November 21, 2005 - Is everyone preparing for the Thanksgiving holiday? Got your bird, ham, spaghetti or whatever your "Thankful" food of choice all ready? Well, please have a safe and happy holiday!!

I want to thank everyone for e-mailing me and telling me the Westward Ho closed. I do appreciate it. I did know about it and I actually had put all the information on the Westward's page but because I have to encrypt everything I just didn't have time to do it and upload it - only problem was the curse of 2005 struck again. I had a relapse of the flu and then the house's heater gave out and we were forced to live in front of the fireplace for some days. Not fun! I can't wait for 2005 to be over like most people. I don't know many who 2005 was good to but bless the few that had a good 2005! Anyway the information on the Westward Ho is up as well as the closing date of the Boardwalk (January 9, 2006).

I finished one item on my to do list for this site and this is the my own personal dedication page to Nelson Sardelli. Now I know, Nelson has his own site NelsonSardelli.com but if you are one of the lucky people to be on his mailing list, you know that he sends some great and colorful e-mails about what is going on in his life that he doesn't put on his site and many a time, certainly this year, his e-mails have just cracked me up.

For a tid bit of background I first heard about Nelson from Stan Irwin. Stan had told me that he hired Nelson to open for Judy Garland at the Thunderbird and once in a while would remember a tidbit about Nelson that he would share. In 2000, Sahara had her 50th birthday party and Sam Melchionne (whose stories you read about throughout this site) was there. I told Sam I would like to meet some of the legends that until this time, I only typed their names over and over again and didn't even know what they looked like. He introduced me to most of these wonderful people and as the party was ending I said I was sorry that I didn't get to meet Nelson. Sam took off like a shot and found him and brought him over to me. I had to smile as everything Stan described was true - very charming, debonair and just a tad bit devilish. I spoke with him about the website, about Stan Irwin, and asked his help. He gave me his e-mail address and told me to ask away. Many gave me their e-mail address that day but only Nelson held true to his word and answered every question, described situations, and elaborated on Stan's memories. I used to ask him what he had been up to, as I knew this is one Strip star that I can actually track his career and life, and he would answer with pictures and comments. Then he put me on his mailing list so I didn't have to ask anymore and I've been storing them as this is truly an inside look on one of the people who helped the Strip evolve. Of course there is some information he sent me that he did not want to share with the public and I told him he would get the final word on any page I did. Well this weekend I e-mailed it to him and received the typical Nelson response: "WOW !!!!!! That is fantastic...... I wish I KNEW this guy personally. Thanks a Brazillion."

The next step was where to put the page. He is equal with the Sahara, Flamingo and Thunderbird. Sahara has Stan and Sam's stories and of course Flamingo has her own claim to fame but once again, the fourth lady on the Strip Thunderbird, has very little for people to remember her by. Nelson opened for Judy Garland there and Thunderbird needs something for all of you to remember her by. I decided Nelson's page should be off of the Thunderbird and Nelson agreed. For those of you who want to read a little bit about Nelson, please go to the Thunderbird's page. I want to thank Nelson for all his help and allowing us into his life, both professionally and personally. This page definitely couldn't have been done without you keeping me updated on your life. Just to note, Nelson speaks a couple of different languages and I put up the translations as well. I will keep this updated as Nelson keeps me updated.

I'm hoping to get another revision out to everyone as I did get my hands on the 1953 Christmas edition of the Fabulous Las Vegas magazine and to keep up on my to do list. Keep your fingers crossed and once again, have a safe and happy Turkey Day!

November 6, 2005 - Belated Happy Halloween to everyone. I hope you all got lots of treats and no tricks (unless of course you're into that sort of thing.) Unfortunately, I spent Halloween and all last week sick with the dreaded flu. Didn't go to work the entire week and let me tell you, if I had the choice of staying home with the flu or being healthy & going to work I would've definitely picked the latter. No medicine in the world made me feel better and even now, I work on the site for a little while and then I have to rest.

