Years ago at the old Dunes Hotel, a friend of mine hit a slot jackpot for an awful lot of money. Immediately, someone involved with the hotel's P.R. descended on him to insist he pose for photos showing him holding a large prop check with the six figure amount on it. He didn't want to do this. He especially didn't want certain friends and family members to know about his sudden wealth. But the hotel guy persisted and hinted that the hotel had ways of withholding the payoff if the winner declined to participate as asked. My friend, afraid they would deny or at least delay paying him his winnings finally agreed to pose. I told him later that he'd been lied to; that all he had to do was fill out the proper tax forms and go cash the normal-sized check and that there were no other strings attached to his winnings. Did I give him accurate info and is or was this kind of thing common?
Ah, old Vegas.
First, yes, you gave your friend accurate information and second, yes, this was common, though perhaps not to the pressurized extent that your friend experienced at the Dunes.
For decades, especially from the 1950s through the 1990s, Las Vegas casinos loved jackpot publicity photos. (They still do, but not to the extent they did back then, which we'll get to anon.) A winner holding an oversized check, a bucket of silver dollars, even a pile of cash were free advertising, as most publicity is. Casino marketing departments routinely asked winners to pose, and many casinos trained employees to encourage participation ... enthusiastically, to put a mild spin on it.
That said, legally, a casino couldn't refuse to pay a legitimate jackpot merely because a patron declined a publicity photo. Once the jackpot was verified and all regulatory requirements were satisfied, the casino was obligated to pay. In Nevada, especially, gaming regulations require casinos to pay valid winnings; refusing payment because someone wouldn't pose for a photograph would have been asking for trouble with regulators.
Still, casinos had various ways to "encourage" winners to cooperate.
The jackpot process took time. To a winner sitting on the slot floor while marketing personnel kept asking for a photo, it could feel like, "We're not finishing this until you cooperate." Likewise, employees could make the experience less pleasant. A winner might hear things like, "Are you sure? We'd really appreciate it," or "Most winners are happy to help us out." To some people, that felt like pressure.
Also, some winners no doubt didn't realize they could say no, especially when casinos presented the photo as a "routine" part of collecting a jackpot.
By the 2000s, privacy concerns had become much more prominent, which they remain today. Many jackpot winners decline photos, ask that their names not be publicized, or allow only first names. Casinos generally accommodate those requests. In fact, some high-value winners specifically insist on anonymity for security reasons.
Even then, casinos occasionally make publicity participation part of a promotional contest's rules. For example, if you win a drawing, tournament, or giveaway, the official rules may include a publicity release. That's different from a standard slot jackpot. A slot jackpot is a gambling win governed by gaming regulations, not a marketing promotion.
Bottom line: In the 1950s–1980s, casinos viewed jackpot photos as one of their most effective advertising tools. A smiling tourist holding a giant check was the casino equivalent of a billboard saying, "People Win Here!"
Which brings us to Part 2. Though you didn't ask, the limits to casino advertising in the days when Nevada was the only place that had them are an interesting addendum to this topic, which we'll address tomorrow.
