Coming soon: Explore Las Vegas during Ice Age at new state park

Fossils are on screen at the Ice Age Fossils State Park Visitor Center on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, in North Las Vegas. (Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-Journal)Walter Panzirer, a trustee of The Helmsley Charitable Trust, announces a grant to assist open Ice Age Fossils State Park at the park's visitor center on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, in North Las Vegas. (Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-Journal)Nevada State Parks Administrator Bob Mergell speaks at the Ice Age Fossils State Park Visitor Center on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, in North Las Vegas. (Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @ellenschmidtttNevada State Parks Administrator Bob Mergell shakes the hand of Walter Panzirer, trustee of The Helmsley Charitable Trust, at the Ice Age Fossils State Park Visitor Center on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, in North Las Vegas. (Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-Journal)The Ice Age Fossils State Park Visitor Center on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, in North Las Vegas. (Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-Journal)Fossils are on display at the Ice Age Fossils State Park Visitor Center on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, in North Las Vegas. (Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-Journal)The Ice Age Fossils State Park Visitor Center on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, in North Las Vegas. (Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-Journal)An artist rendering of Monumental Mammoth Plaza, where the 18-foot-tall sculpture will be on display in Ice Age Fossils State Park. (Courtesy of Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources)An artist making of an area along Megafauna Trail, where visitors will see life-size makings of what Ice Age animals from the area appeared like. (Courtesy of Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources)An artist making of a shade structure for the Ice Age Fossils State Park path system. (Courtesy of Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources)An artist making of the picnic pavilion at the Ice Age Fossils State Park. (Courtesy of Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources).
The Ice Age Fossils State Park in North Las Vegas might look simple, however by the end of 2023, officials say it won't be so bare bones.

The preserved traces of mammoths, alarming wolves, prehistoric camels and other animals soon will be the focus of Nevada's newest state park, established in 2017. Minimal funding left the park unfinished and closed to the general public while the Nevada Division of State Parks sought brand-new sources of funding.

Now, a $3.5 million grant from the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust will enable the state to finish the job by this fall, trustees and state park authorities said during a press conference Wednesday.

Nevada State Parks Administrator Bob Mergell stated he hopes the task will be an entrance to the outdoors for both tourists and residents who may not wish to take a trip too far out of town.

" This is a fairly distinct thing. You don't find a lot of centers that concentrate on the Ice Age and megafauna," Mergell stated. "There's an extremely distinct story to be informed here that you simply can't discover anywhere else - - you certainly can't discover the fossils that we have on-site.".

The park's inception came out of then-Gov. It directed $13 million in state money and another $1.2 million in federal money to the state park system, the Review-Journal reported.

When completed, the 315-acre park will have a visitor center with fossils, interactive exhibits, a historical film and a place for momentary display screens.

3 different tracks will reveal visitors different parts of the park, including the Big Dig website and the megafauna trail, an ADA-accessible loop path where visitors will see life-size screens of the huge mammals that as soon as grazed that land.

Visitors will likewise have shaded locations along the trails and at a picnic pavilion.

Likewise featured at the park will be an 18-foot-tall mammoth sculpture made from scrap metal found at Tule Springs - - re-creating an animal that once wandered the land with the product discarded on it.

Sculptor Tahoe Mack created the Monumental Mammoth idea for her Girl Scouts Gold Award project and accepted permanently display it at the park, after it was featured at the Life is Beautiful and Burning Man celebrations in 2019.

The Helmsley Charitable Trust has actually previously donated to Nevada organizations through its rural health care effort. It's also supported visitor center tasks at other public lands in the country, such as Badlands National Park and Custer State Park in South Dakota. That's since the trust sees land conservation and healthcare as linked, Trustee Walter Panzirer stated.

" The trust thinks by getting individuals out into nature and getting individuals out into the neighborhood - - whether it's exercising on the routes or just taking a psychological break and enjoying nature - - they'll have much better health results," Panzirer stated.

For Mergell, it's an opportunity to see the desert for what it once was - - a flourishing wetland house to enormous creatures. He stated he grew up in the location about 30 years back and would ride horses through the man-made Trench Cave.

" It wasn't up until I headed out on-site with an actual paleontologist, who explained all the fossil residues that are out there, that I knew," he stated. "It's incredible when you can look at something with a completely different point of view.".

McKenna Ross is a corps member with Report for America, a nationwide service program that puts journalists into regional newsrooms. Contact her at mross@reviewjournal.com. Follow @mckenna_ross_ on Twitter.