While lying down I have been reading and trying to decide what documents I'm going to use on Jack & Etta's tribute page. They were certainly a hell of a couple and once again thanks to Cathie Bryant for lending me all of Etta's cherished documents. The tribute page is going very slowly but surely.

I've added another article from our beloved Charles "Pop" Squires - A Half Century of Service. I had to laugh while typing it in and he is discussing how worried he was that Las Vegas was going to die. If only he could see his city now.

I did manage to get a 1927 Las Vegas Age newspaper which Pops was the Editor. I didn't get it so much for this site but maybe I could use it for the E-book of Downtown or just read it to see how Pops arranged his newspaper. I got it at work so I was reading it on the train home (boy did I get some strange looks when I opened my 1927 Las Vegas Age!) It was funny as although it was "new" news to me, it read all so familiar. That night I pulled out a Fabulous Las Vegas magazine to see if there was anything in it to add to this site and it hit me. The layout of the magazine was almost identical to the layout of the Las Vegas Age. It seems to me that not only did Jack Cortez get Pops to write for his magazine, Pops also helped with the layout of the early Fabulous Las Vegas magazines or Jack liked the layout so much, he used it for his magazine. Either way I think Pops was thrilled to see his layout become the "diary" of Las Vegas even after his paper ended.

On to another subject - I have so much to add to this site and so little time and I often find information and have yet to create a place to put it. Over time I forget about it and we are all lost to these pieces of history. Now I try to throw the information somewhere on the site until I can create the appropriate place - case in point - when Nancy Williamson sent me those wonderful poems that Buddy Hackett sent to her I had no place to put them as I had not created an obit page for him. I threw the poems up on the Sahara's page until I could create the page and when it was done, I put the poems on his page. Well, it has happened again. In 1955 May Mann went to a party that Liberace and his brother George hosted and she gave her report on that party. I have yet to create Liberace's obituary page so I decided to put it on the Riv's page since he opened the resort the same year he gave this party. I will transfer this article when I can create Liberace's obit page.

Stan Irwin wrote one of his headlines articles in a 1950 Fabulous Las Vegas magazinewhich I added to his bio page. I've also added tidbits of information from this magazine to Flamingo, Frontier from 1950 and to the El Rancho, Frontier, Flamingo, Thunderbird, Desert Inn, Dunes, Riviera, Sahara, Sands, Silver Slipper and Thunderbird from 1955.

I've also added recent history to the birthday girl - Riviera including plans for New Years Eve.

October 3, 2005 - I hope you all had a wonderful month! I've been over-loaded with information for this site. I've added a sentence here and a picture there but nothing to really note here. I've added the more substantial information below.

Before I begin though I would like to discuss a non-Vegas issue - that of two ladies - Katrina and Rita. These were really bad bad girls weren't they? I, like everyone else, wants to help out but giving to Red Cross and Salvation Army was not an option. Ever since 9-11 when they admitted not all the money donated to 9-11 went to that cause, I've not be inclined to donate to them even though they now state they have the option of giving the money to another disaster. If you want to help but have been left cold but what is legal, what's not, please CLICK HERE for a legitimate way to donate that I can personally verify is true blue.

First thing first though. Regular readers of this site know about Steve Fischer writing his book. Well it is done and I've been sent a copy of Steve. Of course, as anyone who deals with history, there are certain articles stated in the book that I don't agree with but for the most part I do agree with it and some of the stories are just hilarous. You can get your copy by going to When the Mob Ran Vegas. I am also putting this link on my links page. The book is selling non-stop and I'm sure you will all love it.

I've been fortunate enough to get the July 1, 1950 Fabulous Las Vegas magazine and in that magazine was the talk of the town, the wedding of FLV magazine owner Jack Cortez to Etta Barton. Of course this is great information for my tribute page to Jack and Etta but the big surprise to me was that a surprise reception was held at the Club Bingo, which of course became the Sahara, which now includes the Strip and the topic of this site. What to do! I don't want to repeat information unless it is absolutely necessary but at the same time the history of the Club Bingo includes the reception of Jack and Etta. Then to complicate matters more, Charles Squires wrote an article that included the wedding/reception. Now I have a separate section with just Squires' articles. I could conceivably have this particular issue in three different places on this site, saying all the exact things but taking up webspace.

