Moulin Rouge Casino - kinda

Interesting way to keep your gambling license.

Wonder what they used for chips? What games did they offer? Comps, hee hee?

http://www.ktnv.com/news/local/159661635.html

 

That's pretty cool. Too bad such a historic site is reduced to this, but then again, I doubt I'd make the journey up to it even if it was open.

 

I would LOVE to see them rebuild this!

I've always wanted to see the original re-opened, although it's been closed since I was a toddler.

Back maybe a decade ago there were some attempts to re-open it. I remember driving by there one trip and seeing some construction equipment on the site.

Here's a shot I grabbed back in 2005 (I think) prior to the last series of fires and the demolition.

 

Great photo!!! That iconic sign is currently on display at the Neon Boneyard if anyone is interested in seeing it up close. It is the only sign that is only there on loan and is not owned by the Boneyard.

 

Thanks. {blush}

Wishful thinking that one day it will be returned to its rightful location!

I would also like to see the Stardust sign returned to its rightful location as well.

 

I wish the Stardust sign had never been removed in the first place! Seeing that sign light up the Strip at night was one of my favorite Vegas sights.

It is a crime that a perfectly functional hotel and casino was imploded, and people were put out of work, just for "Echelon Place" to end up as nothing more than a pile of rubble and a couple of rusty steel beams - one of the Strip's ugliest eyesores.

 

I say the same thing about The Frontier and The Westward Ho. Thats 3 casinos that were imploded for NOTHING! And all 3 of them gave deals to the little guy!

 

This (implosion of the Stardust), in my not so humble opinion, was the worst {f-bomb}-up that any casino company did in the history of Las Vegas.

Casino owners and managers are incredibly short-sighted and follow each other like lemmings. In the early 2000s it was a race for the largest, most upscale mega-whatever with this and that and all of that drek!

Boyd had a cash cow with the Stardust! They killed it purely due to greed!

Some have said, however, that if Boyd had not halted the Echelon project when they did, they would be in receivership today!

 

One of our friends was a bellman at Stardust. When they closed he was given the opportunity to go work at Boyd downtown with the promise that as soon as Echelon opened he had a guaranteed job.

He works as a barback now at a fraction of what he was making in tips as a bellman. He has his bartender's license but nobody is hiring. He would prefer to be a bellman again, but really would take any full time bartender job.

 

Question: The Landmark sign is pretty close to its original location, correct?

As far as the implosion of casinos, several stuck 10's of millions into renovations only to be tore down soon after, truly a waste.

 

Stardust, The Frontier, Westward Ho (Really?)... How come I never here anyone moaning about The Sands or The Dunes or Aladdin or any of many others? Why? Because they were replaced with better facilities. How 'bout the Desert Inn? A decent joint in its day, but if it was there the Wynn/Encore complex wouldn't exist.

Boyd got caught in the middle of an economy few foresaw (I know most of you soothsayers did) and the new owners of the Frontier property were fortunate not to have started construction, otherwise their place likely would look just like Echelon or the Fontainebleau. Frankly, during the last few years of the Frontier, the place wasn't much nicer than the Echelon project is now.

My point is that armchair quarterbacking with the benefit of hindsight is easy, but so unfair. I have nothing again nostalgia for a favorite joint, but some on this board's attacking of the business decisions that were made with known information at the time just seems tiresome.

Now back to the Moulin Rouge... indeed a sad story to have lost the structure and history in such a manner. Nevada (Mississippi of the West) was not friendly to african-americans, even the famous ones, but even absent the structure, the stories of short history of the Moulin Rouge and it's patrons are well chronicled.