1950 In the morning, gambler Nelson Harris, 34, telephoned two Fort Worth, Texas criminal attorneys and said he was on his way over to discuss a life and death matter. He and his wife Juanita, 25 and pregnant, due in a week’s time, quickly loaded into the car to drive there, but didn’t get anywhere.…
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 to go somewhere. When Barnes stepped on the car’s starter, an explosion blew him through the roof. He suffered lacerations…
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 eggs to a neighbor, this San Mateo, California resident walked back home. He grabbed his coat, kissed his wife good-bye…
1969-1975 A bomb exploded on the Casino d’Istanbul’s roof, injuring several people, on the night of Saturday, May 1, 1971. It happened during a banquet hosted by the Dayton, Ohio-based National Cash Register Company and attended by 1,400 Europeans and Americans. Just the month before, 11 provinces in Turkey had been put under martial law…
1943 The British submarine, HMS Sickle, fired a succession of torpedoes during World War II, in May, sinking an enemy vessel in Cape Ferrat, southeastern France. But one of the missiles hit a cliff in Monaco, and on exploding, it blew out the top windows of the Casino de Monte-Carlo. Consequently, the ship’s captain became…
1970-1971 In the summer of 1970, a package and suitcase found in a Sparks Nugget motor lodge room in Nevada with a note affixed saying to please deliver the items to Nugget owner John Ascuaga’s office. A $20 bill was attached as a tip. A few days later, Nugget manager Gil Padroli opened the package.…
1880 British and French patrons crowded the Casino de Monte-Carlo, games were in full operation and large sums of money sat on the tables. It was a typical Saturday night in spring at the Monaco institution. Around 11 p.m., a tremendous explosion wracked one of the gambling rooms, throwing people to the floor, extinguishing most…
1972 A 71-year-old, wheelchair-bound, California grandmother, Susan Ellyn Reid, who had a long rap sheet and various aliases, entered Harrahs Club in Reno, Nevada in July carrying a box. She gave casino personnel a typed note that demanded $100,000 and indicated she was holding a bomb. It revealed kidnappers were holding her grandson hostage, so…
1980 Thirty-five years ago, on August 27, an intricate bomb blasted a chasm that spanned six of the 11 floors of Harvey’s Resort Hotel at Lake Tahoe’s South Shore. The explosion hadn’t been intentional but, rather, the result of the best idea experts could conceive of to disarm the instrument. “To this day it remains…