Viva Las Vegas!

34. SLS Las Vegas

Las Vegas, NV

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Milton Prell was a St. Louis native who moved to California as a young man and got into the gambling business by opening an "honest" bingo palace at a time when that was not always a given. In 1947 he came to Las Vegas and started the Club Bingo here at a time when there was no Las Vegas Strip and the heart of the gambling action was back in downtown. Club Bingo had 240 rooms and a 300-seat bingo parlor. When casinos started building out on Las Vegas Boulevard Prell converted his bingo parlor into the Sahara casino in 1952. He called it "The Jewel of the Desert" and put statues of camels out by the highway to emphasize his Moroccan theme. The Sahara would operate for 59 years, adding a roller coaster called Speed - The Ride that launched riders from inside the casino out onto The Strip. The Sahara was shuttered in 2011 and after a $415 million facelift it re-emerged as SLS Las Vegas.