What I've done is take the article written by Audrey Lee for the Fabulous Las Vegas magazine explaining the wedding and reception and put it on Club Bingo's page and it will also go on the Tribute Page. Then I put Charles "Pops" Squires article sans the part about the wedding on his section. The rest will be on Jack and Etta's Tribute Page. I feel this is the best way of saving space and avoiding repetition on this site.

I've added pertinent information to Sahara - 1952, 1963 and Frontier - 1954

I'm still adding more information so I'l have a further update soon. I wanted to get this up though because of Renee's cause.

September 4, 2005 - I hope all of you have a safe and happy holiday! Yes, I've actually updated the site. I know, it looks like I've been slacking but not true. Unfortunately, this is still the year from hell for me so I've been on unstable ground. I am guilty of taking on too many projects with little time to work on them so I've been doing a little on each but they all have something to do with Vegas.

First, I'm still working on my e-book of the history of downtown. I opened one of the boxes from my move and found some documents that I took all the Strip information from but not downtown so I've added all that information.

Also, in the old documents I've been finding all kinds of receipes that chefs from the Strip hotels donated. Its such a shame that all these chefs who cooked for the resorts shared their receipes and now they are gone with their deaths and the deaths of the resorts they worked for. Now I've put all the receipes I found in the Christmas Fabulous Las Vegas magazines on this site but all the others are going to be forgotten. I've decided to type all these recipes in an e-book. When I get about 150 of them I'll sell the e-book from this site so if you're interested in cooking like the great chefs of the past, this e-book will be for you.

My third project and probably the most important is the one I started about the time I started this site but had no information until now. I've been trying to do a tribute page to Jack Cortez, founder/editor/owner/published of the Fabulous Las Vegas magazines. If you've read his magazines, you probably noticed that his writing, along with his staff's were different from the other magazines of their time. He wrote about each resort like they were parts of his family and the employees who worked them like his brothers and sisters. I think if he were alive today, he would've been the one to create this site and he saw the importance of keeping the history alive. He also had the foresight of seeing that Charles Squire's memories had to be kept and shared so he hired Squire to write about his memories in his magazine of which Squire did until his death. He got his wife Etta involved and subsequently when Etta took over, she got their son Bruce involved for a short time.

Unfortunately, when someone does all the reporting, very little is asked of him. I've spoken with many people who knew Jack and few who knew about him. Therefore, my idea to honor one of my idols died - right up until the time Cathie Bryant wrote to me after reading my site. Cathie noticed I quoted Jack quite a bit and we got talking. A few years back I met her when I went to Vegas and we got along right away. After Etta Cortez died most of her items were sold off and Cathie was right there. Jack and Etta are high on Cathie's respect list as well and she also wants a tribute to these two. The items included love letters between Jack and Etta, personal photo albums, prototype ads for the magazines, etc. She sent me copies of some of the photographs and I went right over to Stan Irwin and he recognized a few of the people and was able to help Cathie and I to identify them. Even after a right bad time in her life, must worse than what I've been experiencing, she boxed up all paper items she had and sent it to me so I can create what we both think is very important - a tribute page to these two most incredible people. Of course, I'm most thankful and there is no way I can thank Cathie for doing this.

I've been going through all these documents putting them together and deciding what to use and what not to use. Many of the letters contain very personal thoughts between the love birds and I want to honor them but also respect their privacy and intimate issues discussed. I've been reading articles they wrote for publication to get a better feel for their personalities. Jack is definitely the one that is outgoing and I really think he would not have cared what I put on the site as he was more than willing to tell everyone he knew how much he loved Etta and discussed much of his life in these letters. Etta on the other hand was a private person and her writing tells that. She wrote many articles and was very opinionated but not with her personal life. Therefore, I'm going to be careful about what I put on their tribute even though, to be honest with you, I think both would approve on whatever I choose to write as they shared not only a true and deep love for one another but they are truly a story-book couple.

