Monday, May 16, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Centennial celebration takes the cake

A 130,000-pound treat is just icing on the festivities

Performers and local dignitaries assemble Sunday on Fremont Street to re-enact a 1905 land auction in which nearly 3,000 people gathered to bid on prime Las Vegas lots. The re-creation was among the festivities of Las Vegas' centennial celebration. Photo by Jane Kalinowsky. The Guinness Book of Records will determine whether this 102-foot-long cake unveiled Sunday at Cashman Center was the world's largest birthday cake. Photo by Jane Kalinowsky. Dan Markoff drives his Eureka & Palisade locomotive No. 4 down Fremont Street on Sunday. The locomotive was built in 1875 and for the next 26 years was part of the Eureka- Palisade railroad line in Nevada. Photo by Jane Kalinowsky. Las Vegas City Councilman Gary Reese, second from left, looks on as Mayor Oscar Goodman loads one of the final pieces to the city's 130,000-pound centennial birthday cake Sunday at Cashman Center. Photo by Jane Kalinowsky.

While actors and Nevada politicians re-enacted the inception of Las Vegas on Fremont Street on Sunday morning, Sarah Arrasmith was at Cashman Center repairing stress fractures and scrolling decorative borders on what may be the world's largest birthday cake, a confectionary tribute commemorating the city's centennial.

"It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience," said Arrasmith, an Albertsons bakery manager who volunteered to help build the massive treat. "This is 130,000 pounds of cake."

Arrasmith labored on the construction of the basketball court-size cake from midnight until its completion shortly after 5 p.m. Sunday.

By noon, she was moving around the cake's perimeter, laying down a blue border, while dozens of other volunteers worked to build the center of the giant sheet cake, which stood seven layers high.

"The smell of the sugar was getting so overwhelming that I had to take a break at 8 a.m.," Arrasmith said. "I just had to step outside."

The yellow cake, donated by Sara Lee Corporation and delivered from North Carolina in seven refrigerated semi-trucks, was baked with 24,000 pounds of flour, 18,000 pounds of sugar and 130,000 eggs.

More than 500 volunteers helped assemble the cake's 30,240 pieces. Sara Lee Executive Chef Brian Averna flew here from Connecticut to direct the project, which had to be tweaked at least six times to avert trouble.

"I didn't know what to expect," said Averna, who was clutching a packet of Tylenol as the effort neared the 12-hour mark. "I am completely overwhelmed with the community volunteers and their involvement. They've been just great."

The Guinness Book of Records will determine if the cake meets its requirements for the title of World's Largest Birthday Cake sometime during the next 12 weeks.

Revelers who chowed down on the cake at Cashman Center described it as "buttercream frosting" over pound cake. They expressed surprise that such a giant cake could be so tasty.

Herds of people braved long lines to snag a piece of the fluffy stuff. The orderly distribution process degenerated into mild chaos as some people used bare hands to grab brick-size chunks of cake, loading them onto long pieces of cardboard and then slinking away.

Brad Barnette, a married father of two, was one of those who found a way to beat the system. He and his wife emerged with enough cake to feed a family of 12.

"It was a messy job. We had to go deep," Barnette said, his hands smeared with cake and icing. "You want to pick a fresh piece before it's been tainted by the hand of another."

By 5:55 p.m. -- roughly 45 minutes after Mayor Oscar Goodman kicked off the feeding frenzy by dubbing the bash "the greatest birthday party in the history of the world" -- an announcer told the crowd that the event would be ending in five minutes. Despite the best efforts of many double-fisted children and adults, Sara Lee's masterpiece remained like a small island that had lost maybe 5 percent of its borders.

The centennial of Las Vegas is a yearlong celebration, highlighted by special events this week to commemorate the land auction that was the foundation for a populated Las Vegas.

Before donning his garb for master of ceremonies at the cake-cutting ceremony, Goodman put on a cowboy hat to play the role of Montana Sen. William Clark, the owner of the San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake City Railroad. The company laid the tracks and created what was then Clark's Las Vegas Town Site.

"Sure I named it after myself," Goodman said in his role as Clark. "Wouldn't you?"

The re-creation of the land auction of 1905 began on Fremont Street at 10 a.m. The cast included Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., who bemoaned the hot desert clime.

"Who in God's name would ever live in a place like this?" Berkley wailed while playing a turn-of-the-century woman.

"Lady, I hope you never run for public office," deadpanned a fellow cast member.

J.O. McIntosh was able to purchase two parcels of what would later become prime downtown real estate for the bargain price of $500. The best deal of the auction was deemed to have been made by John F. Miller, who spent $1,750 for three parcels of land at the corner of Fremont and Main streets. Contrast that, Goodman said, with the prices of today. A one-acre site in the downtown area recently went for $5 million.

"That's pretty good progress," Goodman said, before unveiling a historical marker that highlights the original site of the land auction. "We've moved from $1,750 to $5 million."

Review-Journal writer Frank Curreri contributed to this report.