Casinos in Las Vegas – a History of the City’s Development

Las Vegas is the first thing that comes to mind regarding gambling, huge winnings, and an unbridled entertainment atmosphere. It was the world’s first recognized gambling capital. Other gambling centers appeared much later and were built in the image and likeness of Las Vegas. Wildtornado casino provided research on the history of casinos in this article.

Sin City: The Beginning

The history of Las Vegas began in 1905 with the completion of the railroad from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles. The city was officially founded on a large railroad junction site. Most workers lived there, for which an entire area with all sorts of entertainment was set aside. At first, there were money fights, but in the mid-1910s, card games and slot machines began to gain popularity.

The first casinos in Las Vegas flourished until 1919, after which they went underground due to the legal ban on gambling in Nevada. In 1931, at the border of Nevada and Arizona, construction began on the Hoover River power plant on the Colorado River. And Nevada legalized gambling again to attract workers to Sin City, where they could spend their hard-earned money in a fun way.

The Streets of Vegas.

Las Vegas has two main streets: Fremont Street and Strip Boulevard. The historically significant West Vegas is also sometimes singled out.

Fremont Street is a pedestrian street for tourists, with many stores, cafes, bars…and, of course, casinos: the Four Queens, Golden Nugget, Binion’s Horseshoe, and Golden Gate.

Fremont Street is completely covered by a dome made of LED displays in a huge Viva Vision screen. It showcases commercials, concerts, and shows – it’s a major attraction in the neighborhood. By the New Year 2020, city officials completely replaced the panels on the dome, increasing the brightness of the screen fourfold and the number of LED lamps – up to 50 million pieces. They spent $32 million on the renovations. Still, those costs will pay off fairly quickly, considering that Fremont Street is visited by more than 25 million people annually out of the 43 million tourists coming to Vegas.

Las Vegas Strip. After World War II, Fremont Street became a little short of space for entertainment venues when the casino city was booming. And with the beginning of the construction of huge entertainment complexes on the Strip, the center of the city’s gambling and tourist industry moved there. The first casino on the street was built in 1941.

On the Las Vegas Strip are all the major attractions of the city: the Stratosphere Tower, the Bellagio musical fountains, the Flamingo Hotel, and the most famous gambling houses in the world.

West Vegas. Until the mid-20th century, the city had rules that discriminated against people of color. African Americans could not freely enter the gambling establishments in downtown Vegas, so they created their own entertainment district. In the 1960s, this part of the city lost its importance as an independent gambling accumulation, but you can still find venues with a special atmosphere here.

Vegas money.

How many casinos are there in Las Vegas? There is no definite answer to this question because of the different counting methodologies. The Nevada Gaming Commission claims 1,700 licensed gambling establishments, but only 130 of them are considered full casinos. And according to statistics from the Nevada Gaming Control Board, 214 casinos were operating in Clark County, the center of which is Las Vegas, in August 2019. There are 51 gambling establishments directly on Las Vegas Strip and 20 on Fremont Street.

The heyday of Las Vegas as a world gambling center came in the mid-1970s. In 1977, the gambling industry in Clark County, for the first time, reached a revenue of more than $ 1 billion. In 2018, that figure was already $10.25 billion. Interestingly, casinos on the Strip bring in more than 55% of all gambling money in Nevada. Since 2012, revenue from establishments on the Las Vegas Strip has fluctuated between $6.2 and-6.5 billion.

The largest company in Las Vegas Sands. Its founder and CEO, Sheldon Adelson, was originally organizing the COMDEX computer show. Adelson and partners bought the Sands hotel and casino in Las Vegas in 1989 from MGM Grand. The corporation now owns The Venetian, The Palazzo, and several hotels outside the United States. The company has annual revenues of about $14 billion.

The creation of MGM Resorts, the second most powerful corporation in Las Vegas, is connected to the name of Kirk Kerkorian. He began his acquaintance with Vegas by buying land on which Caesars Palace and the International Hotel were built.

He then purchased the Metro Goldwyn Mayer (MGM) movie studio and opened the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino, the largest casino in the world. MGM Resorts International was separated from the movie studio in 1986 and began an independent development, much more successful than Metro Goldwyn Mayer. MGM Resorts International owns the famed Bellagio, Aria Resort & Casino, The Mirage, New York – New York. The company’s annual revenue is about 10 billion dollars.

Another giant in Las Vegas is Caesars Entertainment Corporation. Its history began in 1937, when William Harrah’s opened a small bingo room in Reno, Nevada. In 1973, Harrah’s became the first gambling company listed on the New York Stock Exchange. In 1980, the corporation was purchased by the Holiday Inn and later changed hands to The Promus Companies, which grew Caesars Entertainment. Now Caesar’s annual revenue is about $ 9 billion. It owns legendary casino hotels like Flamingo and Caesars Palace.

Las Vegas online?

Is it possible to play online at casinos in Las Vegas to enjoy the atmosphere of Sin City from thousands of miles away? Internet casinos are generally prohibited in the U.S. under the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA).

But in 2011, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a clarification that made the legalization of online gambling possible in the states of New Jersey, Delaware, and Nevada.

Despite the legalization of online gambling, casino cities in America are wary of the development of online gambling. The ubiquity of online gambling for money noticeably affects the decline in land-based establishments’ revenues. In turn, representatives of virtual gambling are happy to exploit the promoted image of Vegas. 

Las Vegas is a unique phenomenon of civilization. It shaped the modern culture of gambling and the relationship between player and dealer and offered a new perspective on the entertainment industry. The largest gambling zones in the world and casinos worldwide are now created and operate according to the standards laid down in the 20th century in Sin City in the middle of the Nevada desert.