The now defunct Desert Inn Hotel & Casino shields its course like the statues that guard the entrance to the tomb in the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Casino [edit] Las Vegas was broken when $34,955,489 was won by an anonymous gambler at the Desert Inn, playing a bank of six.
Desert Inn | ONEWilbur Clark was operating several bars and a hotel in San Diego, California in 1. El Rancho Vegas hotel- casino on the emerging Las Vegas Strip was up for sale.
Clark, who for years had his eye on running a casino, sold his interests and moved to Las Vegas. He quickly acquired a majority stake in the western ranch- themed El Rancho, and he also invested in the Monte Carlo casino downtown and the Player's Club on Highway 9. The one- time kitchen worker and casino dealer from Illinois really wanted to design and build his own resort, which he would call the Desert Inn. With his project, Clark was one of the first to envision Las Vegas as a leading post- war venue for casino gaming and name entertainers from New York and Hollywood. In 1. 94. 6, Clark sold the El Rancho for $1. Desert Inn. At the same time, William "Billy" Wilkerson and partner Ben "Bugsy" Siegel were constructing the Flamingo, and another investor was planning the Thunderbird hotel. Clark, who started building in May 1.
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- Desert Inn Casino Chips. Opened from 1950-2001. Image. The Desert Inn was the idea of Wilbur Clark. With the $1.5 million proceeds from the sale of his part of the El Rancho, and Monte Carlo Club..
Meanwhile, the Flamingo—with crucial financial backing provided by Siegel and other East Coast mob figures—laid claim to being the first new, post- war Strip casino to debut with gaming and top entertainers. The Flamingo opened in December 1. Xavier Cugat and soon, film comedians Abbott and Costello, who were paid an- unheard- of $2. Badly in need of additional funds to complete his Desert Inn project, Clark turned to Moe Dalitz, a former illegal liquor bootlegger from Cleveland, Ohio, with ties to top organized crime figures. Dalitz, who ran the so- called Mayfield Road Gang of gambling racketeers in Cleveland, bought a seventy- five- percent interest in the Desert Inn from Clark in 1. The backing of the so- called "Cleveland Group" ensured the eventual launch of Wilbur Clark's Desert Inn, as it appeared on the hotel's distinctive neon sign, along with pictures of desert cacti. The Miami- style Bermuda- pink and green resort opened, at a cost of $6.
April 2. 4, 1. 95. Radio comedian and ventriloquist Edgar Bergen, film star Vivian Blaine, the Desert Inn Orchestra, and others performed in the Painted Desert showroom for $2. The upstairs Sky Room restaurant overlooked the "Dancing Waters," rising and falling fountains set to recorded music and lit by colored lights inside a figure- eight pool. Each of the Desert Inn's 3.
A chef from the famed Ritz Hotel in Paris oversaw the gourmet restaurant. Dalitz's man, Allard Rosen, managed the casino. In 1. 95. 1, Clark began construction on a million- dollar, 1. Dubbed "Wilbur's Folly" by local skeptics, the course featured the first links on the Strip.
Clark brought added publicity to the Desert Inn in 1. Tournament of Champions, a professional charity golf event that lured celebrities to the course and high- roller gamblers to the casino. Many continued to doubt Clark's actual participation in the running of the Desert Inn, calling him the "front man" who merely served to distract from the Dalitz group.
The Desert Inn's opulence soon attracted many celebrities and dignitaries including former president Harry Truman, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Winston Churchill, Adlai Stevenson, and then- U. S. Senator John F. Kennedy. The "D. I.," as it was nicknamed, helped establish Las Vegas as a national showcase for major talent in the 1. Ed Sullivan, Betty Hutton, Noel Coward, and Jimmy Durante. The Desert Inn was one of the most venerated hotel- casinos on the Strip despite allegations that the Dalitz group regularly underreported the money collected by the casino.
The practice known as skimming concealed the involvement of hidden outside partners who sought to conceal their shares and avoid paying taxes. Clark sold his interest in the hotel in 1. In the hands of Dalitz and his dubious associates, the Desert Inn attracted controversy that inspired FBI surveillance for years. In November 1. 96. Howard Hughes—then considered the richest man in America—checked into the Desert Inn's top- floor penthouse. Hughes liked the apartment, stayed for several weeks, and declined Dalitz's request for him to leave.
He is said to have casually asked Dalitz what he wanted for the Desert Inn, and when Dalitz immediately answered with an inflated figure of $1. Hughes agreed to buy it and took over in April 1. Hughes' purchase meant that Dalitz's group, and the controversies over mob ties that drew national attention to Las Vegas for two decades, was on its way out and the respected investor Hughes was in. Secret skimming of casino proceeds by hotel employees loyal to Dalitz is said to have continued for a time, without the knowledge of Hughes or his less- experienced management team. Hughes purchased other hotels on the Strip, and approved plans to enhance the Desert Inn property.
In the throes of mental illness, he remained in the penthouse, with darkened windows, until 1. The Desert Inn remained in the hands of Hughes' company, the Summa Corporation, until 1.
The company invested $5. Augusta Tower. Despite a succession of owners until 2. Finally, just four days after the Desert Inn's fiftieth anniversary, developer Steve Wynn purchased the property at a cost of $2. Wynn, a former operator of the Mirage, Treasure Island, and Bellagio hotels on the Strip, closed the Desert Inn for good on August 2.
The famous hotel- casino was imploded, starting with the Augusta Tower, in October 2. Wynn Las Vegas. The $2. April 2. 7, 2. 00. D. I. Wynn's major partner in the hotel company was Japanese gaming machine magnate, Kazuo Okada. Wynn kept and renovated the Desert Inn's original golf course.