WHAT HAPPENED IN VEGAS: AN ICONIC HOTEL AND CASINO RETURNS

By Howard T. Brody

 

If you’ve spent any time at all in Sin City, then you are familiar with the fact that several of the streets along Las Vegas Boulevard share the same name as the resorts for which they are named.  For example, Tropicana Avenue and Flamingo Road immediately come to mind since those resorts are still active. Hacienda Avenue, Desert Inn Road and Sands Avenue are all aptly named after three legendary hotel/casinos that no longer exist, although to be fair, the Sands Expo and Convention Center (located on Sands Avenue) plays an integral part of Las Vegas’ tourism. And then there is Sahara Avenue.

Back in 1952, when Milton Prell opened the 240-room $5.5 million Hotel Sahara, the name of the street was called San Francisco Street. It took several years for the owner of the Moroccan-themed resort, decorated in a Middle Eastern theme complete with life-size camels, to get Clark County to change the name of the street to match that of the casino. But by then, the hotel had expanded with a 14-story 200 room tower, a convention hall, and a massive 127-foot sign.

For nearly 60 years, the Sahara occupied the southeast corner of Sahara Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard and operated uninterrupted until May 2011 when it finally closed its doors. Like so many other iconic Las Vegas casinos before it, the Sahara was no more. But unlike other hotels that went away, instead of being imploded, the building sat empty for two years until a man named Sam Nazarian invested $415 million into the property and re-opened it under the banner of the SLS Las Vegas. Nazarian said that SLS stood for “style, luxury, service.”

The history of the legendary property is well documented, especially when it comes to entertainment.

When the property opened in 1952, and for the next five years, Ray Bolger, who was best known as playing the scarecrow in “The Wizard of Oz,” headlined the Congo Room. While Bolger’s show was drawing the early-evening crowd, in late 1954, jazz musician Louis Prima was hired by entertainment director Bill Miller to be the Sahara’s late-night lounge act. Prima, along with his then-wife Keely Smith and saxophonist Sam Butera, created one of the first late-night attractions on the Strip and the trio became the hottest ticket in town.

While a lot of entertainment firsts took place at the Sahara, in 1956, the hotel hosted the very last performance of Bud Abbott and Lou Costello as a team before their permanent breakup. It was the last time they ever appeared on stage together.

In 1959 comedian Don Rickles, who would earn the nicknames “Mr. Warmth” and “The Merchant of Venom” for his making fun of people of all ethnicities and walks of life, made his first of many appearances in the hotel’s Casbar lounge. That same year comedian George Burns, who was best known at the time for being part of the Burns and Allen comedy team with wife Gracie, also appeared in the Casbar.

As the 1960s rolled around, while the Rat Pack (Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr. and Peter Lawford) played up the Strip at the Sands, the Sahara’s entertainment director Stan Irwin paid $25,000 (a hefty fee at the time and nearly $208K in 2019 dollars) to bring another quartet to town: four lads from England known as the Beatles. Although John, Paul, George and Ringo performed at the nearby Las Vegas Convention Center, as the largest room at the Sahara couldn’t hold them, the Fab Four stayed at the hotel and generated a lot of publicity for the property.

For many years the Sahara hosted the annual Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon, first from 1973 to 1981 and again from 1991 to 1994. It was during the historic 1976 telethon that Frank Sinatra made a surprise appearance and reunited Lewis with his former partner, Dean Martin.

Throughout the years, the list of performers who took the stage at the Sahara, whether it was in the main hall or one of the many smaller rooms or lounges, read like a who’s who of entertainment, including: Paul Anka, Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy, Tony Bennett, Jack Benny, Shelley Berman, Joey Bishop, George Carlin, Johnny Carson, Charo, David Cassidy, The Coasters, Bobby Darin, Sammy Davis Jr., Marlene Dietrich, The Drifters, Duke Ellington, Judy Garland, Buddy Hackett, Lena Horne, (drag queen) Kenny Kerr, KISS, Peter Lawford, Liberace, Ann-Margret, Dean Martin, Liza Minnelli, Wayne Newton, Roseanne, Frank Sinatra, Red Skelton, Sonny & Cher, Barbra Streisand, (magician) Rick Thomas, and Tina Turner.

