Nevada Club Casino, Las Vegas, Triblend Tee

Venue History

The Nevada Club was a classic mid-century Fremont Street casino that once lit up the south side of the 100 block, just steps from the Golden Nugget’s famous neon. Located at 113 East Fremont Street, it occupied a prime spot in the heart of Glitter Gulch. The site first operated as the Santa Anita Turf Club, a race-and-sports-focused gambling hall opened in the late 1940s. In July 1953, the city licensed the property under a new name: Nevada Club. Over the next few years the casino went through ownership changes, eventually coming under the control of operator Robert Van Santen, who also ran the neighboring Fortune Club. By the mid-1950s, Nevada Club leaned hard into its downtown identity. Advertising and souvenirs pitched it as “Your Downtown Fun Spot” and “The Jackpot Spot,” reflecting a casino built around approachable gaming, slot play, and lively atmosphere rather than high-roller formality. Van Santen started what became known as “The Great Las Vegas Slot Machine War” by offering generous jackpots and introducing innovations like bells and revolving-light beacons on his machines, sensory features that are used on slot machines to this day. The payoff tray below each machine was hollow, causing the noise of falling coins to resonate throughout the casino, drawing even more attention to the big winnings. Vintage postcards and gaming guides show a compact but energetic frontage, squeezed between the Lucky Strike and the growing Golden Nugget. A major change came in 1957, when the Fortune Club, Nevada Club, and the adjoining Western Union office were physically combined into a single, larger Nevada Club. The remodel produced a new, roughly 75-foot-long marquee that stretched across multiple storefronts, adding serious neon firepower to Fremont Street’s already blazing skyline. As the 1960s unfolded, the property’s branding evolved again. Under Van Santen, the operation cycled through names like Diamond Jim’s Nevada Club and later Lucky Nevada Club, reflecting both ownership personality and an effort to stand out in an increasingly competitive downtown market. Throughout, the casino remained a mid-sized hall filled with slots, low-limit table games, and a bar that also served adjacent clubs via creative architecture—holes cut through ceilings so cocktail servers could deliver drinks without stepping into the street. By 1969, Nevada Club’s run ended when the Golden Nugget absorbed the building as part of its westward expansion, ultimately taking over the entire south side of the 100 block of Fremont. Today, the Nevada Club survives only in chips, matchbooks, postcards, and photos—a vivid reminder of the tight, neon-packed casinos that once defined classic downtown Las Vegas.