Transcripts For CSPAN3 American History TV In Las Vegas NV 20160605

Plentiful, and it was accessible to southern california, and here was all of this money waiting for them to make it. Announcer first, we take you to be university of las vegas gambling hear how the industry here evolved over the years. There is a lot of different thoughts about why gambling is so polarizing. If you read the writings of someone like jackson lee years, there is the antithesis of the managerial work ethic and working hard and getting ahead. Who winay that people money gambling did not earn it. It is polarizing. Of course, you can lose a lot of money doing it, so it can be very dangerous. Gambling in las vegas goes back to the very beginnings of las vegas. Las vegas was established by what was the Union Pacific railroad, and that it was the salt lake, los angeles, and san pedro railroad, and they bought a branch from a woman by the name of Helen Stewart, and they decided they were going to lay a town out there, and this is a map from the original auction. Live land ino block 22. This is what the map is. It was generated by the railroad. Originally, it had las vegas divided into 40 blocks, and they needed a place for what they drinking, gambling, prostitution, and here is the thing. Las vegas was going to be a respectable town. The railroad was a respectable railroad, so you could not have it on fremont street, which is a main street, so they called one of the blocks, block 15, the place where they would have the vice, and this was the red light district, and it was a little bit away from the train station, one block off of fremont, so if you walked one block, turn left, and walked another block, that is right where it is. Vegasa man comes to las with this family, they can stay on fremont street and have a wholesome time, and if he comes south and wants to see a little bit of the world, he can make a left and walked down there to block 16. A couple of interesting things happened in the state of nevada. In 1909, the state decided they were done with gambling. They wanted to become modern, so they outlawed gambling. Hooray for that. A couple of years later, they were saying people were still gambling prethis was not a good situation. And then there was the decision to allow pennyante gambling, and then in 1931, they took the plunge in the stormy great depression. Really hard hit. They took the plunge and legalized commercial gambling. They did. And it is very interesting because the governor signed that legislation in late march, and the first week of april, the Las Vegas City Commission met, and they granted the first four licenses to casinos, and here is the minute book reflecting that vote when they granted the licenses to the las vegas club, to the exchange club, and to the northern club. These are the first four gambling halls. They were not casinos. It was just a bar with a couple of tables that they granted licenses to, and these were very small scale, and for a long time in las vegas, there was this need by folks in the chamber of needrce and else to say we a firstclass hotel. That is when hoover dam was being built. Just have af we can firstclass hotel in downtown las vegas, we can become a huge tourist mecca. So for years, they were trying to get this done. Late 1930s, a guy by the need of thomas said he was going to build a great las vegas hotel, but it was not going to be in las vegas. On theded to build out los angeles highway, highway 91, which was the road that links to tell a two las vegas, and there is a real interesting story about this. Supposedly, he was driving to las vegas, and his car broke now, and he sat on the side of the road and had his friend go into town to get help. Not much of a friend. To walk three miles in the desert. Counts the cars going past, and he said, you know what . This is where i should build my hotel. Not downtown, where we are competing with everybody, because the train people do not really need them. I want to get the automobile people. At United States history, after world war ii, this was a big boom, and the car culture, the interstate highway ranch, so he built the out on highway 91, and if you look at this, this gives you an idea. You can see a little part of the package even then. If you look at this, this did not look like an urban gambling hall. This is somewhere out in the wild west. The ranch in vegas opened with 63 rooms, and this was considered big at the time, but this was the first time in the United States a built in isolated gambling destination. They had done it down in mexico, but the Mexican Government banned gambling there. The same architect built them. They could do everything there, and this was really into the reality of casino economics. Back when gambling was illegal in those cities, they wanted the people to lose their money and leave quickly, so they would cheat them. That is how they made money. You had to lose and go. Here, they had a chance at legitimacy. The games are honest, but there is that house edge though, and the way it works, over time, you will probably lose. In the short run, the customer can get really lucky and win a lot of money. What you want to do is keep them and winning your money leaving your casino. You want them to lose your money back. Something like this, which to me is very instructive. This man is throwing caution to the wind. Of pie. Ting a piece i do not know if he is celebrating or not. Vegas, the a deal was you would go in there, and it was one dollar. A chuckwagon of fake. You could stuff yourself with all kinds of food, and you were so weighed down that you would end up gambling, and you would not move because you were stuck in the casino like an anchor keeping you in the casino. It worked. Vegas was very successful, and some more opened up after that, so the idea was he wanted to have a lot of attractions to keep the person in the casino. Good news. And we have all heard about the rat pack, but the interesting thing about this is that a lot of entertainers really started to make their name in a bigtime weight in the las vegas area. Sammy davis junior. When he started, it was the trio, his dad and his uncle, starring sammy davis junior. At some point, sammy became bigger. This memo from the William Morris agency shows the billing that mr. Davis needed. In the same type as the trio. You can see at some point, sammy actually became the biggest star in the treo because now sammy davis junior is bigger than the treo. And one of the great things about las vegas is that you could meet celebrities breed you could hobnob with celebrities, thefor example, they have executive Vice President of a tire association, and sammy davis junior comes to their party, and everybody, so a tire eader, he couldr say, hey, i met sammy davis junior. You could do that. After a while, las vegas started to get bigger. The scale of a changed, and you no longer have that personal collection with connection with celebrities there, and there is a lot of soulsearching about what to do, and some thought that the town was getting boring, and one of them was jason arnault, who at the time was living in atlanta, a hotel developer, who had a very Good Relationship with jimmy hall for and was able to get money from them. In 1960 threeas and hated it. He thought it was the most boring place. He was a gambler. Our a lot ofo other things. So