How Did Las Vegas Get There?

As has been true at some point, I’d imagine, for many of you, I landed in Las Vegas last night and said to myself, “Now how did this get here?”

What we know, from Wikipedia, on how Las Vegas came to exist:

• There are natural springs here, and there aren’t natural springs in a lot of places in this desert.

What else we know, also from Wikipedia:

• The springs fed wild grasses, which is how Las Vegas (“the meadows”) got its name.
• The valley was discovered by non-indigenous Americans for the first time in 1829, when a Mexican scout named Rafael Rivera found it. John Frémont advertised it a bit after visiting in 1844, and pioneers started to come.
• In 1855, a Mormon fort was built as the halfway stop between Salt Lake City and Los Angeles. It was abandoned, but is evidently still here? Or its ruins are? Could be a tourist attraction for NIT Stu on Wednesday. If it isn’t too packed with Utah Valley fans.
• In 1905, the city was founded. In 1911, it was incorporated. The founding happened when land next to the railroad tracks was auctioned off. This land “would become the downtown area,” which makes me think those railroad tracks next to the highway to the west of the Strip are the railroad tracks in question? Railroad tracks don’t move very much.
• In 1931, Nevada got a libertarian kick, legalizing casinos and loosening divorce laws. Simultaneously, construction began on the Hoover Dam a couple dozen miles to the east.
• In 1941, the Army put an airfield in Las Vegas. I’m going to go out on a limb, knowing what we know about the number of young, single men in the military, and say this had something to do with demand for all the Las Vegas things rising.
• “Following World War II, lavishly decorated hotels, gambling casinos, and big-name entertainment became synonymous with Las Vegas.” Continues to track.
• Las Vegas became the home of nuclear weapons testing in 1951, a practice that continued for twelve years. Cannot have hurt the city’s bid to become thoroughly unlike anywhere else in the United States (Reno is different, I can attest, Reno and Las Vegas are each wonderful and terrible and not at all the same).

I think this is it. Answered my questions. TLDR goes: natural springs, Hoover Dam, libertarian laws, armed forces. All checks out.