Vintage Postcard – Horseshoe Club Las Vegas

HORSESHOE CLUB LAS VEGAS, NEVADA
The fabulous “new look” of the new Horseshoe Clue is a sight long to be remembered. This world’s largest electric sign lights up the sky for miles around while the 24-hour restaurant and ’round the clock casino continue to draw people from all over the world.
Color by David M. Mills

Copyright Ferris H. Scott, Santa Ana, Calif.
Western Resort Publications, 1320 N. Broadway, Santa Ana, Calif.
S45418
FS-863

As you know, I have a lot of love for the Horseshoe Club. Check out this post, featuring my Mom and Dad, as well as a more recent photo I took when we were there on vacation. Good times! This postcard looks like it’s from the 1950s, based on the cars.

From Wikipedia: “Benny Binion bought the Eldorado Club and Apache Hotel in 1951, re-opening them as Binion’s Horseshoe (also called the Horseshoe Casino). The casino’s interior had a frontier flavor, like an old-style riverboat, with low ceilings and velvet wallpaper. It was the first casino in downtown Las Vegas (also called Glitter Gulch) to replace sawdust-covered floors with carpeting.”

Feeling a bit of Las Vegas nostalgia. Did you see they just took down the Riveria? The Riv operated from April 1955 to May 2015. From Wikipedia: “The Riviera opened on April 20, 1955 as the first high-rise and the ninth resort on the Las Vegas Strip. Liberace cut the opening ribbon, and became the first resident performer. The Riviera is one of the oldest and most famous casino resorts in Las Vegas Valley. The Riviera also broke new ground in its design: previously, Strip resorts resembled roadside motor courts.”

Here it is, if you didn’t already catch it:

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Golden Gate Casino

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Binion’s Horseshoe Club

Binion’s Horseshoe Club
Downtown Las Vegas
The ‘Bright Spot’ on the world’s brightest 2 blocks, features the most unique display seen anywhere; $1,000,000.00 in cash. One hundred $10,000 bills encased in an 8 foot golden horseshoe. Long famed for ‘Fast Action’, the new beautiful Horseshoe Hotel and Casino is now considered the “Showplace of Casino Center.” The popular new Sombrero Room features the most authentic Mexican food in Las Vegas.

This postcard is a real photo printed on postcard stock on the back (Kodak Paper). It is postally unused. And that cute couple in the middle? That’s my Mom and Dad! Mom guessed this photo to be very late 70s, possibly 1980.

Of course, Binion’s is still in operation downtown Las Vegas. My folks stayed at the Dunes, but the million dollars was a heck of a photo opportunity back then. According to Wikipedia, “the casino is named for its founder, Benny Binion, whose family ran it from its founding in 1951 until 2004. The hotel, which has 366 rooms, closed in 2009.”

This photo is from our trip to Las Vegas in November of 2007:

Vintage Postcard – Golden Gate Casino – Las Vegas

Golden Gate Casino
Downtown Las Vegas, Nevada
In the Sal Sagev Hotel on Fremont Street, with a fine restaurant and all the popular games that make for fun in Las Vegas.

Desert Supply Co., Las Vegas, Nevada
Curteichcolor 3-D Natural Color Reproduction (Reg U.S.A. Pat. Off.)
9C-K1118

This card is unused, but the Curteichcolor dating guides suggest this was printed in 1959.

As you may know, the Golden Gate is still in business. According to their website, land for the casino was purchased in 1905. In 1931 the hotel changed its name to Sal Sagev, as noted in the postcard, which is Las Vegas spelled backwards. The Golden Gate Casino was created on the site in 1955.

When we got married in Las Vegas in 2007, we made a trip downtown to Fremont and I snapped this image:

More Las Vegas here:

Moulin Rouge

Binion’s Horseshoe Club

Desert Inn

Vintage Postcard – The Hotel Dunes

The Hotel Dunes
Las Vegas, Nevada
This new high-rise multi-million dollar hotel on the world famous Las Vegas Strip is one of the showplaces of the Western Hemisphere. The many exclusive shops and facilities make it not only a city within a city – but a city within a hotel.

Copyright Ferris H. Scott, Santa Ana, Calif.
Western Resort Publications, 1320 N. Broadway, Santa Ana, Calif.
S-60735L3
FS-1012

When my folks visited Las Vegas in 1980, they stayed at the Dunes.

This site has a nice little write-up on the Dunes. They note that the casino and north tower were where the Bellagio fountain is today. This website has additional history about the Dunes, which opened with only 200 rooms…can you imagine that in Las Vegas today? The addition of the tower brought the room total to 450 in 1961.

The Dunes seemed to have financial difficulties from the very beginning. The Dunes is long gone, replaced by the Bellagio. The doors closed for good in January 1993, with demolition starting in October of that year.

Want to see the implosion of the Dunes? Thank you, YouTube.

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