Photo Illustration by Erin O’Flynn/The Daily Beast/Getty
The business got off to a rough start. It was over budget—way over budget—and there were whispers that some money had mysteriously disappeared from the investment pot. It was so rainy on opening day that the high rollers and celebrities stayed away, and somehow the proverb that the house always wins did not initially apply. The Flamingo was forced to close its doors two weeks after opening—and after losing $300,000 to some very lucky gamblers—for a reset.
But all of that was washed away, Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel surely thought, when the Flamingo reopened three months later complete with a newly finished hotel and quickly began to make money. It was one of the first hotels on the Las Vegas strip to embody what Vegas would become: glitz and glam, high-end entertainment, and luxurious amenities.
It was a huge success for Siegel, the “one-time public enemy” (as newspapers loved to refer to him) who had made his fortune and fame from coast to coast in organized crime. He was associated with men engraved in mob history—“Lucky” Luciano, Meyer Lansky, Al Capone. He was a stone-cold killer, a gambling don, a drug lord, and a pimp. And now, he was also a hotelier and casino magnate.