he decided they needed to do Something Special and have fantasy, excitement, so he built a place called caesars palace. If you are lucky enough to be invited to the opening of caesars palace, you had a big manchurian looking guy who with caesar,uirrel who looks a lot like j, and that looks a lot like jays wife, and it was excitement that was going to last all weekend, featuring beauteousams and a dancing maiden. Wasidea, what made caesars ofcaesars, the hordes gladiators are here to serve your every wish and command. This is what made las vegas a different kind of destination, jay had the idea that what happens in biggest stays in vegas before anybody else did. He had an idea that it was special breed you just do not go there and have a night out. There, and the women in the restaurants are wind goddesses who massage you. You are the center of everything. It was really just a totally different idea from what they had. The most successful casino on the strip for years until the mirage opened. Happened inge that the 1960s is the industry continued, so a place like the sams when it opened had 200, 300 rooms. Pretty small. They found that you could take a lot of money from the casino. Outsiders started to get interested in it, and one of them who got interested was kirk kerkorian, who made money in the aviation industry. He decided, you know what . The real money is not in the land. It is running a business, so he decided to build the Worlds Largest or tell, which he decided to call the international hotel, and this was the booklet. It was a little bit off the strip next to the convention what thend here is international was planned to look like, and one thing you will notice is that it is a big building. In the middle of the parking lot, it has this flat structure which has the theater and everything in it, and this big tower about 30 stories high, and it is y shaped. This was the first y shaped casino in vegas, and you see a lot are built on this model. It was built by kirk kerkorian, and it was the first real modern casino. It set the pattern for what was going to come, what was going to follow. In 1969, july 1969, so the big events was the opening of the mirage in 1989. The mirage was built by steve downtownbought a small club called the Golden Nugget and build a hotel, and he really made a splash in Atlantic City, where he built the Golden Nugget in Atlantic City, and he was able to get money from michael milken, junk bonds, step ahead in casino finance, and he found that if you build them right, they can make a lot of money, so they went out to get 650 million to build the mirage, so really different, and one of the things that set the mirage apart was that it was not a casino with a hotel attached. It was a resort that had a casino in it. A magicianthere was in various shows on the strip, and now they would get their own show, which was incredibly expensive at the time, but people paid it, because it was a good show at the time. This is a photo of the garage. You could not picture the casinos back in the day. Hotel, this gives you an idea of how it is changing, how it is evolving. 1953. There is nobody gambling. This is how things changed in the 1990s. This was a really good move, because in the 1990s, there was gambling across the United States, so they just could not compete on just gambling, so even with Atlantic City and las vegas, and las vegas really diversified from gambling. Today, only about 35 of the income of the big casinos comes from gambling. Most of it comes from fancy restaurants and the entertainment, so they really changed the model. Youre not going to find a lot in thef of the mob collection because these people generally did not like to leave written records that could put them in jail, but if you look at the people who came to town and really built it up during the 1940s and 1950s, most of it came out of illegal gambling and came out of organized crime, and you definitely have that influence here. You can see which people were more connected than others. Really important to document the history of the Casino Industry in las vegas and everywhere because it is such a controversial industry and has such a history with organized crime, but there is a lot of information out there, and it is really great to go into it and see firsthand this is what really happened, and the people who really built in the industry, this is what they were trying to do, and that is why i think it is so valuable, to tell you what it was really like. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, announcer all weekend, American History tv is featuring las vegas, nevada. Millions of tourists visit las vegas. To a recently visited many sites, showcasing the citys rich history. Learn more about las vegas all weekend here on American History tv. Well, i think classy vegas means certain things to certain people, but midcentury, 20th century, was about as classic as it comes. You are talking about sinatra and sammy and dean, the brat pack and the bright lights and the shows, the gambling, even organized crime, and all of that is sort of encapsulated right here. City of a lotin a of magical places, this is probably the most magical. Classic las vegas was one of those areas where las vegas really defined itself. Fromfined itself different anything else in the United States. Las vegas was a little town in the middle of a dozen. It functioned with federal funding, but by the end of world war ii, that was all gone, so it had to become something else, and what it chose to do was to advertises health a place to have fun. World war ii and the depression before that had really stopped a lot of people in the United States from being able to do anything. They were just getting by. They were trying to surprise. With the end of world war ii, you had people coming back from the war. They were going back to school. They were getting out of the military, out of this regimented lifestyle. A could now buy cars. They could now travel. They could now get whatever they needed, and they wanted to let off steam. They wanted to be able to do something fun. Las vegas was here. Play by day. Lay by night. See Great Entertainment throughout the strip. You had entertainment and the lounges. You had the shows that you would go to. You had good food. You also had gaming. We allowed you to spend your money here, and that was a good thing, and so all of the property to all of the casinos on the strip, what they were trying to do was to attract the eyes so that you would drive into the parking lot, because casinos in the 1940s and 1950s in the main were two or three stories tall. They looks like fancy fronts on a motel, so it is not what we think of today with these 30 story, 40 story, 50 story buildings and that kind of thing. This was all on a human level, a ground level, so you had to have signs, and you had to have imagery that would draw you in, of lights andot huge signs and the champagne something standing on top of one of the buildings or a Silver Slipper with a giant Silver Slipper up in the air, and all of that was meant to draw the eyes. The underlying reason. Just put the name out there pay you could have had a wooden board and paint the name on it. That was not it. You wanted these signs. You wanted this kind of brightness and movement in the sign, so they signs took on a hugely Important Role in the advertising