Gavin or Garvin, depends on which side of the line you're on

John Gavin has lived in Carson City for 30 years, but people still get him confused with with John Garvin, who lives in Minden.

Mr. Gavin wouldn't have a problem with that, except that Mr. Garvin is an activist and co-chairman of the Sustainable Growth Initiative.

Mr. Gavin is a real estate broker and an attorney. Mr. Garvin is a retired attorney.

Mr. Gavin has been working in Carson City for 30 years and graduated from the University of Nevada, Reno with bachelor's and master's degrees. He married a Borda on his arrival here and has done reasonably well for himself ever since.

"I've had several people ask me if I was involved in the slow-growth initiative in Douglas," he said. "It has affected me in the eyes of my colleagues."

John Garvin, an attorney for 35 years, has lived in Minden for five years and been co-chairman of the Douglas County slow-growth movement since the beginning.

Garvin said he has had more than a taste of the agitation some people feel at the initiative.

"The worst came across when I was attending a building industry meeting," he said. "We went into the lion's den and got a warm feeling, and not a fuzzy one. Other than that people have been very civil and even then it was not too much out of hand."

John Garvin and his wife are celebrating their 40th anniversary.

I called Pete Livermore in Ely on Friday night about the Ormsby House and we ended up talking about hunting.

Pete pulled an elk tag for the first time in 15 years of trying and was scouting hunting grounds in eastern Nevada.

"I saw a beautiful elk today through binoculars and a camera," he said.

When I was a kid in Las Vegas in the 1960s the sound of the ice cream truck's bell would bring us out like bugs to a light

Bette Svensson sent in a picture of her ice cream man, Mr. Miller, from 1930 Reno. Instead of a truck, he road a cart and drove a horse.

She says she and her brother, Roy Bowers, would sit on the curb and wait patiently for him to come around. Mr. Miller would serve them ice cream cones. Bette was 9 years old and brother was 4.

Barbara Hancock and husband Marlin finished coordinating the fingerprinting of 400 elementary school children in Carson City last week.

Barbara and Marlin are members of the Foresters, once known as the Independent Order of Foresters, a fraternal benefit society.

The group visited schools holding open houses this week, which did not include Fremont Elementary School because it is on a year-round schedule.

Besides Barbara, Marlin and her daughter, Leann Freeman, the Foresters' president came down from Reno and a couple from Washoe Valley also helped out.

Barbara and her husband have been Foresters since 1955. They moved to Carson City 16 years ago. She estimates there are 3,000 Foresters in Northern Nevada with about 100 here in Carson.

"We hope that if they've got the card, then they won't need it," she said.

Fingerprint cards can help police find a lost or stolen child.

Debbie Nolan promised to send me some pictures from Irwin Home Equity's National Playdough Day.

Debbie said her co-workers brought in 10 good sculptures they'd made with Playdough in observance of the day.

"We do something every month," she said of her office. "We had watermelon for national watermelon day. It's also pudding day and we're all going to have pudding this afternoon.

Kurt Hildebrand is city editor at the Nevada Appeal. Reach him at 881-1215 or kurt@tahoe.com.