In addition to all of the above, I'm also going through Moe Dalitz' FBI so as you can see, I've been busy on many things. I'll keep you advised of my progress.

Regarding Stan Irwin's book. We're still working on it. Stan has gotten side-tracked with his pet project childhood obesity so the book is still coming along.

This week I've the original release and pictures for the announcement of Project X which went on to be Luxor. I also acquired a great Fall of 1969 Frontiersman newsletter which I added to the Frontier's page as well as some pictures taken from the performance of Dunes' 1963 Guys and Dolls. I've also added:

Sahara - 1961, 1962

Desert Inn - 1965
Stardust - 1965

I also updated the present (or future history) to this year's birthday girl - Riviera.

July 10, 2005 - I added an article from Pop Squires discussing The Big Springs. I've also added bits and pieces to the following:

Dunes - 1957, 1958, 1959
Desert Inn - 1957, 1959
Desert Spa - 1958
El Rancho - 1957
Flamingo - 1951, 1957
Sands - 1957
Silver Slipper - 1957, 1959
Thunderbird - 1957

John Pleskovitch donated some pictures that were taken from the Las Vegas Hilton of the Landmark, Hilton and Circus Circus which I added to their respective pages. Many thanks John for sharing these pictures with us all.

I also want to take this opportunity to mention that if you are a Hall & Oates fan that you may want to think good thoughts for Daryl Hall. The duo had to cancel quite a few of their concerts because of his illness. I hear tell that even though he is very sick, he is well on his way to recovery and all the tickets for the cancelled concerts will be good on future dates. As some of you know, Hall & Oates are frequent Strip entertainers performing at Caesars, Desert Inn, Paris, and Las Vegas Hilton to mention a few. Send good thoughts his way so the duo could go on entertaining us with new songs along with old hits, i.e., She's Gone, Rich Girl, Maneater, No Can Do, etc. I don't know if you can send him get well wishes but you may want to visit Hall and Oates' site and it may tell you there.

June 26, 2005 - Well, hello everyone! Long time no update as you can see. I do apologize but this year is proving to be a very dramatic one and this is especially devastating to someone who tries to maintain a mundane lifestyle. I won't bore you with the details of all that has happened just to say the dog my mother left when she passed on took sick, had to have an operation, and she crashed out shortly thereafter. She is hospitalized now and we're holding our breath; my second kitten, Ginger, that I obtained for Tabitha as Tabitha was missing her brother that suddenly died so much, now is infested with parasites and is very sick. Can't seen to get rid of them so the dosage of her medicine has been upped; got into a fight with my bank and I am now trying to change banks; train schedules were changed and the rates upped; and I actually got a ticket to go to a concert this weekend & can't find any way I can go. Much more has happened but why go into it. As I was telling my boss, after all I'm going through and working, the last thing I want to do is think more when I get home and it does take some thought to go through the old documents, etc., that this site was the last thing I wanted to work on. Therefore, once in a while I would add an obvious tidbit of information or picture that didn't require thought. Now I can't find the piece of paper I wrote everything on so I'm going to have to go off of memory as to the revisions.

First I want to welcome back Las Vegas Hotel Accomodations back. They had advertised on my site and renewed their ad. I also want to welcome Las Vegas Nevada Real Estate Relocation who is advertising on my site. Please visit these sites when you have a chance and check them out. Their links for the next six months will be on my main page, right before the listings of the Ladies on the Strip.

Okay, I do remember updating the birthday girl,
Riviera's page for the 1950s, and 1960s. Other than that I can't remember what years I worked on just the pages. Sorry about that - Aladdin, Circus Circus, Desert Inn (I think 1960s), Dunes, Flamingo, Frontier, International (Hilton), Landmark, Sahara, and Colonial House.

