 12.4 percent in the past decade, census figures show.

"They're part of the area that's been having a declining economy because of the mining bust," says state demographer Jeff Hardcastle. "That economic pressure tends to put pressure on families and drive people toward splitting up."

At 9 percent, Lincoln County north of Las Vegas has the lowest percentage of divorced people.

The 2000 Census also found that 25 percent of Nevadans have never married, with Clark and Washoe counties home to the highest percentage of never marrieds, each at 26 percent. Percentage wise, Pershing County has the lowest number of people who never married, 15 percent, and also the highest number of married people at 66 percent.

Only 266 residents older than age 15 live in Blue Diamond, a quiet community about 23 miles southwest of Las Vegas and nestled near the entrance of the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area.

Here in what residents call "the village," the horse droppings are shoveled to the side of the road and the Beer Garden gets hopping on Saturday nights with live music.

A sign on the way into town announces the city's statistics: "Welcome to Blue Diamond. Population low. Elevation high. Burros?"

"The people that are attracted to that lifestyle, maybe they tend to be people that are divorced and want to just get away from everything," Hardcastle says.

Bill Dahlquist, pastor of the Blue Diamond Foursquare Church, thinks he knows the reason so many divorced people call Blue Diamond home. "It's a good hideaway."

Then, he adds, "Most people in the village don't go to church."

Back at the library, Pat VanBetten, married for 42 years, pops in to chat.

"It's a nice place to live," she says. "I could see why divorced people would be attracted to it."