I’ve got another commentary up on CDC Gaming Reports. This one is about why we shouldn’t write off conventions in Las Vegas: The casinos of the Strip were particularly vulnerable to the pandemic, not only because it put a temporary halt to gaming on casino floors. Casinos across the country (mostly) managed to emerge from […]
They Will Return – CDC Gaming Reports Read More »
CDC GamingLast week I had a commentary published on CDC Gaming Reports about the possibly already forgotten Golden Knights/Upick partnership. As usual, I tried to see the positive. Here it is: You probably have already heard the story. It raced across Twitter in a brilliant blaze last week before sputtering into dust over the weekend. The Vegas Golden
All’s well that ends well with the Upick debacle – CDC Gaming Reports Read More »
CDC GamingOne of the major attractions of the Sands hotel was the music–whether it was in the Copa Room, the lounge, or, in later years, the Celebrity Theater. To commemorate the musical legacy of the Sands–and give you something to listen to while you read At the Sands, I’ve created a Spotify playlist featuring over 43
At the Sands Playlist Now on Spotify Read More »
bookI have good news for all those who want a copy of At the Sands and who prefer hardcovers: the book is now available through Amazon as a hardcover. If you’d like to preview the book before buying, you can read an excerpt and look at the chapter titles here. If you’d like to see
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bookI’ve got an excerpt from At the Sands that you can read at On The Strip: From the start, the Sands involved several personalities: Jake Freedman, who had arrived in America destitute but by dint of his personality had become a beloved gambling operator and racehorse owner, was its president and public face. Jack Entratter,
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bookIn honor of Kefauver Day, the Mob Museum published a short article I wrote that summarized the drama of the Kefauver Committee’s hearing in Las Vegas; The U.S. Senate’s Special Committee to Investigate Organized Crime in Interstate Commerce, chaired by Tennessee Democrat Estes Kefauver, focused attention as never before on gambling-related crime as a national
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writingI recently was featured on “Talk about Las Vegas with Ira” talking about, what else, At the Sands: This week, Ira spoke with David G. Schwartz, author of “At the Sands: The Casino That Shaped Classic Las Vegas, Brought the Rat Pack Together, and Went Out With a Bang.” In this 30-minute episode of Talk
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bookGreat news for Kindle owners: you can now buy (and read) At the Sands on Kindle. With that, the book is now available on all major (and a few minor) ebook platforms, for the (relatively) low price of $6.49. See At the Sands on Kindle.
At the Sands is now on Kindle! Read More »
bookI’ve got a new article published with the Gaming Law Review called “Venomous in the Extreme: Understanding Frank Sinatra’s Acrimonious 1963 Exit from Nevada Gaming.” Here’s a peek: Today, there are few personalities more intimately connected with the classic era of Las Vegas casinos than Frank Sinatra. Indeed, the pre-corporate period (1940s to 1966) is
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authorI’m taking a quick break from promoting At the Sands to share some other exciting book news. My book Boardwalk Playground, which chronicles the history of Atlantic City in 100 short pieces, is now available in a multitude of ebook formats. You’ve got: Kindle Apple Books Barnes & Noble Kobo And, if you want to
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authorAfter a long writing, editing, and publication process, my new book, At the Sands: The Casino That Shaped Classic Las Vegas, Brought the Rat Pack Together, and Went Out with a Bang is available on most platforms. You can buy it in paperback from Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and in Apple Books, Nook, Kobo,
At the Sands Is Out (Mostly) Read More »
bookGood news! I’ve gotten the print proof of At the Sands, my forthcoming book. Here is a photo of the cover: And here is the title page: And here is a random page: I know that we shouldn’t judge books by their cover, but I’m happy with the overall look of At the Sands.
At the Sands on its way Read More »
author, bookI recently had an essay I wrote about Fallout New Vegas’s Honest Hearts DLC published on First Person Scholar. Here’s the first paragraph: As a Western set in a post-apocalyptic Mohave, Fallout: New Vegas demonstrates that the big questions that drive Western history are durable and malleable enough to survive even the (fictional) nuclear demise
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writingI have an article in the latest edition of the Popular Culture Review about Mario Puzo’s views on capitalism and gambling: The Godfather made him a wealthy man, but Mario Puzo’s long years as a struggling writer and childhood in New York City’s Hell’s Kitchen conditioned him to treat money—and those who made a great
I’d like to share my Neon Museum Scholar in Residence Lecture: The lecture looks at the years 1967-1988, which are the “middle child” of Las Vegas Strip casino history. People usually focus on the “classic” or “Rat Pack” era or the Mirage/megaresort era, but don’t think too much about the early corporate period. Hope you
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video, writingAs the scholar in residence at the Neon Museum this spring, I’ve had the chance to look into an aspect of Las Vegas casino history that is usually neglected: But the two decades between 1967 and 1988 don’t fit neatly into either period and deserve further consideration in their own right. While some aspects of
When asked repeatedly about how Las Vegas can come back from the coronavirus, I kept thinking about an earlier Las Vegas disaster–the 1980 MGM Grand fire and the subsequent Las Vegas Hilton blaze, which provoked a national conversation about highrise safety. I wrote something for KNPR’s DC Blog about how Las Vegas came back from
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writingEarlier this week, I wrote a few thoughts on why the current focus on getting back to “normal” might not be for the best: The bigger question that everyone seems to be asking is, “How long until we get back to ‘normal’?” These two announcements, which hit the wires without hours of each other, are
Back to Normal? – Comped Travel Read More »
compedtravelLast Friday, I gave the first ever virtual Rebel Recharge lecture for UNLV’s Office of Alumni Engagement. I was asked to talk a little about what might be ahead in the future. Here is the conversation: The description for the talk was: Las Vegas has never witnessed a crisis like the one brought by COVID-19.
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writingI’ve got a new academic paper published as a chapter in the conference proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Language and Literary studies: Language, Literature, Play and Games. It’s about what we learn when we read Sid Meier’s Civilization V as a text. The game makes some very interesting judgments and assumptions about history.
New paper on reading Sid Meier’s Civilization V as text Read More »
writing