May 16, 2005 - While still trying to find my transcriber, I've added some tidbits to the site:

Castaways - 1964
Bonanza - 1967, 1969

May 7, 2005 - Well folks we are back from helping Riviera celebrate her 50th birthday and I can tell you, this experience will forever live in my memory banks. We had a fantastic time and I want to take this moment to thank John Neeland who not only made this dream come true, but has been a continous donator of this site, not only for the Riviera, but other resorts as well. I also want to thank Barbara Wolfe, Robert Vannucci, and William Westerman. This was definitely a once in a lifetime event. I've added the outline of my experience to my trip diary page and only got on my soap box once. To read about additions to the
Riviera I've added to 1957, 2004, and 2005.

As stated in my outline I've added pictures to:

Algiers
Desert Inn/Wynn Resort
El Rancho Vegas
Flamingo
Frontier
Silver City
Tropicana

I've also added the opening information for the Wynn Resorts. As we all know, the ladies on the Strip will always have something happen on opening night just to add spice and the Wynn was no exception. This time it wasn't the structure but Wynn's employee but opening night wouldn't be opening night without something happening!

In a perfect world, four resorts should be celebrating their 50th birthdays, Dunes, Royal Nevada, and Moulin Rouge would've been the ladies sharing this year special year with the Riviera. Only the Riviera though survived to attend her party. Carol Knoll went to visit the burned out Moulin Rouge and took some pictures of this sad lady which I've added to the Moulin's page. Many thanks Carol for your continued support to this site.

Speaking of resorts lasting, as we all know, instead of imploding the Marina, Kerkorian made it a part of his new MGM Grand. Jay Abamson sent me a great photograph of the Marina being transformed into part of the MGM with part of her green with the Marina logo showing clearly in the middle. I've added it to the Marina page. Many thanks to Jay for showing us the transformation.

Lynn Zook, who has donated to this site, has created her own site called Classic Las Vegas. I've added this link to my Links page. Stop by her site and take a look.

April 18, 2005 - Well, this will be my last set of revisions before leaving to help the Riv celebrate her 50th Birthday. I'll let you know all know the details when I return.

I've also updated the festivities for the 9th Lady's 50th Birthday Party. I told John Neeland that this will be the last revision before I leave so if he anything to tell you and I about the schedule, etc., he's got to do it now. He gave me more of a break-down so everyone could set up their schedules. Of course, this could be found on the Riv's page.

This set of revisions is rather special. Since this site went up plenty of people have written to me with their feelings/memories, etc., of the resorts that were imploded. As you all know, my personal favorites and the reason why this site is here is the Landmark and Aladdin but I'm in the minority. Most of the e-mails concern the Dunes. By far, the Dunes page continues to bring out the most feelings and memories. It seems most everyone has a memory, a fact, a piece of trivia, something that keeps the Dunes close to their heart. Of course, the symbol of the Dunes, just like the windmill was the symbol for the El Rancho Vegas, was the sheik/sultan which sat on top of the resort. Show only the picture of the sultan without any caption to people and all would say the Dunes. Now I've had some mention that Young had created the sultan but everything was vague.

Well, I had the honor and great pleasure to have Carol Hawkins contact me. Carol is the daughter of Kermit Hobson Hawkins, the actual designer/creater/builder of the sheik. Kermit is one of the unsung visionaries of the Strip creating an important part of the Strip's history. I asked Carol to look through her albums and documents and see if she could find anything regarding her Dad's creation. She found pictures of him creating the sheik, with the diagrams, etc. She also gave me articles as he was much more than the creator of the Sheik along with her memories of this special GENTLEman. My problem was where to put it all. I decided to create a separate page dedicated to Mr. Hawkins and you can find out about this visionary under the Dunes' page. I think you will find this page most interesting.

I want to take a moment to thank to thank Carol for contacting me, taking the time to find all the documents and sending them to me, and being patient while I conducted my interrogation (just ask Stan Irwin about my own Spanish Inquisition style of questioning).

I've also added another one of Pop Squire's articles, this one entitled Indian Springs.

I've done a pile of revisions but its all a sentence here, a picture there, nothing really worth noting. I've added information to all of the resorts pertaining the years so I'll give you the years and you'll pretty much know its every resort that was around during that year. I've been working on 1958, 1968, and 1971.

