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1936 A single penny got Los Angeles store owner Ethel Jamison convicted. One day at her shop, Police Officer James Mulligan placed a penny in the slot machine, pulled the lever, received a penny premium…
1913-1915 Circumstances of a lawsuit in the U.S. led to an unusual occurrence, even for Nevada: the federal government taking over and running a Silver State casino. It was The Big Casino, a combination casino,…
1936 Gambler Leo Barnes and his wife had only been in Denver, Colorado for about six months, having moved from Kansas City, Missouri. On the night of Dec. 8, the couple got in their car…
1943-1944 Had it not been for a shifty plan Tony “Joe Batters” Accardo and/or his attorney, George Bieber dreamed up, the Mobster might’ve gone to prison at age 37, in 1944, for illegal gambling. Cigar Store…
1935-1965 Tony Accardo, né Antonino Leonardo Accardo (1906-1992), is credited with reviving and expanding the Chicago Outfit’s gambling business in the 1940s after the organization’s head Paul “The Waiter” Ricca named him underboss. Accardo himself…
1953 Harrah’s in Reno, Nevada proposed, to event officials, the casino host an exhibit about gambling at the California State Fair. With a backdrop of silver dollars, the display was to contain gambling equipment and pamphlets…
1952 The life of wealthy, prominent businessman with several connections to the gambling industry, Thomas “Tom” A. Keen, 56, was abruptly ended at about 10:07 a.m. on Tuesday morning, February 5. After giving some duck…
1946 A Reno, Nevada casino hired a man, new to the city and gambling, as a shill. (A shill is paid to play games in a gambling house to entice others around to do the…
1938-Today Bets placed, spectators occupy the stands, waiting. Anticipation, excitement fill the air. Finally, the get-ready bell dings, and the crowd quickly quiets. The start signal sounds. The gates open. Out lunge the competitors, into…
1937-1970s For Harrah’s, which debuted in Reno in 1937 as a bingo parlor, extensive advertising was key to its growth into one of Nevada’s largest gambling empires by the 1970s.* However, owner/operator William “Bill” Fisk…
Joseph “Doc” Stacher (born Gdale Oistaczer, 1902-1977) was a “a genial, shrewd, witty gent” who could be “homicidally tough,” wrote “Voice of Broadway” columnist Jack O’Brian (Monroe News-Star, March 17, 1977). Closely aligned with fellow…
1949-1950 During the Prohibition years in California, 1919 to 1934, San Mateo County was a hotbed for illegal vices — gambling, prostitution and drinking. Even a Mobster, Hillsborough-based Sam Termini, said the county was the…