of the properties and the drawing of people into the properties. This is made up of about two hundred neon signs. We started this collection about 20 years ago and finally opened into a fullblown museum with a Visitors Center about three and a half years ago. The popularity of the museum has been absolutely overwhelming. We have had visitors from 60 countries, every state in the so there is a real appetite for this type of museum, and it sort of tells the story of not only neon but certainly of las vegas. Neon began to develop and the 1920s and the 1930s and then really took off in the 1940s, and what you could do with neon and beyond gas issue could, first of all, then the tubes into spectacular images. Then, you could light those tubes with alterman kinds of color of gas, and then when you combine to the neon with the light bulbs and the canisters of these signs, you basically came up with not only a sign, but you came up with a work of art. So when las vegas started imploding all of its old hotels to Start Building the new hotels, we looked at this and said, hey, this is art. It is art and history. We need to keep it for generations to come. Because of the cost of the signs and the cost of restoration, we will not be able to restore all of these signs, and we would not want to because we love this boneyard. We love this museum. There is a plan to restore multiple signs that will be all long las vegas boulevard leading from the museum all of the way to sahara avenue, but they are very expensive to restore. They are very expensive to move. The largest sign in the collection is 15 stories high. It was cut into eight pieces when it was moved, and it cost 200 move it to the boneyard. We just restored the desert rose sign. Stoodsert rose hotel where the mandalay bay is. It was not a full restoration effort. It was really be first one that was a conservation effort here in the boneyard, and while the neon tubing was not completely restored, we did have other portions, including the latticework, the red roses. The paint. Just that was 60,000, so i think you can see just how immense the job is when you talk about a complete restoration of any sign in this boneyard. Severallly do have signs that are lit up in the boneyard, and it is interesting because a lot of people like to come it night and see the ones that are lit. It has a whole different feel to it then daytime, such as now. Others like to come on a daytime tour because you can really see, i think, more of the design. The artwork. What really went into making these signs, so you sort have have two choices there which makes it fun. You know, when the strip started in the 1940s, there were 7000 People Living in las vegas valley. There is now 2. 1 million People Living here. Las vegas has not been really good about respecting its history. I think as i have mentioned before, we have to warn down a lot of iconic hotels, so as we have torn down these midcentury beauties, and they were beautiful hotels, i think it is important that we save at least some remnant from these hotels, so we think it is important that we need to protect our history, how did the city come about, and what better place to do it than in the neon boneyard . Announcer all weekend, American History tv is featuring las vegas, nevada. Stratosphere,the the largest freestanding Observation Tower in the United States at 1149 feet. Tour staffties recently visited many sites showcasing the citys history. Learn more about las vegas all weekend here on American History tv i was thrown into covering nevada politics month before the primary in 1986 when the clinical reporter of the Las Vegas Review journal just decided to leave. It ended up being a great baptism of fire because i covered harry reids first race for the u. S. Senate and the race to replace him in congress. The tactice were places to learn about politics. Harry reid is probably among the most seminal, coming from nowhere to become wraps the most powerful figure in nevada. Harry reid started out his greek and the legislature and became the youngest Lieutenant Governor at age 29. Ambition got the best of him. He ran for u. S. Senate in 1974, lost a very, very close race to a guy by the name of paul became a legendary figure. Reid decided to run for mayor and lost in a landslide. People thought his career was over and disappeared, but his good friend and boxing coach who was then the governor resurrected his career, appointed him to the gaming commission, which oversees the cnote in nevada, and he made a name for himself there, fighting the mop, which he used as a springboard, and he served two terms and then ran for the with his 1986, and relentlessness and has back room abilities, certainly not his charisma, and he was able to rise through the ranks and become minority leader and then minority leader and now minority leader again. As his career ends, he has probably held more powerful positions than anyone in the history of the state of nevada. History is a story of their are second acts in life, especially politics. Harry reid should have been gone, but he just kept going and going and going, and he never surrendered, never gave up, always wanted to be an public office. Now, you do have to have some luck and some connections, but his is a story of a guy who should have been dead but who resurrected himself or was resurrected by his friends. Nevada, especially in president ial politics, has been for a long, long time in republican state. After lbj won the state, republicans won essentially every election here up until bill clinton, and they won the state only twice only because ross perot was on the ballot and was able to split the vote. They were then in the wilderness again until barack obama came along. As one of the swing states in the country, a socalled purple state, although i would argue it leans more blue. This series is the state itself is a series of contradictions. There is a libertarian streak, and not evangelical but mormons here, and they are in Single Digits in the population, but a lot of mormons run for public office. The mormon vote is considered very important, and nevada is essentially three states when it comes to politics. Is southern las vegas southern nevada, las vegas, and then the other counties are very rural and very conservative, where a guy like harry reid would be hung in effigy so that he would be welcomed into the local bar. The staterson got twice, mostly because the Democratic Party elected by harry reid is a formidable force, and the best work here thanks to his prominence, and the fact that we became an early state in the 2008 cycle. That is we became one of the first four states to vote in the president ial race on both sides, so we have become very, very prominent. Once again, the Democratic Party after losing very badly in the off year, 2014, has essentially retooled and now looks very, very formidable for Hillary Clinton, and i think Hillary Clinton has the advantage in this state, but almost every prediction by people like me has been wrong this year, so i will reserve the right to change this. The final debate of 2016 is going to take place in las vegas, nevada. I think it is substantial and it has not settled and how important this is. We had a debate here last year, but to have the final debate and what could be nobody knows yet a very close race, two weeks before election