1907-1958 Wertheimer was their name. Three of these four Michigan-born brothers became full-fledged, successful gambling operators in the first half of the 1900s, their reach spanning five states: Michigan, Ohio, Florida, California and Nevada. “As gamblers, Al, Mert and Lou became almost as well-known Detroiters as the automobile pioneers. However, the only thing the Wertheimers…
1950-1956 A novel, animated gambling device began to appear in Nevada casinos in 1950. It debuted in the lobby of Reno’s Mapes hotel-casino in the fall and “got a big play from visiting Shriners,” reported the Nevada State Journal (Nov. 12, 1950). They were one-armed bandits, or life-sized outlaws whose torso was a slot machine…
1947 When the luxurious 12-story Mapes hotel opened in Reno, Nevada on Saturday, December 27, 1947, it boasted two casinos. One was on the river side of the main level, the other in the southwest corner of the Sky Room, mainly for dining and dancing, on the top floor. Both spaces boasted a “modernistic design,…
1944 The debut of the Bonanza Club* on October 3, 1944 in Reno, Nevada, was doubly significant. Formerly the Barn Club, the new casino was regarded as one of, if not, the finest in the state; about $300,000 (roughly $4.2 million today) were spent on redecorating and equipping the place. It also was one of…
1951 Chief Warrant Officer Marcus Gordon Oliver, paymaster at the U.S. Naval Station Treasure Island, complained of feeling ill and left work early on Friday, April 13. The following Monday and Tuesday, he didn’t show up at the San Francisco office and hadn’t phoned. Co-workers called his home in Berkeley and got no answer. Oliver,…
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 bribing and threatening jockeys to “pull” the horses they commandeered, or keep them from winning. Einstoss went by the name…
1949 Casino owners balked when the question of going on daylight saving time (DST) arose in Nevada in 1949. Gamblers’ Outcries Charles Mapes, owner of the Mapes hotel-casino in Reno, made a few arguments: • “It’s difficult to put on a floor show at 9 p.m. with the sun just going down. A spotlight can’t…
1947 The United States’ Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) co-financed construction of a gambling enterprise via its $975,000 loan for the Mapes hotel-casino in Reno, Nevada in 1947. Under Attack Three years later, Senators William Fulbright (D-Ark.) and Paul Douglas (D-Ill.), members of a committee investigating the RFC’s past lending practices, publicly criticized the group for…