A converted desert wasteland built on debts, vice and entertainment.
She’s only been around for a century but our cheery friend Las Vegas has drawn the masses from all walks of life, all over the world producing trillions of dollars in wealth.
Originally a city founded by ranchers and rail-road workers she quickly found out that shes the greatest asset to Southern Nevada.
Las Vegas couldn’t forget the embrace of Old West-style freedoms—gambling and prostitution. She provided a perfect home for East Coast organized crime.
Born in the 1940s, money from drugs and racketeering built casinos and was laundered within.
Prehistory and Founding of Las Vegas – Viva Las Vegas!
The Paiute tribe were in the area as early as A.D. 700.
The first European to enter the Las Vegas valley was Rafael Rivera, who scouted the area in 1821 to open up a trade route—the Old Spanish Trail—between New Mexico and California.
He named the valley Las Vegas, “the meadows,” after its spring-watered grasses.
In 1848 there was a shift from Mexican to United States rule until 1855, when Mormon settlers came to the area.
The Birth of Las Vegas
In 1905 the San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake railroad arrived in Las Vegas, joining the city with the Pacific.
Nevada outlawed gambling in 1910 but the practice continued in illicit casinos. By the time gambling was legalized again in 1931, organized crime had roots in the city now due to this.
1931, construction began on the Hoover Dam, back then known as the boulder dam, drawing thousands of workers to the city.
Cheap hydroelectricity powered the flashing signs that came to be.
The rest is history.
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