day, it is going to put a spotlight on a place not often see or thought about in nevada. Sure, they will have the cliche shot of the strip, but it will put unlv, which used to be just a Basketball School with one nowon in the spotlight, and the law school, and it will be how far that school has gone to achieve what the quality or one status, so it will be the other side of loss they get them also, it will show off it will be the other side of las vegas also. People want toat watch here in nevada politics . The number one is governor sandoval, kind of a remarkable political story. He was in the legislature. The attorney general, first hispanic elected statewide as attorney general and then got a federal appointment. He was on the bench and then left that to run for governor against the first hispanic governor. He has already been floated as a Supreme Court hit, u. S. Supreme court, very briefly, and then withdrew, and i think he is going to be talked about. Be in thet want to u. S. Senate. I think he is a potential pick for a federal appointment, maybe eventually going to the u. S. Supreme court, maybe more likely whether hillary Hillary Clinton or donald trump win the president ial election or someone else we do not know of yet as a potential cabinet pick. I think he is a natural. Looking out west, looking to be bipartisan, the interior secretary, maybe even education secretary, department of energy. Sandoval is truly oneofakind of a political talent. The question is, what does he want to do with it . He is still young also. Ais is a guy who can go into room and talk to everybody, even people who do not like his politics, and they will come away and say he is a friendly guy, and affable guy, a genuine guy. There has been criticism of him too sunny, and i have said that he is preternaturally positive. Him down on pin things, which is a very, very good talent for a politician. Of the topbly one two or Difficult People i have ever interviewed. What is it going to take to nail the nevada vote . I say this all of the time to national interviewers. Wen you ask this question, are not aliens out there that all sprung from area 51. The thing about nevada that people forget, and harry reid made this point when he made us an early state, we are much more reflective of america that you might think. Forget about sin city. Most people who live here do not think about it that much. If we were a melting pot, the burgeoning hispanic population, now more than a quarter of a percent, and the africanamerican population, it is a real cost of politics population now, and nevada was hit the hardest may be proportionally of any state in the recession that we are just coming out of, so i think all of those issues combined to make us kind of a microcosm of america. What are voters looking for . They are looking for an economic plan that makes sense and is fair. They are looking for a Health Care System that makes sense. A lot of those in nevada in the service industry, especially in the casinos, are spoiled by having kind of a Cadillac Health plan. State withht to work any credibly strong labor presence in southern nevada, so i do not think their interests are much different than the interests of wisconsinites or new yorkers or fluidity ands. I really do not. Announcer our caucus locations partners worked with the cspan city tours staff when we worked to go to nevada to explore its history. The state legalized gambling in 1931 in response to a declining economy after the great depression. Learn more about las vegas all weekend here on American History tv. Announcer a long time. As a matter of fact, ever since trinity, men from los alamos have been in the great barren stretches of the southwest. This region for the most part fits the bill. Isolated from centers of population with favorable wind, with the necessary consistency of soil and formation of the earth below, and beyond the world war ii Training Base to the north of an early day, nevada state stops in Indian Springs comes 65 miles north and west of las vegas, an atomic range was established, a test side of over 400 square miles of flatbed areas mingled with mountains of solid rock whose veins once colored history with gold and silver. A range remote from civilization, isolated, forgotten as the names of the men who once made their fortunes here. Well, we welcome you to the National Atomic testing museum. We are an affiliate of the smithsonian institution. Focuses on atomic testing over a period from the early 1950s through about 1992, and to me, interesting story occurred right after world war ii, in between that time of the development of the cold war, and there was quite a question of what to do with Nuclear Weapons. President truman worked hard to develop some sort of International Control or consensus over Nuclear Weapons. He was persuaded very early on, but what truman did, he assured that the department of defense was not in charge of Nuclear Weapons. Atomic energy the commission, which is actually a civilian organization, and they were always the ones in charge of Nuclear Weapons. This is a big surprise to many people. The military actually could not get their hands on the Nuclear Weapons, and when there were tests of Nuclear Weapons, that was overseen by the Atomic Energy commission, not the military. The test site was established in 1951. There was no statewide testing after world war ii. Of course, the first atomic bomb was exploded in the trinity site in new mexico, but all of the done,after the war were and it was a big, logistical nightmare. T cost millions they really needed something closer and stateside. It was rather controversial, actually, to establish a test site in the United States, it was not until the cold war started up that the president conceded to establishing a test site within the United States. They looked at all sorts of different areas around the country, and this was an area that was actually the old las vegas gunnery range from the world war ii days. It was a huge area, where they actually tested tom or cruise. They would train and drop bombs. There were also some gunnery tests, pretty inactive after world war ii, and it became an considerationr for a very remote location to explode Nuclear Weapons. Over a period of years, there werent 928 Nuclear Tests at the test site. 100 of those were above ground or atmospheric tests, and the other 828 actually done underground in tunnels. The soviet union and the United States and the World Nuclear powers agreed to a limited test ban treaty. This did not prevent Nuclear Testing, but it did limit it to testing underground. In other words, you could not test underwater. You could not test in the atmosphere, and you could not test in space. So what the soviet union and the United States did was develop test site where they drilled vertical or horizontal tunnels underground to do their Nuclear Testing. Two basic really types of underground testing, and it really depended on the types of tunnels. There were horizontal tunnels and vertical tunnels through there are a lot of mountain ranges that are ideal for digging the horizontal tunnels. Now, many of those tunnels were designed for tests that were designed around effects tests or scientific tests, where they look at how scientific packages payloads, where they would test the effects of a nuclear on the scientific hardware. Most of