Mafioso

Someone suggested that I visit the "Las Vegas History Museum." They meant the Mob Museum. The two are indistinguishable, for the history of Las Vegas is the mob.

Yeah, yeah, there are natives tied to the area, but they weren't dumb enough to settle a desert with few resources to provide for them. A Spanish patrol scouted the area in the 1820s and named the area "The Meadows" after the springs there that have long since dried up. Some Mormons tried to settle the area in 1855, but they were out of there in two years. It wasn't until 1905 when the railroad came to the place that people actually settled. The railroad workers brought with them gambling and prostitution, railroad corporations brought privatization and development, and vice brought the mafia. The desert settlement was the perfect place to run booze operations while the rest of the country was going through the insanity of Prohibition. The Hoover Dam was constructed in 1931, bringing more workers, more prostitutes, more gambling, and more booze. That's when Fremont Street opened, full of casinos and showgirls to keep the workers content.

Hoover Dam Souvenirs. No idea what they are.

Religious whackjobs always ruin everything.

On sale at the museum gift shop

When people think of "The Mafia," they usually think of Italians, partly because of The Godfather. But there were many ethnicities with their own version of mafia - Irish, Jewish, and Mexican, to name a few. They arose out of discrimination after immigrating to America, or in the Mexican case, the takeover of their land by the United States. They provided services to immigrants that weren't available to them because of prejudice.

The Mob Museum does an excellent job tracing the history of Las Vegas, but becomes a bit too much copaganda by the end. The glorification of cops in this country can be traced to the pursuit of the mob when Murder, Inc. was in full operation and the violence got out of hand. Americans rightly wanted those criminals off the streets. Today's cops would pee their pants if they had to confront mobsters like John Dillinger, Pretty Boy Floyd, and Baby Face Nelson. They're too busy shooting unarmed black men, harassing homeless people, beating their wives, and sexually assaulting children to go after real criminals.

Murder Inc was the enforcement arm of the National Crime Syndicate operating during Prohibition until 1941. It was an alliance of the the Jewish and Italian mafias that was responsible for up to 1000 contract killings and claimed many more innocent victims caught in the crossfire. The syndicate dissolved after the 1941 trials that saw many mobsters convicted and executed after members turned against it and informed on them.

The mob began to find more legitimate ways to make money in the form of casinos and divorce. The 1940s saw the rise of a divorce industry in a country where it was difficult to get one. The so-called "dude ranches" you'll find in Nevada were more often than not once divorce ranches. People who wanted divorce would stay on these ranches so they could establish residency in the state of Nevada and get a divorce in only six weeks. The industry thrived. Celebrities were among those who benefited from the set up. Many people had their next partner lined up to marry once the divorce was final, which is how Vegas became the place of quickie weddings.

Some old slots:

As mobsters transitioned to legit businessmen, one has to wonder - were the mobsters becoming better people or were the businesses becoming worse? As I walked through the final part of the museum, I saw displays of organized crime today, particularly drug trafficking. I ask you why narcotics cartels are any worse than the Sacklers causing an opioid epidemic in America or the founder of the pharmaceutical company Insys bribing doctors and pharmacists to prescribe fentanyl or Martin Shkreli jacking up the prices of multiple pharmaceuticals or Pfizer tripling their price for the life saving drug Paxlovid or the Republican congress fighting to overturn the law capping insulin at $35 for seniors so the companies can go back to charging them $600?

It isn't worse. It's the same damn thing. At least the Insys guy was charged with racketeering, but he only served two years of a five and a half year sentence because rich guys have a different system of justice. Shkreli is out of prison, too, and still a millionaire. But those in prison for selling illegal drugs can spend decades behind bars.

I left the museum and headed downstairs to their "speakeasy" bar called The Underground, where I had a drink popular during Prohibition called "the bees knees." There I watched a jazz trio (which became a quartet) perform songs from the era as well as much more modern Halloween-themed songs. The bar's walls were lined with replicas of old political ads and other Prohibition era memorabilia, as well as some factoids about the era. The band was good - I ended up staying for their whole set before heading back, for the next day was Monday and there was work to be done...