Question of the Day - 24 April 2021

Over the past two days, we covered, in chronological order, the first five of the top ten most influential Las Vegans: Helen Stewart, C.P. Squires, Tony Cornero, Moe Dalitz, and Howard Hughes. Today, we present numbers six and seven.

E. Parry Thomas

When this reticent power broker died in August 2016 at the age of 95, the Las Vegas Review-Journal called him the man who “did more than any other person to win the status of legitimate businesses for Nevada casinos.”

That was an ironic destiny for the Ogden, Utah, native (born 1921) who was raised in the Church of Latter-Day Saints. Following a stint in Army Intelligence during World War II, Thomas followed his father’s footsteps into the banking industry. As it happened, his employer (Continental Bank & Trust Co. of Salt Lake City) was a stakeholder in the Bank of Las Vegas, whose board chairman was Nate Mack. Bank of Las Vegas was the only lending institution that would provide funds for casino construction. Thomas was dispatched to Las Vegas in 1954 to oversee operations. 

After Continental owner Walter E. Cosgriff's demise, Thomas became president. He was the pivotal figure in the Teamsters Central States Pension Fund’s move into Las Vegas as a casino investor. He also acted as a front man for Howard Hughes, buying up area real estate for the mysterious tycoon, including myriad casinos, and lent money, advice, and prestige to an up-and-coming casino investor named Steve Wynn. In tandem with Hughes and Bill Harrah, Thomas lobbied the state government to allow corporate ownership of casinos. This was a decisive change, as the presence of SEC-responsive companies at the helm of gambling houses gave them respectability and helped sweep away the Mob cobwebs.

With banking partner Jerry Mack (Nate's son, who took his father's position in the bank), Thomas engaged in philanthropic efforts that included the donation of 400 acres that became the campus of the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. In return, the UNLV basketball stadium is known to this day as the Thomas & Mack Center.

Thomas’ influence in Las Vegas casinos continues to be felt through one of his four sons, Roger Thomas, who became Wynn’s trusted right-hand man in the field of interior design, resulting in the most luxurious casino interiors on the Strip. Throughout our research, we didn't find a single negative word about Parry Thomas, whose biography was aptly titled The Quiet Kingmaker of Las Vegas.

Jay Sarno

For a lot of people, “tacky” and “Vegas” are synonyms. Jay Sarno had everything in the world to do with that. Ironically, today an annual architecture award is given out in the name of the man we have to thank for Circus Circus.

Like many other Las Vegas pioneers, he was the son of immigrants, born in 1921 in St. Joseph, Minnesota. And like many, he was a product of World War II military service. He tried his hand as a tile contractor in Miami before building the Atlanta Cabana Motor Hotel in 1958. The Roman statuary and cement-filigree walls that screened guest rooms prefigured Sarno’s greatest creation, Caesars Palace. The Cabana also brought Sarno together with the Mob via a loan from the Teamsters Union’s pension funds. Next stop, California, where Sarno opened the Palo Alto Cabana in 1962. Its headless Winged Victory of Samothrace also made it to Caesars Palace; it's still a fixture there today.

Sarno had already relocated to Sin City, which eased the strain of flying between California and Vegas to feed his wicked gambling habit. On his reconnaissance missions, Sarno felt that casino customers were being shortchanged with substandard hotel rooms, while resort owners raked in the dough. Armed with more millions from the Teamsters, Sarno set about to change that. In the end, Caesars Palace cost a whopping $25 million. Sarno staffed his hotel with employees dressed as Roman soldiers and Egyptian empresses. One of the swimming pools was crafted from 8,000 pieces of Italian marble.

The property opened, counterintuitively, in hot weather — August 1966 — and Sarno was soon in hot water with the feds for his Mob connections. He was forced to sell Caesars Palace in 1969 to the (equally mobbed up) Perlman brothers.

That didn’t stop Sarno, who was already operating a little casino called Circus Circus. Having gone upscale with Caesars Palace, he was now aiming at the masses. (He didn't, however, have the foresight to build a hotel, a decision that would cost him.) But in those days, gamblers wanted to gamble, not watch aerialists or worry about elephant dung. 

Sarno took $7.5 million more in Teamster money, greased by Kansas City mob boss Nick Civella, and belatedly built a hotel, partly to make money for irate creditors. It was a Faustian pact, as Circus Circus became one of the hubs of the Mafia skim, with cash flown out of Vegas and straight into the hands of the K.C. mob. (Also at this time, gangster Tony “The Ant” Spilotro literally set up shop in Circus Circus, operating a jewelry store.)

Sarno hung on until 1974 when, with the IRS dogging his heels, he leased the property to a pair of new brooms, William Bennett and William Pennington. Sarno kept a suite on the property until the two Bills bought him out altogether in 1983, whereupon he was unceremoniously evicted. He died the next year, still dreaming big.