the weapons testing took place in deep, vertical shafts dug straight down into the ground, which were actually extremely Huge Enterprises to take. Life oil drill rigs that were much bigger that had to drill very deep and very wide tunnels straight down into the ground, and what they would do, a weapons sit merge testbed package, such as you see displayed behind me, which would carry all of the scientific instruments, that would record the yield or the blast effects of a given nuclear weapon. That is actually a test canister that was designed to be lowered and itto the ground, actually held a Nuclear Warhead, which, warheads at that time were very miniature. They are much smaller than the beginning Nuclear Weapons, and as that blast or bomb went off, there would be scientific instruments above it that were connected to the surface by cable, and those instruments would record in microseconds the blast effects of the particular Nuclear Warhead they were testing. There were numerous projects that took place on the Nevada Test Site. One of the most famous was a project called rover. In the mid1950s through the 1960s. And it was basically a project to study the feasibility of orducing a Nuclear Rocket Nuclear Rocket propulsion. President kennedy, of course, was so interested in space and inspired all of the events that took place to the moon, and he actually came to the test site in 1962 and towards the rover project here the rover and toured project here and saw many things. It, the design for a Nuclear Powered motor, the technology was just too big and heavy to be launched into space, and by 1970 three, the project was finally canceled. Now, as an interesting sidebar come the Nevada Test Site to the department of defense or department of energy work out there, and as i understand, nasa is again interested in exploring the possibility of researching Nuclear Rocket propulsion, and i understand that within a year or so, they will be doing some work on that again at the test site. We have a very large visitation here, about 100,000 people per year, and we have a lot of people, international visitors, people from many countries, and this is probably the most asked about matter of the museum, which is the pop cultural aspect of the atomic age. Sort of a comic age. It had a great effect in the popculture, not only in the 1950s, but after that, it actually went back earlier than that. Many people will tell you that atomic wasomic bomb, actually very prevalent in the 1920s and 30s with the flash gordon and buck rogers radio series. It was actually a concept in fiction of uses of an atomic bomb. Of course come they had no concept of what an atomic bomb was until after it was developed and used in world war ii, but in the 1950s, especially when they started testing atomic weapons here at the test site, they really came into Popular American culture. Examples of the atomic cereal box and all sorts of icons with the atomic engine toys and and kids chemistry sets and this sort of thing create was actually overwhelming, and they had an atomic beauty contest at one point in the 1950s. Every casino had their own atomic cocktail recipe book, and it was quite the rage. And of course in the early days, when they were doing aboveground testing at the test site, as i said, you could go outside a local casino at a given time and see a Mushroom Cloud out in the distance. It actually got to the point in the lid to make 50s that there were so many aboveground test that the Atomic Energy commission started to advertise in advance so that local people and tourists landing their itinerary could come to las vegas and actually plan on witnessing or observing a nuclear blast, because las vegas was only about 60 some miles from the test site. I think this artifact from the is a perfect exit point of our museum, because the people founded this is the him were the actual veterans of the test site, and they are very proud of the fact that they fought and won the cold war. There are many believers that Nuclear Testing lead to help keeping the peace with the cold war. The school kids get a real education here. They learn how different tensions rose during the cold war, how close we actually came to warfare, for example, during the cuban missile crisis, and a very serious situation that the cold war was. Kids, youhese school can see on their faces it is a real awakening how serious the tensions were paid they are aware we have Nuclear Weapons and that it is an issue, but i think it is a real History Lesson for them to visit this museum and look at snapshots in time and learn the history of where we have, and where we are going. Announcer all weekend, American History tv is featuring las vegas, nevada. The renowned Las Vegas Strip is located in clark county just outside the city limits. The cspan cities tour group visited many cities. Learn more all weekend here on American History tv. If every dam was started in 1931 in april. The contractors were given seven years to complete it and actually got it done in five years. The federal government decided authorize the dam and fund it, it took literally six different Construction Companies to come together with their resources to have enough stuff, machines, manpower to put this together, so you will see the signs around here that the dam was built by six companies, because that is actually how many it took, and they joined forces to build this useful place. Totally, there were about 21,000 men who worked on the dam. 1934, thereand, were 5000 workers that were here working. The workers were 24 7. They had to double your days off per year that they could take, if youwas voluntary, and they alle to guess, would guess christmas, and then the other was the fourth of july. That is how proud they were. The Colorado River would flood and flood and trickle, and someone once said it was too six to trade and too sin to farm, so what they wanted to do is add some stability to the southwestern United States to enhance farming and the growth of communities, but they needed to control the colorado because it kept washing everything away, so hoover dam was built primarily for flood control. The other purpose was water delivery. Under a compact that was signed with arizona and california, the water was divvied up for the last miles of the Colorado River. So they wanted to have a way to deliver that water. You cannot do it all at once. You have to do it when the farmers want it or the communities need it, and hydropower generating electricity was the third reason. Right now, i believe we have come down about 500 feet area and we are in one of the tunnels that was built inside the rock walls beside hoover dam. We are headed to the arizona side of the dam. Damide is part of hoover that contains nine generators, and it is generating electricity, and you can see when we get in there that some are generating, and some are not. 1, 2, 3 come to indicate they are on the air, and we are what is called a peaking plant, which means we do not generate electricity all of the time. We generate when we get notice from an Electrical Company that says they need more power. When you turn your air conditioner on in california, you will see some of these theyators fire up because need more power, but we do not just deliver power purely deliver water. We will not generate any power unless there is water delivery to go with it, because that water is designed to fill the water orders, and it will be released and generate electricity when the water orders come in. Hoover dam is 726 feet high. One hundred 71 feet higher than the Washington Monument in washington, d. C. , so we are about feet above the dead rot. This is where the water comes out of the turbines after it has generated electricity, and it is going to the contractors who have water entitlements to the colorado. The arch dam is 660 feet at the bottom, and then it comes up to 45 feet at the top, so basically, it is pushing down and against the walls of the canyon, so it is definitely going to be staying in place. The dam, when it was constructed, took about 4. 