Category
1924-1932 The story of the estate of a long-ago Nevada gambler after his passing is strange and unfortunate. John Quinn was a man who’d lost and made large fortunes in gambling and mining stock deals…
1916 The year brought indictments in Las Vegas against individuals for violating Nevada’s anti-gambling statute, which was unusual because law enforcement generally ignored or poorly enforced it. Operating a gambling game then constituted a felony.…
1949 The article, “Las Vegas Gamblers Arming in Control Battle,” ran on the front page of a Los Angeles newspaper in the third week of December, to the chagrin of Nevada gambling regulators, casino owners,…
1939-1941 Bernard “Bernie” Einstoss was a well-known gambler in Northern Nevada for nearly two decades, between 1947 and 1965.* Prior to that, he masterminded and executed a scheme to fix horse races** in California by…
1890-1910 The heyday of the Monte Carlo casino resort in Monaco was The Roaring Twenties, but that was due in large part to the solid foundation laid by François Blanc decades earlier, who stepped in…
1941 The man who played roulette in the Palace Club nearly every day for six months was noticeable for his suave appearance. Henry Helmut, age 47, had a bit of gray hair and sported a…
1946-1947 On the third Tuesday of April 1946, after work at the Southern Pacific Shop in Sparks, Nevada, Sam Lemel took the bus to Reno and went to Harolds Club where he played craps. He…
1934 After Nevada legalized gambling in 1931, a faction opposed to the industry fought to have it eradicated. “A group of Nevada citizens felt there was a growing protest against the injury being done our…
1948 The November 22, 1948 issue of Sports-Week roiled Nevada Wolf Pack fans and supporters. Bevy Of Allegations An article in that edition of the nationally circulated digest charged that the University of Nevada* (UN)…
1950-1953 During the 1950 federal hearings on organized crime, two Northern California gamblers — Walter “Big Bill” Melburn Pechart and David “Dave” Nathan Kessel — were uncooperative, according to the questioners. They were Senators Estes…
1947-1952 Despite New York mobsters trying to scare her off, an ambitious woman — Elaine Townsend (née Margaret Helgeson) — held her own as a gambling operator in the late 1940s. Bright, young and gorgeous, she…
1937-1938 In each of two consecutive summers, Northern Nevadans experienced on-site, parimutuel* betting on new types of organized races locally: first, midget car in 1937 and greyhound (the dog, not the bus) in 1938. The…