In addition to world-class entertainment, the Sahara has a bit of a notorious history as well. The property has been the site of three fires: a rooftop blaze in 1964 that caused $1 million in damage; a second rooftop fire in 1968 that was believed to be caused by a spark from welding equipment during an air conditioning unit repair (also causing $1 million in damage); and a third-floor hotel room fire in 1981, prompting the evacuation of more than 200 guests. While some smoke inhalation took place, in none of the three incidents was anybody killed or seriously injured.

In May 1967, a much more nefarious event took place. Three men were arrested after planting a homemade bomb in a 12th-floor hotel room as part of a failed extortion attempt. A note demanding $75,000 for information on how to disarm the bomb was found. The note also warned that bombs had been placed in two other hotels. In total, seven hotels in three states were evacuated due to the bomb threats, but there were never any other explosive devices found.

Prior to Nazarian taking control of the property in 2013, the Sahara went through quite several ownership changes.

In 1961, Del Webb Corporation acquired the Sahara through a stock transaction involving 1.5 million shares of their company valued close to $12 million. With the purchase, the Sahara not only added a $5 million, 24-story tower with 400 additional rooms, bringing its total at the time to more than 800 rooms, but they upgraded their convention facility to 44,000-square-feet at the cost of $3.5 million.

Twenty-one years later, Paul Lowden bought the property for $50 million. Within six years of his purchase, Lowden expanded the casino area, opened a new state-of-the-art race and sportsbook, and added a 26-story tower that upped their room count to 1,500.

By 1995 a new suitor came knocking as Bill Bennett bought the Sahara – as well as 30 acres west of the Strip – for $193 million. The new owner immediately began a five-year $100 million renovation that would include 220 more hotel rooms, new restaurants, bars, swimming pools, and an expansion of the casino by 50,000 square feet.

Bennett wouldn’t be the last to own the Sahara before it closed its doors and Nazarian took over. That honor went to SBE Entertainment and Stockbridge Real Estate who purchased the property for an undisclosed amount estimated between $300 million and $400 million.

When Nazarian took over control of the property in 2013 and the SLS era began, within a year Hilton Worldwide added the SLS to its specialty Curio brand. But under Nazarian’s management the new brand struggled and by 2015, Nazarian sold his interest back to Stockbridge Real Estate Group. Once that deal was completed, Starwood Hotels & Resorts agreed to add SLS Las Vegas to its Tribute Portfolio and the 289-room Lux Tower was targeted for renovation. Once that renovation was completed in 2016, the Lux Tower was rebranded as W Las Vegas.

Unable to turn the property around, within two years Stockbridge Real Estate Group was again ready to sell, and in 2018 The Meruelo Group headed by Alex Meruelo agreed to buy SLS Las Vegas. They immediately announced plans for a $150 million renovation and were not only ending the property’s relationship with Starwood but discontinuing the W Las Vegas brand.

As renovation began, it was done so under the working name of “Grand Sahara Resort,” mirroring Meruelo’s property in Reno, the Grand Sierra Resort. This, of course, led to speculation that the iconic Sahara name would be reinstated.

On June 27, 2019, Meruelo officially announced that the hotel would indeed be renamed Sahara Las Vegas during a ceremony that included fireworks and a light-flashing drone show that projected triple cherries and triple sevens jackpot-winning slot reels in the sky above.

On August 27, 2019, Meruelo tore down an abstract statue by designer Phillipe Starck that was an homage to former SLS Las Vegas owner Sam Nazarian called “Sam by Starck,” and two days later, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, the name change was official as once again the iconic Sahara hotel and casino occupied the real estate on the southeast corner of Sahara Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard.

While the city’s tourism board likes to say what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, we all know that it is just an advertising gimmick to attract gamblers and convention-goers. But sometimes those of us who live here have to take a step back to look at the big picture and realize that sometimes what happens here in Vegas does stay here, and for that, we are happy that it does.

Welcome back, old friend.