3 million cubic yards of concrete. Now, that is enough to build a from lose highway angeles to new york, so when they were building that, of course a lot of construction folks know that concrete takes time to cool, and to keep pouring and pouring and make that deadline, they built their downefrigeration plant here in the 1932 time frame, and they built types with refrigerated water to cool the blocks so they could keep pouring, so as they poured, they cooled the concrete. It was quite an ingenious thing to build their own refrigeration plant down here in the bottom of the canyon. There is a large body of treaties and court cases called the law of the river, and included in the law of the river is the compact that was signed in 1922, which divvied up the water into the upper Colorado River basin and the lower Colorado River basin. That lower Colorado River basin is basically what hoover dam controls, the water delivery to arizona, california, and nevada. Now, at the time they divvied it up, they were counting on recordkeeping from 1905, and those had been pretty wet years, so they actually divvied up the water based on some pretty wet years. Now, it is variable. You can have great snow pack years and have a lot of water, or you can go through what we are going through now, 16 years of drought with maybe one good year in there, so the lake has dropped, and this is being called over allocated. When the river is called over allocated, it basically means that the hydrology is not keeping up with the water delivery needs. In other words, we are not getting enough water into the system to make the water deliveries that are contracted with us. As of today, we have never failed to meet the contracted water deliveries to arizona, california, and nevada. We do not anticipate that next year, but if we continue to see that dropped, we might be in a position called shortage in future years, and under that compact, california would have the senior water right in that agreement, arizona and nevada taking less water. And i look this up. The senses for nevada was 8000 people. For nevada was a thousand people. The population is risen since then. As time went on and water became more available, the communities spread out. Las vegas grew. It clearly has become a huge community, and people continue to move out there, but they managed their water. They knew how much they had. Of how muchcted they could take by contract, so they have managed to recycle their water. If you look at the fountains in downtown las vegas, that is not fresh water. That is reused water. They take care of it, recycle it, and put a lot of it back into lake mead. When they were building hoover dam, it was clear, especially in the depression, that this was going to be a huge undertaking, and people were going to want to come and see it, so in order to a knowledge that and make a place for all of these visitors, they knew they needed to have some of that art deco work in there. Statuesfloors and wings that salute the american spirit on the plaza, so they knew that people would come, and they sure did. We sell 800,000 tickets a year for the tours, and you do not have to buy a tour ticket, so we are figuring we get about one Million People a year to and visit hoover dam. Taking a look around, it is such an incredible mixture of engineering and art deco creativity, i sometimes think to myself, how did the Straight Line engineers and the architect who is more creative, how in the world did they find a way to get along and make this so beautiful and so functional . Announcer all weekend long, American History tv is joining our cox indications Cable Partners to showcase the history of las vegas, nevada. To learn more about the cities on our current to her, visit cspan online. We continue now with our look at the history of las vegas. [water noises] above theu talk history of the las vegas area, there are two words that define our history. One is water. Water is what brought the first travel through here. The other one is transportation. This area is in the middle of nowhere. Transportation has always been an issue here. Water is something that when youre in the desert is more precious than anything else. When youre traveling through doingsert, when you are this, leading pack mules, leading a packed train, you had to carry enough water for every animal you had. You might not have water, but your animals had to have water. Otherwise, they would die. You would not get your goods to market. Your entire train would not work. Here, what they found was running artesian wells. There was an area that became known to the mexican travelers through here as a word that means meadow. Meadow, and ite got that name as a descriptor for the location, not because somebody named vegas was here. It was just a description of this wonderful spot in the middle of the desert. Settlement inal the vegas valley was 1855, and that is when the mormons came into this area. They were set down here by brigham young. In order to create a settlement here. The idea was to help solidify as a stateat he saw that was not just utah but what is part of nevada, parts of eastern california, little pieces of new mexico, pieces of colorado and wyoming, and this was part of what they were looking at as part of their state. The the problem was settlement only lasted two years. By 1857, for a number of different reasons, the settlement was unsuccessful, and the settlers here apply to be allowed to go back to salt lake city. The Church Fathers allowed that, in the first settlement here was abandoned. They moved back to salt lake we were basically unoccupied for a number of years after that. After the mormons were in this what happen with prospectors coming into the area. Not into the valley here but into areas near the valley, and in the case of a couple of those prospectors who were actually better at ranching then they were than at prospecting, they and by the vegas valley, the 1870s or 1880s, you had six ranches in this area. We are only talking 20 or 30 people at that point in this entire valley. It was not a heavily settled the area in the 19th century. Man by the name of William Andrews clark, and xm it are from montana, decided he was going to build a railroad rum san pedro, california, to los angeles to salt lake city. Spot,d to have a watering and the only place that had enough water was this valley, and it was the las vegas rancho. There was Helen Stewart who had , and they bought it and brought the railroad through. They had a big auction, and the clarks las vegas townsite was created. Get is when las vegas started. Las vegas is a 20th century town. In of the interesting things the