I've added more then a sentence or picture to:
Aladdin - 1966, 1968
Caesars Palace - 1966
Sands - 1966

April 10, 2005 - I want to thank Terrance Norman for his monetary donation. Your name has been added to my Donator's Plaque and I really appreciate it. As I've said, any monies donated to this site go right back into the site.

I've added another one of Pop Squire's articles, this one entitled "The Right of Way War."

I've added all kinds of entertainment tidbits with most resorts who were around in 1973. I also added to the following:

Desert Spa - 1958
Dunes - 1958
El Rancho - 1954
Flamingo - 1954
MGM - 1982
Las Vegas Hilton - 1982
Riviera - 1958

April 4, 2005 -I first want to thank Tom Sayen for his monetary donation. It is really appreciated!!! Tom, I've added your name to my Donation Plaque and once again thank you!

John Neeland over at the Birthday Girl Riviera has given me an itinerary for what's happening over there and I've put it up on the site so those of you who are going can mark their calendars. I've already marked mine - thanks John!! Now parts of the itinerary maybe repeats of other portions but I'd rather have items repeated then not having them in at all.

I'm still unpacking from my move with my daughter and son-in-law bringing another truck load on Easter. It is quite a job trying to join my apartment of 24 years with my Mother's house of 10 years. Its also fun trying to get my Mom's dog and my three cats to become friends. The German Shepard doesn't want anything to do with the cats in any way, shape and form, and my stray-learning-to-be-an-indoor-cat is having a time trying to be her friend. The dog responds "Talk to the paw!!"

I must apologize if any of you got the notice the site has changed and it didn't. I just forgot that no matter what happens to the main page, the notice is sent out. All I did was widen one of the columns. I got the notice and banged my head on the computer. Sorry, folks, I forgot.

Pet Peeve for the month - if you're going to sign my guestbook and make tons of negative comments have the nerve or could I be frank and say have the balls to put in your name and e-mail address so I can respond. I love the spineless creatures out there that have a ton to say but no balls to back it up with an e-mail and name. Worthless - so totally worthless creatures. (Of course I was able to coax the ones that did leave their e-mail addresses to admit they were trying to steal parts of the site.)

As I've said before, I decided that since so much history of downtown Vegas is mixed in with the Strip's history, I decided to put all the tidbits together and create an E-Book that I will eventually sell on this site. I've been adding and adding but never paying much attention. Well, a few days back I went to read one of the downtown casinos and was amazed as to how it is coming out. I thought it would be a book of random pieces of history but it is slowly but surely turning out to look just like this site. As it stands right now it looks like its going to be a pretty good book if I say so myself. Now mind you, I'm not even close to saying I'm finished, but I think anyone who buys it when its finally done will be very satisified.

I've added an article written by Pop Squires from the November, 1953. A part of his article pertained to the Hotel Last Frontier so I repeated that part on the Frontier's page.

I've added tidbits to the following

Desert Inn - 1953
Frontier - 1956
El Rancho - 1953
Flamingo - 1953
Hacienda - 1956
Las Vegas Race Track - 1953
Sahara - 1953
Sands - 1953
Silver Slipper - 1952, 1956
Thunderbird - 1952, 1956

I've also added Christine Jorgensen, who played at the Sahara, to the Obituary Section of the site. I found an article written about her that did more than anything I could write.

March 21, 2005 - I'm sorry for not having much for this update. Unfortunately, I relate 2005 with the statement "and the hits just keep coming!" Now, my little girl cat got sick, I totally accidently downloaded Microsoft's Service Pack 2 and installed it. The computer came up with BSD (blue screen of death). It took three days to get that fixed and all my programs had to be reinstalled. Then just when I was ready to work on the site and begin the gradual upload sequence my DSL went down and there was another couple of days trying to fix that instead of working on the site. I figured instead of waiting and forgetting what I did, I'm going to let you know now and hopefully I get a little more done this week.