1952 “One of the members of the Journal news staff stopped in at a [Reno, Nevada] casino one night last week, put a nickel in a slot machine and hit the jackpot. The attendant came with $7.50 and gave him another nickel to take the machine off pay. He did it — you guessed…
1960s-Today The Big Bertha introduced in the 1960s wasn’t a circus lady or a German howitzer; it was a made-in-Nevada slot machine that became iconic. Named for its size, the three-reel device stood 5 to 6 feet tall and weighed about 700 pounds. Along with its ample dimensions, the potential $1,000 (about $7,800 today) jackpot…
1960 When one rural Nevada town grew into a gambling hotspot in the mid-1900s, the gamblers in another loudly grumbled. Soon after Idaho outlawed slot machines, its last vestige of legal gambling, the sagebrush- and broomgrass-covered land 47 miles south of Twin Falls, just across the border, began to evolve into a small community —…
1961 Dick Seller boasted that, within a year, a new luxury gambling resort would be built 100 miles from civilization, on a 100-acre parcel he owned (and named Holiday) in Humboldt County in Nevada’s desert near Highway 140 and the Oregon border. As for whether it would be successful, he said, “Look at Jackpot,” referring…