history of las vegas is that most people know las vegas from the movies. It isnow las vegas as today, and so they think that las vegas has always been focused on gaming and on entertainment and on the service industry, and it was not. One of the people that did more damage to the history of las vegas than anyone else was all a birthstone when he did buzz feed, and had these guys show up in the middle of the desert and said let there be a flamingos, and Everything Grows up out of the sand. There was already a community here, and that community was one that had been built a lot of workers who had come in here initially with the railroad, later on with building the dam the 1940ss, and what we had here was a lot of federal spending because of the magnesium and the air here and the gunnery school. We had a lot of things going on las before game he became vegas. When you look at our history, the real misunderstanding is that there is a history, and it is a much longer one and much different than what we are today. All weekend, American History tv is featuring las vegas, nevada. In 2015, over 41 million tourists visited. Cooperation with our Cox Communications partners, our lases tour staff visited vegas to learn more about its rich history. [explosions] a lot of people have this image of las vegas that we just low up buildings. And we have blown up a lot of details, casinos on the strip and build new ones hotels, casinos on the strip and build new ones. The mayor was also a good one and he had been an attorney who represented a lot of figures connected to or allegedly connected to the mob. He said, no, this is where i practiced my first case. Its an important building historically. Lets save it. Today it houses one of the nations leading museums and certainly in our opinion of organized crime and Law Enforcement. The role that they played throughout United States history, but especially the 20th and early 21st centuries and in las vegas. Whether las vegas likes it or the rest of the world likes it, the mob laid an Important Role in our development. Where we are now is the centerpiece of our museum. The is the courtroom on second floor of the building and really the historical motivation, if you will, of having this museum. Senator Estes Kefauver and other senators conducted hearings on organized crime in america. Thatmallest city by far they came to was las vegas. They spent an afternoon here to read in this room up there in they questioned various local casino operators and executives. So, wilbur clark, he testified, bill moore who was on the Nevada Tax Commission and owned a couple of casinos kefauver was a guest at the notion that you could have involved inere organized crime elsewhere could come here and be legitimate businessman. Was, the problem with this in fact, it was legal here, whereas in other cities, you erre shut down and the kefauv hearings are important in American History. He had been elected to the senate by attacking one of the most corrupt political machines in the country and yet great ambitions. He wanted to be Vice President or president and going after organized climate going after democratic operatives. Organized crime was big in the cities. So were the democrats. These were working with people not necessarily with any particular vice in mind, other than getting ahead politically. Wanted toat kefauver do. It ends up making him a household name. He ends up being the democratic Vice President ial nominee. What is interesting. People around the country react kefauver hearings and they say, my god, this is horrible. Weve got to get rid of organized crime. Where are they going to go to operate casinos legally . Was vegas. Las vegas in set being the beneficiary of the hearings because of the numbers of people who came here to work in or operate the casinos. These hearings are incredibly popular because it is the first big daytime tv show. In prime time at the time you have milton berle and Jackie Gleason starting out and you shows. Rious daytime, not so much. These hearings are being watched and cities around the country. Interestingly enough, not las vegas because las vegas does not get a tv station until 1953. Seeing these people on tv, mobsters, gangs to us, accused killers, reduced a lot of the perception of them as robin robbed frome who the rich and gave to the poor, they were not such bad people. Hollywood had created an image, if you will, of mobsters that maybe they were not so bad or some of them who were really bad, at least they got put away, you did not deal with them. This changes perceptions of organized crime in america. It is a popular show. It is a riveting show. It is a transformative show. The hearings were a success and a failure. The sensea failure in that organized crime survives and illegal activities go on in the cities. Where it does serve the intended is a moralfauver reformer. He wants change. And there is change the results. You can trace the trajectory from kefauver to Bobby Kennedy going after or has crime in his brothers administration and to the rico acts. Kefauver hoped that these hearings would make him a National Figure in the did. Did they take him as far as he wanted to go . No. But they certainly made him more powerful. And i think there was satisfaction among democratic politicians who were connected to these guys in one way or another. Moreso made kefauver hated. The second floor looks at organized crime in las vegas in the 1960s. In 1931, the state of nevada thelized gambling and in 1940s offtrack betting. Here are things that organized crime has been doing illegally. And at the time las vegas was a new enough community the auction that led to the gratian inthe town of las vegas was 1905 there is not an establishment here where they would have to break in. Other cities, like reno for example, being 40 years older than las vegas with a more established community. The land was cheap and plentiful and what was important it was accessible to southern california, where not only did organized crime have some l. A. Area wasthe always booming. There are people who wanted to drive to las vegas and here was all of this money waiting for them to make it. When we talk about las vegas as wideopen, it actually can mean a couple of things. One is it was wide open to the mob, to illegal gamblers to come in here. That may suggest that organized crime itself was not that organized. In chargee were guys helping to broker disputes. If you go down the strip, you would find people coming in from new york, miami, houston, cleveland, cities throughout the United States. In that sense, it was wide open for people to come in. Because of the cities they imageped, because of the of las vegas, it struck people as this wideopen place. One writer, mark cooper, said to certify las vegas you are an adult. What are you doing to certify you are an adult . Are wideat suggest you open. Down below we have a briefcase t belong to most headway liquoro had driven trucks for bugsy siegel during the prohibition era. One of the uniform jackets from the desert inn, interestsized crime from cleveland operated to the placemat from the moulin rouge, which was the first integrated hotel and casino in las vegas. Las vegas was a segregated community. If you were africanamerican, or could not stay in patronize a Downtown Hotel or casino. Entertainers usually had to stay in West Las Vegas and the moulin rouge, which had mob connections , was an attempt to integrate the industry and the community. The casino closed. It helped set standards that contributed to the Civil Rights Movement that would lead to changes in las vegas and around the country. Low that are photos below that are photos in a magazine featuring frank Lefty Rosenthal. If you have seen the movie casino, Robert De Niro is playing a character supposedly based on him. He could never get a gaming license because of his background. Production show at the Tropicana Hotel for nearly a century. This is one of the outfits that one of the showgirls would have worn and the headdresses can weigh up to 30 pounds, so you really have to be a flat it to do this. Joel a gusto that she really have to be athletic to do this. Ugusto was helping them. What we have here is the list of excluded persons, which became known as the black book, because believe it or not, it has always been in a black book. Originally it was a threering binder. Regulatory board created it because they wanted to get a list of people they saw to be inoo bad casinos. The original list was 12, all italian mobsters, which led to charges, with some justification, that there may have been a little discrimination here. Alive ine 12 was still 2016. Wasguy next to the mugshots from chicago, accused of a lot murders. He was an enforcer in the 1970s and 1980s. In the movie casino, joe pesci plays a character based on him and if you have seen the movie, he meets a violent end and that is how he died. He made sure that the money got back to chicago in the midwestern cities that controlled the strip during the 70s and 80s. It he also had a burglary ring on the street that became known as the hole in the wall gang because they literally blew a hole in the wall of the building they were breaking into. Fbi agent named mark casper arrested him in 1983 in las vegas. These are the handcuffs. In case anybody got a little too interested, the key is there, too, just in case. Not the greatest exhibit in the museum, but it talks a exame bit about what the does today. We have on our website and interview i got to do with harry reid, where he talks about his days with the gaming commission. It was quite a period for him. He had been through a couple of electoral defeat. He keeps his name in the news. This is when the fbi was really crimethrough organized families, so he ends up adding the closure of casinos, dealing with a lot of public controversy. He had this confrontation over Lefty Rosenthal for a license. I think you call this great cinema, bad history. Called him about something attached to a scar that ended up being something that would blow up his car. He dealt with a few things in his past that might be a little bit rougher than moving things on the senate floor. The second through four, the 50s, 60s, 70s, national, international connections, we get to how the mob was brought down and what Law Enforcement was doing and then weighs organized crime spreads beyond where we think it might be. So, for example, right here, thanks to the federal inernment and the fbi agent charge here, we were able to get access to wiretaps. What makes these wiretaps possible, what changed was in ,he 1970s Congress Passed rico and rico is a great acronym if you think of Little Caesar and and all ofobinson the old gangster movies. And it enables them to go after the mob in less traditional ways. If you think about al capone. The guy who got capone was not j. Edgar hoover or a prosecutor. It was the irs. They got him on tax evasion. Now what they will be able to do is love, wiretap, use evidence used to bug, wiretap, butnce against someone not necessarily be person who gave the order. It makes it easier for the federal government to get the evidence it mean against these it needs against these gangsters. This wall has a couple different wiretaps people can listen to and over here is a conversation between alan dorfman and joe lombardo. Joe lombardo was connected to the teamsters. So was dorfman. Dorfman had mob connections through his family, which was close to our. Here they are talking about loans the teamsters made. Where the teamsters were incredibly important, with very few exceptions, banks would not lend money to casino operators. The theory being, oh, they are gangsters, are they going to pay it back, are they going to pay it back at the rate we want, should a bank and vest with a casino . And there were banks that realize the benefit of lending money. But the teamsters did this and in return, were able to get skimming operations going. Towas dorfman who called who out a friend of his ends up coming to us biggest oversee these scam. Man glick becomes the front running a couple of casinos in ed withas, who work the chicago mob. The teamsters and the families had pretty well replaced new york and miami operators who were taught by meyer lansky. They are really the dominant mob presence in las vegas in the 1970s and 80s. When the federal government through the rico act, when federal officials bring down organized crime, its really these people who they get. Of the organized Crime Task Force there was a strikeforce, they end up prosecuting the midwestern crime family leaders and dorfman and dorfman is eventually gunned down because there is a fear he might testify and he knew too much. And alan dorfman was literally the man who knew too much. Wiretaps, there is i would call it a threat to andttorney for jimmy hoffa various teamsters leaders. It says how he could live to his next birthday. E was having a little trouble representatives of the teamsters were reminding him he needed to pay. Of organized crime as violence, and we should. It was very violent. A lot of people depicted in this museum though who were in las vegas were in the business end. They were skimming money or they were just operating casinos where the profits go to some organized crime people, some who are not connect it, and the casinos here are going to find all kinds of things going on nationally and internationally from the drug trade to various Violent Crimes or burglary rings. When somebody leaves this museum, i hope they realize that historyis self itself can be fascinating. Not everyone thinks that, unfortunately. The history of organized crime and Law Enforcement is intertwined. There are bad guys on both sides. Were on the Law Enforcement side. Organized crime provided a lot of economic benefit to places like that like las vegas. Aople thinking that this is tribute to the mob will have their perceptions changed. That is what i hope. Staff cities tour recently traveled to las vegas, nevada to learn about its riches three. Learn about las vegas and other stops on our tour at www. Cspan. Org citiestour. Youre watching American History tv. All weekend, every weekend on cspan 3. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] up next on American History tv, university of Pepperdine School of law professor Edward Larson talks about the history of the vice presidency. We will learn about the men who first held that office and the early, convoluted method of selecting Vice President s. Larson argues that before the 12th amendment, the office of Vice President did not have substantial executive or legislative power. This talk was hosted by the university of Pepperdine School of law, and it is about a half hour